Warhammer 40000: Space Marine 2 review

There are many, many games under the Warhammer 40K banner these days, from CRPGs like Rogue Trader to first-person shooters like Necromunda and Boltgun, not to mention a metric ton of turn-based tactical titles. And by and large, there aren’t many that miss the mark in terms of atmosphere and theme. The universe is legendary for its depictions of a grimdark future where there is only war, and I can’t think of many titles – if any – that have misunderstood the assignment. But Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2, from Saber Interactive, might hit the nail just a little squarer on the head than most.

The original title, released back in 2011 and starring the now-very-famous Mark Strong in the lead role of Captain Titus, turned heads among fans of the franchise or explosive action games, garnered itself a cult following, and then went mostly un-thought-of for thirteen years. But with the seemingly unstoppable rise of the license (a license that this year is thirty-seven years old), it feels like the time is simply right to give it another run. And what better studio to do it than Saber Interactive?

Having delivered the super-successful Left 4 Dead-alike, World War Z, Saber had already proved their mettle when it comes to gunplay and tension, but they also have their proprietary Swarm technology, the ideal medium to properly explore one of W40K’s most infamous enemies: the Tyranid Hive. A living war machine comprised of billions of unstoppable killing machines all controlled by a single hive-mind, the Tyranids are among W40K’s most interesting and enduring enemy types – and the perfect villain for a balls-out third-person shooter like Space Marine 2.

It takes place roughly 200 years after the events of the first game, which sounds like a long time to you and me but Titus still looks in pretty good shape. After serving in the Death Watch for two centuries, he is reinstated as a Lieutenant and given command of a Primaris squad under Captain Acheran. The mission is to prevent a Tyranid invasion fleet from spreading through the Emperor’s worlds at any and all cost. All the while, Titus must deal with the fact that his past makes him something of a pariah, and his ruthlessly pragmatic attitude causes tension among his subordinates.

The campaign wastes no time in dropping you into the thick of things and then delights in keeping you there, always vastly outnumbered and fighting what at times feels like a losing battle. There isn’t a huge amount to spoil and so I’ll be vague with details, but the campaign is one of the most atmospheric and on-point depictions of the universe in recent years. Supported by two other marines, Chairon and Gadriel, Titus faces down countless hordes of enemies across a number of inspired locations painstakingly designed to convey the trademark 40K sense of grim attrition.

But it isn’t the locations or the atmosphere that set Space Marine 2 apart, for as surprisingly beautiful as this game can make a blood-drenched battleground look, the real star of the show is the Tyranid Hive itself. First seen in World War Z, Saber’s Swarm tech is a marvel to behold. It renders hundreds of deadly Tyranid Termagants on-screen at any given time, sweeping towards you like a tidal wave of teeth and bone before the AI splinters off into individual units that act independently of one another.

They leap at you, dodge your attacks, flank you – and getting surrounded by a few too many is an easy way to get your limbs hacked off. There are larger foes, too, as well as a handful of elite-type enemies with unique attack patterns and abilities, such as Tyrants and Raveners. The foe is many and varied, and even on standard difficulty it gets pretty hairy at times. But of course, you’re not exactly a pack of scaredy cats hiding in the corner.

Primaris Space Marines are the backbone of the God-Emperor’s forces and the defacto good guys of the W40K universe (well, sort of – it’s complicated), and each one is a bio-engineered walking battle tank in half-ton armour, armed with some of the most devastating weaponry you can carry with just two hands. Saber Interactive have gone all out here, to the point that moving around in this world almost feels like you’re playing a mech shooter.

Titus is, to forego poetry, fucking huge. As enemies attack you’ll get blue or red indicators to warn you of what’s coming. Blue can be parried, which often results in a brutal counter, while red must be dodged – though perfect dodges can often lead to a kill shot, which wipes out smaller enemies or badly damages larger ones. Able to switch between a two-handed weapon like a Bolter or Melta, and a pistol and melee combo, Space Marine 2 has an impressive array of weapons. Powerfists and chainswords, heavy bolters and plasma pistols, there are plenty of ways to deal death – not to mention a variety of grenades to pepper the battlefield. Get an enemy on the ropes, and a click of the right stick will see you tear them apart in a variety of gruesome finishers.

Sadly, this variety simply doesn’t extend to other parts of the campaign. While it throws new enemies at you regularly and drip feeds you new weapons and loadouts, the campaign itself is very linear, with few diverging paths to explore and no collectibles to speak of. Pick-ups are limited to ammo, stim-packs, and grenades, with a few Data-Slates offering background lore in audio form. As much brutal fun as it is, it feels like the campaign is really just set-up for the online contingent: Operations Mode and the Eternal War PvP mode.

With no cash-shop or in-game purchases at launch, the Season Pass and additional DLC in the form of cosmetics and new Chapters is what’s going to keep Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 profitable, and a lot of effort has been put into making the online element, particularly Operations Mode, feel enticing.

It’s here that you can earn a special currency to unlock a ridiculous amount of cosmetic options to customise your online characters to suit your favourite Chapter of Space or Chaos Marines. There are tons of colours (all coded to Games Workshop’s Citadel Paints, of course), decals, armour flourishes, and emblems. A variety of armour sets are available to unlock as individual pieces via completion of Operations missions and reaching certain milestones, and everything can be transferred over into the Eternal War 6v6 PvP mode.

Operations missions are multi-objective challenges that see you and two other players (or bots) complete a series of tasks such as holding vantage points, activating explosives, or simply holding out until evac arrives. There’s a dedicated horde mode coming in 2025, which feels like a no-brainer. As it is, Operations is essentially World War Z but 40K – you have limited heals and buffs, special abilities on cooldowns, and the AI Director scatters pick-ups around randomly, often based on how you’re coping. The elite enemies are treated just like Special Infected too, popping up almost randomly to split your squad and punish the speedrunners.

Playing with other people (which I was lucky enough to do a few times during review) is a lot of fun, but the bot AI is a bit sketchy. They fail to prioritise certain targets and have a habit of throwing grenades while riding lifts for no reason, but it is doable on the lower difficulty if you just want to grind EXP and currency. There are 6 classes in this mode, Assault, Tactical, Vanguard, Sniper, Bulwark, and Heavy, each with 25 skills to unlock and their own loadouts and special abilities. For example the Bulwark can place a banner down that boosts health and armour, while the Vanguard has a grappling hook for reaching distant enemies and dropkicking their Xenos asses into oblivion.

If anything, though, Saber have gone a little too stingy on the unlocks. Not only do you need to earn enough EXP to make the skills available, you also have to pay currency to equip them. This wouldn’t be so bad, but each costs 10 or more credits, and the cosmetics cost upwards of 30 each – and most missions reward you with just 25. That’s a lot of grind, especially as EXP isn’t shared across classes. Weapons, too, can be up-levelled and customised with the same systems. I can see this being tweaked post-launch to make earning rewards a little more enticing – especially given how long an Operations mission is, easily running upwards of 20 minutes a time until you have a solid grasp of what’s expected.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 does feel like the complete package though. The campaign may be a little “no-frills” and linear, but it sets up the Operations Mode (each mission is framed as happening during the events of the campaign) and delivers some of the most brutal and cathartic third-person action since Gears 5. With a surprise enemy edition around the halfway point, Space Marine 2 also does a good job at mixing up objectives, giving you a Pyroblaster (flamethrower) to clean out vermin in one mission, while another is multi-level and necessitates using jump-packs to get around.

Perhaps most crucially, Saber Interactive truly understood their assignment. They’ve created an arena of war worthy of the universe that fans will absolutely love, and newcomers will enjoy simply for the solid mechanics and responsive, thrilling violence. Played on PS5, the controller haptics make you feel every thundering step and every roaring rev of the chainsword, while the gorgeous visuals present a stunningly grimy world of alien swamps and battle-blasted fortresses. With the Season Pass and roadmap in place, Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 is a superb foray into the universe and a more-than-worthy successor to the 2011 original.