Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2

(available for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC)
(PC version used for review)

As I’m certain you’re aware, Warhammer 40,000 is the most popular miniature wargame out there. Taking place within the 41st millennium, the universe is in a state of eternal war with the Imperium of Man standing alone in a constant fight against alien forces and the legions of Chaos. In a setting filled to the brim with lore, blood and suspected heresy, it’s the most metal thing you can imagine, practically the definition of grimdark. So, of course, there are bound to be video games, a lot of video games. One of the most notable of these games was Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine, a third person action game released in 2011, getting favourable reviews and working as an excellent gateway into the franchise. And now thirteen years later (to the date here in Europe), we’ve finally got the sequel to it with Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, continuing the story of Captain Demetrian Titus after being put under investigation for corruption and heresy at the end of the last. The game was developed by Saber Interactive, published by Focus Entertainment and released on 9th September 2024 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S and Windows. 

Story

We start the game on the jungle planet of Kadaku in the Imperial system of Recidious, where Demetrian Titus, former Captain who’s served on the Deathwatch for a century, has been called to eradicate the Tyranid invading the planet and to protect “Project Aurora”. The rest of Titus’ squad ends up getting wiped out in the onslaught, a fate which he almost suffers after getting trapped with a swarm of the insectoids and suffering a wound from a Carnifax before being saved. Titus awakens on the Battle Barge, having been forced to go through Rubicon Primaris (an operation required to turn one into a Primaris Space Marine) just to be able to survive. He meets Chaplain Quintus when he wakes who informs him of this, the fact that he has been declared free of taint, and his Promotion to Lieutenant, thus allowing him to rejoin his chapter. He is put under the command of Captain Sevastus Acheran and is put in charge of a squad with Sergeant Gadriel and Brother Chairon. Now he is to complete missions assigned to him within his new squad, which include fighting off the Tyranid horde, protecting key individuals, while slowly figuring out what exactly this Project Aurora is. 

I quite enjoyed the story of this game. I thought it did a good job of incorporating the events of the last game into its story, I thought the character moments were very well executed and made it all very understandable for those not familiar with the Warhammer 40,000 lore. It should go without saying, but you should play the first game before you start this one, as there are plot points and MacGuffins that do relate to the events of the last. If you don’t, you’ll likely be a bit confused. That being said, you don’t need any kind of knowledge about Warhammer 40,000 to be able to enjoy this game. There will be some terms that you won’t recognise if you don’t – I already mentioned Rubicon Primaris as an example – but it’s not going to ruin what fun you’ll have, and it may even get you curious and start looking things up (and then no doubt have you falling into a rabbit hole where you start obsessing over the lore and story and probably get you watching lore videos on YouTube about certain races… seriously this stuff can get very addicting).

Presentation

When I first saw Titus in Kadaku donning his Deathwatch Power Armour, I was immediately staggered by the level of detail on it; this of course goes for his Ultramarine armour as well. The attention to certain details is genuinely jaw dropping, from the light shining off the gold emblem on the front, to dirt and battle scars embedded in the armour. Of course, you do see the marines without their helmets on and they also look great. I especially love how they have scars from battle as well, like bullets lodged in Titus’ head and some carrying burn wounds that melted half of their face. Environments do a fantastic job on conveying the effects of war, with grounds being rough and uneven and the crumbling buildings you’ll be exploring, all of which are also incredibly detailed and exemplifies the grimdark setting perfectly. I was expecting the game to look better than its predecessor, but not to this level. 

As far as I’m aware, despite the game looking as good as it does, I never encountered any lagging or frame drops. I played the game on PC, and it ran at a consistent 60fps the entire time I was playing. The only time I encountered any kind of lag was during multiplayer, and that was more due to internet issues than with the game itself.

One thing that surprised me was the change in voice actors for Titus. In the first game he was voiced by Mark Strong (Merlin from Kingsman), but this time around is portrayed by Clive Standen (Rollo from Vikings). If you go looking for it, you will notice that the voice is different from last time, though it’s expected with a change in actor and that doesn’t detract from the great performance that Standen gives. This goes for the rest of the cast, perfectly portraying the honour-bound gruffness you’d expect to find in an Ultramarine. 

You can tell that the soundtrack was meant for a Warhammer game. Many of the songs have long notes that lead into faster ones further in, increasing the intensity and depicting the fight getting more dangerous. The harsh drums especially aid the music, making it feel more powerful and threatening. And when you add in the male choir accompanying many of these songs, you have a soundtrack worthy of the Emperor and will make you motivated to eradicate the Tyranid scum. 

Combat 

Combat feels like it was taken directly from the first game. Space Marine 2 is a third-person action game focusing on melee and shooter combat where you fight swarms of enemies across different planets. You’ll be able to carry one melee and two ranged weapons – one rifle and one pistol. The melee weapons vary quite a bit, primarily in speed and damage, with the Combat Knife being fast and useful in one-on-one encounters, the Thunder Hammer dealing a ton of damage and making dealing with crowds much easier, and the Chainsword being somewhere in between. Melee combat is quite simple, you’ll have a standard combo consisting of only a few swings, but you can interrupt them at any time for a unique combo finisher. If an enemy is blocking, then you can hold down the attack button to break their guard. Sometimes when an enemy is about to attack, you’ll see a blue or red ring around it, if it’s blue you’ll be able to parry the attack and deal quite a bit of damage, if not kill the enemy outright, meanwhile if it’s red then you’ll have to dodge. 

The differences with guns are very much what you’d expect; different rates of fire, further or shorter range, how much ammo per magazine, things like that. There are both standard and plasma weapons, though the main difference is that plasma guns don’t need to be reloaded, though they can overheat if shot too frequently. And thus, we get to a pretty minor problem with the guns; in the original Space Marine you were able to carry four guns at once – a pistol, a fully automatic, a sniper rifle and a semi-automatic – meanwhile in this game you can only carry two. Now it’s not a major problem, and I suspect that it’s the case because of this games’ focus on co-op multiplayer, but it makes me feel like I’m at more of a disadvantage at times, for example if a battle will include enemies from far away and I don’t have a sniper on me. It just means I’m less prepared for certain battles. 

On top of those, you have a small assortment of grenades found throughout the level. Each of these have a variety of different effects aside from exploding enemies into chunks, like Shock blinding targets while continuously damaging them, Krak sticking to targets guaranteeing maximum damage, or Melta-bombs acting as remote landmines. 

After a certain point in the story, Titus will gain a new ability called Righteous Fury. This ability will charge up on its own. Once activated Titus’ health will start regenerating and you will deal more damage. Once again, I felt that this was a bit better in the original Space Marine as you could also slow down time when aiming with your gun. Again, I understand that this change was due to multiplayer, but it’s still a slight downgrade in my opinion. 

Now I’ve been consistently referring to the battles against Tyranids as swarms, no this isn’t because of my lack of creativity when it comes to writing, this is intentional, because I cannot recall a battle where I wasn’t fighting dozens of these things. Yes, there are a couple of smaller groups of the insectoids, but these are found more on the path to these battles, rather than the primary conflicts. You will be overrun by these things consistently, having to fight numerous waves of the creatures as you fulfil your primary directive. The first time I saw basically an entire army running towards me in the distance and then witnessed them attempting to climb the walls below to try and reach me was honestly pretty terrifying. The enemy variety is very thin, only really consisting of half a dozen types of Tyranid, which doesn’t change when the legions of Chaos enter the fray, some small that only take a couple of shots to kill as well as some larger ones that will take more of a beating. Though for once this is something that I’m actually going to praise, as I’d rather not have to figure out their move set while trying to kill a thousand more. While they are easy to kill, if you’re not careful you will find yourself becoming overrun, and the threat of that is constant; and it’s because of this that I never found myself growing bored. The intensity of the fights simply through the immense numbers had me on the edge of my seat the entire time, ensuring that I never relaxed even on repeat runs through some missions. 

Multiplayer

I have already mentioned the multiplayer a couple of times in this review and how the game seems to be overly focused on it. Pretty much everything in this game screams that it’s designed to be played with multiple people, from the squad list in the top right corner, to the fact that you don’t get a game over when you die, instead needing to wait for an ally to revive you. If I’m being honest, the constant focus on multiplayer, even in the main campaign, is something that bothers me. As I’ve mentioned, it feels like the developers made some mechanics less powerful because they wouldn’t have worked in multiplayer, and I started missing those elements from the previous game because they weren’t here. Now I’m certain that playing the campaign with some friends can be a lot of fun, but I’d rather just have that as a purely single player mode, especially as there’s already a separate PvE mode. 

Now, while the campaign can still be very much enjoyed on your own, the other modes in this game are very much meant to be played with multiple people. In these modes, you get to select one of six different classes to play as during that mission or battle. Each of these come with their own loadout and specialise in different types of gameplays. For example, the Assault class is very good at melee combat as they have access to the Thunder Hammer, though are very weak in ranged, with the Heavy class being the opposite. On top of that, each class has their own unique ability, different to Titus’ Righteous Fury, like the Tactical class Auspex Scan which make enemies more vulnerable to damage or Bulwark’s Chapter Banner restoring the armour of every ally within range. None of these classes feel more powerful than the other and will all come down to personal preference on playstyle. 

The first of these multiplayer modes is Operations. In each of Titus’ missions he’ll be accompanied by another squad of three who perform their own mission off screen that aids the Lieutenant with his, well in this mode you’ll play as that squad performing said mission. You have a total of six of these missions, each following the story of the campaign. While the campaign can only really be played with friends you’ve invited, in Operations you can play with complete randoms, who just so happen to be playing on the same level as you. This of course means that a big part of the fun you’ll have in this mode is dependent on who you play with. You may encounter some players who are real team players, they revive you the instant you go down, will be expert exterminators of the Tyranid horde, and will possibly even wait to see if you will pick up a medica stim before picking them up themselves, on the other hand you could find someone who just steals your kills, takes every ammo box or grenade bundle they can find and will just run off to the next objective while you’re trying to fight off an army. As said in combat, these missions don’t really seem to get boring, again due to the massive swarms of enemies you’ll end up fighting, and there’s just that extra bit of fun that comes from playing with other people. 

The other multiplayer mode is the Eternal War. This is the PvP mode, where you take part in a 6v6 battle as a Space Marine or a Heretic to accumulate more points than your opponent can. There are three different types of multiplayer modes, each of which are your standard affair in PvP shooters, from capture the flag (Seize Ground), death match (Annihilation) and one where you have to maintain a section of the map for the longest (Capture and Control). Matches can last a maximum of 20 minutes which may sound generous, but these battles can last for a good while. Once again, a big part of the fun you’ll have in this mode is how good the rest of your team are, as well as the skills of your opponents, on top of how much you like getting absolutely decimated by multiple players at once. Some of the weapons you can use will be locked away until you reach a certain veterancy with said class, which is something which I personally really don’t like. I would understand if this was just for Operations mode but having it in this mode can really put you at a disadvantage as it forces you to use inferior weapons or ones you just don’t like until you’ve played the game enough, likely putting you at a disadvantage. 

One thing that I really like is the customizability of your Space Marine. You’ll unlock more cosmetics the more you play either mode and the options you have are plentiful. From the individual pieces of armour you can equip, to the colours of each part, even the emblems on the shoulder plates can be swapped around. Unfortunately, this only goes for your Space Marine, as your customization options for the Heretics are pitifully slim. Yes, it is for only one of the two modes, but I would have liked more options for the Heretics, especially since I can’t choose which side I’m on during an Eternal War Match. 

Conclusion

This game takes you right back to the Xbox 360/PlayStation 3 era of games, where multiplayer shooters with shorter campaigns reigned supreme. The combat is simple, and the multiplayer mode doesn’t have much depth, but it’s still very fun and has really invigorated my interest in Warhammer 40,000. Whether you’re a fan of this universe or not, I recommend this game, there’s more content that’s going to be added in the future, and I’m definitely going to be keeping my eye on it. 

8.4/10