Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2

I will admit that going in, my RPG-tuned brain was quietly hoping Space Marine 2 might be the grimdark answer to something with branching paths, morally weighted decisions, and a protagonist whose arc actually earns its finale. It is not that game, and the sooner you make peace with that, the sooner you will have an absolute blast. What Saber Interactive built here is something rarer than it sounds: a third-person action game that fully commits to making you feel like an eight-foot-tall superhuman killing machine, and then backs that feeling up with some genuinely impressive technical spectacle. The campaign follows Lieutenant Demetrian Titus, an Ultramarine demoted and viewed with suspicion after being wrongfully accused of corruption, fighting alongside squadmates Chairon and Gadriel against an overwhelming Tyranid invasion on a Chaos-corrupted Hive World. The story holds up, with a few decent twists and strong voice work from Titus in particular, but do not expect Disco Elysium levels of textual reward for reading between the lines. The lore is delivered largely through pre- and post-mission cutscenes, and the writing leans hard into 40K's "everything is war and sacrifice" register. Fans of the tabletop will recognise every proper noun; newcomers will likely still enjoy the spectacle without being entirely lost. What the campaign does earn is its setpiece moments, from fortress cathedrals swarming with Thousand Sons to Tyranid tides that genuinely look like tides. The swarm tech here is legitimately impressive, pitting you against hundreds of enemies on screen without the framerate flinching. Combat is the real centrepiece. You have access to a solid arsenal spanning Bolt Rifles, Multi-Meltas, Thunder Hammers, Power Fists, and the ever-satisfying Chainsword, switching between them situationally depending on whether you are dealing with sniping Tyranid Warriors or close-range Raveners getting uncomfortably personal. There is a parry and dodge system that borrows Souls-adjacent timing, which works well in one-on-one exchanges but can feel slightly clunky when you are simultaneously being attacked by forty things at once. Executions restore armour, which keeps the moment-to-moment loop feeling visceral and purposeful rather than just pressing buttons. The main complaint from a build-variety standpoint is that the campaign does not let you customise much at all - that layer unlocks in Operations, the co-op PvE mode, where six classes (including Assault, Vanguard, Bulwark, and Heavy) each carry distinct playstyles and gear progression. The Operations mode is where the game finds its longer legs, though a limited map rotation does start to show repetition once you have cleared each node on higher difficulties. PvP, called Eternal War, exists and functions, but it lands closer to a serviceable bonus than a draw in its own right. Ranged classes currently hold a notable edge, and melee-focused options like the Assault class require meaningfully more effort for comparable results. Post-launch, Saber has kept the content updates flowing, including new Operations maps, a Lethal difficulty tier, the Helbrute Onslaught mode, and Chaos enemies, with the community broadly praising the free nature of those drops while remaining divided over occasional balance patches that disrupted preferred builds. The developer-publisher response to player feedback has been quicker than most live-service contemporaries, which counts for something. For RPG players and narrative-first gamers, Space Marine 2 is a side dish, not the main course. There are no meaningful choices, no branching arcs, no build variety that rewards theory-crafting the way a deep RPG does. What it offers instead is extremely well-executed spectacle, a genuinely satisfying combat rhythm, and a co-op loop that is hard to put down when you have two friends willing to wade into the grimdark with you. If your gaming diet regularly includes games where story and system depth share equal billing, this scratches a very specific itch for cathartic, large-scale carnage - and it scratches it well.

Monika · Scout Team

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