When I was a kid, I remember going to my local big Co-op department store and seeing tiny figurines of chunky menacing soldiers, giant mechs, tanks and blood-covered creatures, and this was my introduction to the world of Warhammer.
I'll be honest in saying that this is the majority of my experience with the giant genre-stretching franchise. The various video game releases over the years have largely flown under the radar for me, but then I saw Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2.
The brutal action, futuristic setting and unmitigated violence piqued my interest, because while Warhammer has never gotten its claws in me, a badass action game where you squash aliens with a giant hammer is something I can get behind.
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Space Marine 2 is a third-person shooter hack-'n'-slash game where you control big meaty men and take down enemies through melee and gun combat while completing missions on various planets.
My expectations of thrilling action were definitely met in my time with the game, with the sequel being loaded to the brim with firefights and epic battles that will satisfy anyone's bloodlust on the battlefield.
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The combat is very meat-and-potatoes and doesn't reinvent the wheel, with dodge and parry mechanics adding an additional layer of tactics that result in satisfying point-blank executions when timed correctly.
Combat encounters are often made up of over a hundred enemies at once, with creatures piling into your personal space en masse adding to the chaos, and on higher difficulties it can result in some very tense battles as you try to ration ammo and perform glory kill takedowns to regain armour.
Much like the combat, the campaign mode itself didn't really offer many surprises. In my seven or so hours playing through the story, it was ultimately a by-the-numbers experience that largely had me going from one area to the next, taking out enemies with the occasional checkpoint to defend. This essentially repeated for the entire duration of the campaign with very few gimmicks to mix things up.
My main interest was a single-player campaign, and it's clear that Space Marine 2 is catered more towards multiplayer, with all three of its modes supporting online play. While you can play with bots like I did, both its campaign and PvE Operations mode allow you to play with two friends, while its PvP Eternal War mode supports 6v6.
At launch, the Operations PvE mode offers six spin-off missions from the main campaign, which are full-on story missions with just as much lore and gameplay as the main campaign, with the only difference being you're not playing as protagonist Titus, but instead taking his orders as a team of Space Marines.
In the campaign, you are tied to three characters and their one unique ability. For example, if you're playing solo you will have Titus' Righteous Fury, which grants increased damage output and health regeneration when activated – but because you're locked to this, you're never really getting a full idea of what the game offers, which is odd as I assumed the campaign mode would be the game's main showcase.
However, it's the Operations and Eternal War modes where you truly grasp everything the game has to offer, because here you can select from six classes including Tactical, Assault, Vanguard, Bulwark, Sniper and Heavy that give you exclusive abilities – like a grappling hook that launches you towards enemies or a big shield – that are nowhere to be seen in the main campaign.
For a few missions in the campaign, you can make use of a Jump Pack that lets you launch into the air, hover and crash-land on crowds of enemies, but it's only limited to select missions, while in Operations mode you can customise your Marine to have it all the time with the Assault class.
Not only this, the Operations and Eternal War modes allow you to customise your Space Marine's armour style and colours in great detail, and also has skill trees and perks that improve your abilities and weapons that can be used across both modes, while the story mode has no kind of upgrades or class-switching whatsoever.
For players who are interested in only playing solo or want the cinematic story of the campaign, be prepared that while fun and well-made, it's not a full representation of what the game offers and is comparatively barebones to the in-depth levelling systems in the other modes.
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There's no doubt that its throwback feel will appeal to those who just want to switch their brain off and pulverise mountains of enemies, but its brisk and generic campaign had me questioning if I had missed something, and I was left feeling like even its 13-year-old predecessor had more variety than this.
Coming into Space Marine 2, I was wondering if the story or lore would be lost on me due to the decade-plus time difference since the original game came out, but I'm happy to say that newcomers to the franchise can just pick up and start slaughtering hordes of monsters and follow along with no issues.
What should be commended is the game's lack of microtransactions as everything is purchasable with in-game XP. The devs have also released a roadmap that details free upcoming content in the form of new missions, weapons and more which I'd be interested in checking out, especially with the game supporting cross-play across consoles.
Despite the campaign offering little emotional pull and shallow characters, fans of Warhammer 40K and the first Space Marine will certainly get more value with the game through its beautiful character models and vibrant environments, a much-needed improvement over the original's Xbox 360-era drab brown scenery.
There's a lot of world-building and blockbuster cinematics to appreciate, but it's a shame that the story and gameplay didn't really evolve like the graphics did, as for better or worse it plays like the original Space Marine with a fresh coat of paint.
Space Marine 2 is a brutally fun action game that will be best experienced with friends in multiplayer, and while the gameplay and story itself are serviceable and don't do much to innovate the series or genre, fans of Warhammer or anyone looking for an old-school shooter will have a good time turning tyranid swarms into puddles of blood.
Platform reviewed: PlayStation 5
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 releases on September 9 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S and PC. It is available on September 5 if you purchase the Gold or Ultra Edition.
