REVIEW – After Captain Titus saved the planet Graia from an Ork invasion and the threat posed by Chaos forces, things took a turn for the worse: accused of heresy, the brave Space Marine was sent to atone by serving in the Deathwatch, fighting humanity’s fiercest enemies. After a lengthy period of penance, however, the Imperium finally grants our hero another chance: Titus returns to the ranks of the Ultramarines – though this time he’s been demoted to lieutenant – just in time to face yet another, even more terrifying xenos threat.

The Tyranids launch a surprise assault on the planet Kadaku, catching the local Imperial forces off guard. With no one able to halt them in time, nearby human worlds are also at great risk. The only hope of turning around a war that seems unwinnable lies with the Space Marines, who, with their strength, speed, and superhuman determination, are capable of emerging victorious from almost any battle… and once again, it’s up to us to step into the boots of the former Captain Titus and protect humanity.

Fighting the Enemies of the Empire

Like its predecessor, Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 pits you against nearly endless hordes of enemies in an intense and brutal action game: while our foes have changed compared to past threats, the Tyranids we now face are even more numerous than any menace encountered in the previous installment. There are times when you’ll find yourself fighting hundreds of creatures converging on your position, and in those moments, you’ll need to utilize every resource at your disposal to avoid defeat.

Often, you’ll be up against an entire moving army, and even the most well-prepared Space Marine can find it challenging when faced with hundreds of enemies at once. This scale is reflected in the game’s significantly improved visuals: at times, when walking across a devastated battlefield with laser beams from weapons flashing in every direction, it’s hard not to be at least a bit impressed by the developers’ work and the epic nature of the staging, which allows us to witness massive battles in arenas recreated with meticulous care and attention to detail.

While the visuals and graphical improvements are spectacular, Space Marine 2 doesn’t stray too far from the formula of its predecessor. The gameplay continues to rely on a mix of melee and ranged combat, progressing through linear levels. These levels aren’t so much designed for exciting exploration opportunities as they are for staging numerous memorable battles and epic moments. Combat is clearly the focus of the game: every level is packed with enemies of various sizes, and by the end of the adventure, you’ll have taken down thousands of foes of the Imperium.

To overcome these challenges, a vast arsenal is at your disposal: you start with basic service pistols for less complex situations, then move on to automatic and semi-automatic weapons that allow for rapid bursts of fire, sniper rifles capable of penetrating even the toughest Tyranid armor, flamethrowers, and gatling guns with extremely high rates of fire, as well as various shotguns that are devastating up close. For melee combat, there’s also a range of weapons to choose from: a swift, nimble knife (though not particularly powerful), the chainsaw sword – a symbol of the Space Marines that offers a balanced option between speed and offensive power – a gauntlet for those who prefer a more brutal style, a power sword that swings a bit slower but packs a bigger punch, and a large two-handed hammer that delivers devastating force despite its slowness.

Some weapons are slightly more effective than others, but there’s something for every taste, ensuring players will find the tool they’re most comfortable with or experiment with the entire arsenal if they wish. Either way, the gunplay feels satisfying, with solid feedback from shots, while melee combat is simpler and less impactful: there are a few combos you can execute, and you can dodge or block attacks with the right timing. The window to react is generous, and there are plenty of visual cues to indicate when an enemy is about to strike, when you can block a shot, or if it’s better to dodge.

Shoot, Hack’n’Slash Your Way

Given the overwhelming number of enemies you face during missions, melee actions often devolve into button-mashing rather than thoughtful attacks and counters. While the melee system isn’t the most complex, it still fits well within a game focused on spectacle and recreating large-scale battles against dozens, if not hundreds, of foes at once. Plus, you’ll frequently use rifles and other firearms, which, as mentioned earlier, provide a more gratifying experience.

When it comes to enemies, Space Marine 2 shows us what it’s like to face swarms of Tyranids. While the most common enemies are small and relatively harmless creatures (at least to a Space Marine) that only pose a threat in large numbers, there are other, more formidable foes. For example, there are flying spores that explode on contact, dealing significant damage, but are destroyed with a single hit; Tyranid warriors, large and tough, can attack in melee with multiple swords or fire acid from afar; and Zoanthropes, flying creatures with powerful psionic abilities, capable of shielding themselves with barriers, empowering allies, and launching powerful energy waves, making them priority targets. Then there are Lictors, stealthy predators capable of hiding and launching sudden, lethal attacks – enemies you must pay close attention to, not to mention the bigger boss fights.

However, the Tyranids are not the only enemies Titus and his allies will face. As the game progresses, you also encounter the forces of Chaos, represented by heretics wielding rifles, small demons that attack in melee and are only dangerous in large numbers, medium and large-sized Chaos Space Marines who are particularly fearsome rivals, and sorcerers who fly around the arena, striking with potent psionic attacks. In total, there are about a dozen different enemy types, so the variety is decent, though not fully exploited, as you often face hordes composed mostly of lower-ranking enemies of the same type.

Not Quite Hugo Boss

There are boss battles that occasionally spice up the gameplay with new challenges, but overall they are not the standout elements of Space Marine 2. While they can offer something different in terms of spectacle, they often lack sophisticated dynamics and sometimes feel a bit familiar. One boss, for instance, kept endlessly summoning enemies to distract the player, resulting in the least interesting and enjoyable battle, suggesting a bit of developer laziness.

Still, the missions constantly take you to different locations and environments – even to other planets as the story progresses – which adds freshness to the game. The settings range from jungles and swamps to urban areas dominated by monumental Imperial architecture, large factories where the Imperium’s deadly weapons are produced, ancient crypts, and spaces devastated by warp energy. The levels are neither small nor short, but they feel quite linear and offer little deviation from the predetermined path. It seems exploration wasn’t a significant focus for the developers, who preferred to maintain a high, action-packed pace. However, you can find some items around, like stimulants to heal wounds, extra ammunition, protective relics, and audiologs scattered throughout the levels that provide more background on the setting and narrative. Otherwise, the pace moves briskly toward the next firefight.

The combat arenas are quite large and provide some (but not many) obstacles for temporary cover, with plenty of explosive barrels that can be used to quickly eliminate a group of enemies passing by. Environmental interaction is mostly limited to background elements that have no real impact on gameplay: you can destroy chairs, benches, crates, and other objects scattered around, but this only serves to make the game world feel a bit more realistic, enhancing immersion rather than providing extra options for action. In general, the arenas are decently designed, but in some cases, more could have been done to offer more cover to the player, who can sometimes feel exposed to enemy fire (depending on the chosen difficulty level, your Space Marine might be more vulnerable than expected), and lose shields and health with little chance to counter.

It’s Better with Friends

The good news is that you won’t be alone in Titus’s second adventure. You’ll have two trusty Space Marine companions by your side, fighting tooth and nail in every battle. If left to the AI, their contribution is often not significant, and they certainly won’t steal the show from the player, who still bears the heaviest burden of clearing the arena of enemies; however, your allies can be useful for reviving you after taking enemy blows, but you can’t rely on this solution indefinitely, as they won’t bring you back to life forever – the third KO is final.

In Space Marine 2, you can also play campaign missions with two friends who control your companions instead of the AI, significantly boosting their effectiveness in battle. Honestly, even though I played the campaign solo, I often felt that the levels were designed to work best with other players, because on the “Veteran” difficulty (which the game recommends), enemies can quickly tear down your armor and hurt you, especially when facing larger waves. In such situations, having three players who know how to move can make a huge difference compared to the AI’s limited effectiveness.

But the game doesn’t end with the campaign. There are two additional modes to spend your time on: first, there are six different cooperative missions where you take command of another Space Marine, choosing their class, weapons, and armor customizations.

The six available classes offer a variety of playstyles. Some classes closely reflect Titus’s abilities and skills, while others provide entirely different approaches. For example, the Bulwark can only use melee weapons and a pistol, but has a shield that deflects enemy projectiles. The Vanguard has a grappling hook mechanism that allows it to quickly approach enemies, giving it excellent mobility. The Heavy rains death with a gatling gun while generating a shield that absorbs incoming projectiles. The Sniper can temporarily cloak itself to avoid enemies and attack from a distance with tremendous force. The Assaulter is a master of close combat and can use a jetpack to launch powerful attacks against enemies below. Lastly, the Tactician is the most versatile of the Space Marines, with a wide arsenal of weapons.

When using a specific class during a mission, you earn experience points that increase when you successfully complete the operation. Accumulating enough points allows you to level up, unlocking new options for customizing your character, acquiring new abilities, and obtaining more powerful weapons. The operations come with four different difficulty levels: the first is aimed at beginner characters, while the higher levels are designed for more experienced and better-equipped heroes. Missions at higher difficulty levels yield more experience points.

The Power of Teamwork

Cooperative missions offer a fun way to spend a few more hours with Space Marine 2 and are closely linked to the story. As the difficulty increases, I noticed a greater concentration of enemies (including some stronger variants) and the need for extra steps, like defending a reactor from enemy attacks multiple times, more so than at lower difficulty levels. However, a faster leveling-up process would have been welcome, as currently, to max out a character’s level, you need to replay the same cooperative missions repeatedly, and the process becomes even longer (and more tedious) if you want to try out and level up multiple character classes.

Cooperative missions can be played just like the campaign, in single-player mode, where the two companions that follow you are controlled by bots, or you can complete the mission with real players. The latter is the most effective approach (and the one the game “prefers,” as it often automatically paired me with a few human teammates at the beginning or middle of a cooperative mission) because a three-player team is much better equipped to overcome any challenge, whereas the bots, as I mentioned earlier, don’t contribute much to success.

In any case, the cooperative missions are a joyful addition: undoubtedly, repeating the same missions can become monotonous in the long run, but the gameplay remains solid and enjoyable enough to provide a few more hours of fun even after completing Lieutenant Titus’s story. And that’s not all, as there’s another game mode, “Eternal War,” which offers the chance to test your skills in multiplayer PvP and challenge other users online: in this case, players are divided into two teams, Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines, and face off in 6v6 battles.

Players can use the same classes present in cooperative missions and compete in three different modes: annihilation, which is a straightforward team deathmatch where the winner is the one who kills the most opponents; territory conquest, where the team must capture and defend three strategic points from the opponents to win; and finally, conquest and control, where players must hold a specific area that randomly changes during the game. Unfortunately, I must admit that despite my efforts, it was very difficult, if not practically impossible, to find enough players to properly test the competitive multiplayer, and on several occasions, after finding a match (which still only had six players instead of twelve), it crashed before even starting.

The Rich Universe of Warhammer 40,000 Comes to Life

While Space Marine 2 is undoubtedly a third-person shooter filled with action, it is also true that the narrative component is not insignificant and perhaps receives more emphasis than one might expect from such a game. Several cutscenes and some high-quality CGI films drive the story forward. Between missions, you always return to the flagship, where you can glimpse into conversations among other Space Marines and crew members about the current situation or other topics. The ship’s chaplain, for example, is always ready to offer advice and warnings, exemplifying the developers’ efforts to faithfully capture the atmosphere of the Warhammer 40,000 universe and immerse the player in a detailed and well-crafted environment.

There’s also the somewhat complex and occasionally contradictory relationship between Lieutenant Titus and his companions. The evolving dynamic over the hours brings many back-and-forth skirmishes, and while some twists are predictable, the story works despite its simplicity. Particularly toward the end of the game, there are plenty of spectacular, epic, and memorable moments that will surely please fans of the Games Workshop universe.

After touching on the combat system, level and arena design, various game modes, and narrative elements, we can say that we’ve covered the main topics. However, it’s worth highlighting again Saber Interactive’s excellent graphical work, which manages to showcase its strength and bring to life one of the most accurate and compelling digital adaptations of the Warhammer 40,000 universe. However, this stunning visual experience comes at a cost, as Space Marine 2 is not among the “lightest” video games. Nevertheless, the optimization is acceptable: by lowering the graphical detail, you still get an enjoyable and consistent experience, even on weaker hardware, without sacrificing too much of the visuals. Some framerate drops are noticeable during the most intense sequences.

For those with a suitable processor and graphics card, the experience will likely be even more impressive, probably without any framerate fluctuations. I don’t have specific information about the performance of the console versions, but it can be assumed that there will be graphical compromises and possibly minor frame drops, but not to a significant extent, so the gaming experience should remain consistent and satisfying.

Dare to Warhammer?

Space Marine 2 is a game that has its imperfections but manages to entertain while offering a beautiful and impressive recreation of the Warhammer 40,000 universe, taking and expanding upon the simple yet entertaining formula of its predecessor. This game may not be a must-buy for everyone, but it can certainly provide great satisfaction to those who appreciate the world, the genre, or both. —Gergely Herpai “BadSector”—

-Gergely Herpai “BadSector”-

Publisher: Saber Interactive

Developer: Focus Entertainment

Style: Action-adventure, third-person shooter

Release: September 9, 2024.