Overview

Malevelon Creek refers to a planet featured in the 2024 3rd person shooter game Helldivers 2. Sometimes referred to as "Robot Vietnam," or "Space Vietnam," the planet sees players go up against robot enemies called Automatons in a biome directly inspired by the Vietnam war. In late February, Helldivers 2 players received a "Planet Lost" retreat order, spurring memes about "Malevelon Creek Veterans" and redraws of the 1000-Yard Stare meme. Toward the beginning of March 2024 gained a new foothold on the planet, leading to renewed warfare and the popularisation of the phrase "Take back the creek."

Background

Around February 11th, 2024, Helldivers 2 players launched an attack on the planet, Malevelon Creek, one of five planets in the Severin Sector. The landscape of the planet consists of jungles and wide ponds, with in-game narration saying that the "strange subversion of photosynthesis that sustains the oddly-hued flora that flourishes on this planet remains an intriguing mystery to the Super Earth's greatest exo-biologists."^[1]

Helldivers sent to Malevelon Creek fight an overwhelming force of Automatons, with many early memes about the planet and its warfare describing it as increasingly chaotic and bleak. X user @Steal_your_shit describes the planet as "literally just Vietnam, but with cyborgs" (seen below).

Malevelon Creek has got to be the one planet that fills me with fear. It’s literally just Vietnam, but with cyborgs. Can’t take 5 steps, without a hail of lasers flying through the trees. I did a mission the other day, and was hammered by borgs. (Vid not mine, just an example) pic.twitter.com/VAfPS1okxf

— Trazyn, the Infinite (@Steal_your_shit) February 12, 2024

Online Reactions

Initial reactions to the war on Malevelon Creek stressed the chaos involved in gameplay on the island, as seen in a February 16th, 2024 post by X^[3] user @cyphr0, gathering over 19,000 likes in three weeks (seen below, top), and a February 19th, 2024 post by iFunny^[2] user Sakom, gathering over 8,000 smiles in two weeks (seen below, bottom).

Me and my fellow Helldivers 2 minutes after landing on Malevelon Creek: pic.twitter.com/MR98y580vC

— Noah (@cyphr0) February 16, 2024

Players lost the battle at Malevelon Creek around February 27th, 2024, and were removed from the planet after being given a "Planet Lost" retreat order. Redditor^[4] /u/RussianNeighbor posted a meme about losing the planet on February 27th, 2024, gathering over 2,000 upvotes on /r/Helldivers (seen below).

On February 28th, 2024, news about a gaming developer being in charge of the campaigns in Helldivers 2 began to make the rounds online. The role of "Joel" was likened to that of a Dungeon Master, with many players jokingly attributing the loss of Malevelon Creek to the developer, as seen in a post by X^[5] user @CharOnTwitch from February 28th, 2024, gathering over 46,000 likes in four days (seen below).

Finding out thousands of our brothers and sisters died on Malevelon Creek cause some guy named Joel thought it'd be fun https://t.co/rdZbylzLbt pic.twitter.com/ziBhomDDM2

— Char (@CharOnTwitch) February 29, 2024

On March 2nd, 2024, American politician Mike Collins posted to his official X^[6] account, writing, "Take back the creek," and gathering over 10,000 likes in a day (seen below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

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External References