Space Marine 2 Is So Busy It Makes You Feel Heroic To Show The Farce At The Heart Of Warhammer 40K

He’s an 8-foot-tall tank, walking on foot. He is covered in war, he has been brainwashed since the child killed in the name of the dead body in the chair. You hack and shoot and kill at the behest of a vile ruling class, sacrificing millions of people for a decaying, dying society—the Imperium. That is the main theme, the beating heart of Warhammer 40K. In the latest game, Saber Interactive’s Space Marine 2you are made to feel every inch of the super solider you play with. It never asks you to join its sarcasm.

I’ve been enjoying it Warhammer 40Kbut often people who write setting fiction struggle to handle the dark irony that lies at the heart of the setting. It reminds me of the first in a series of video stories from Lindsay Ellis discussing Michael Bay Transformers movies. For another videoEllis broke with the first film by ditching the vacant Sam Witwicky and casting Mikaela Banes as a real character. Despite her agency, her arc and character growth, the camera never moves away from showing the audience her chest or rear end. Ellis ends his story with a quote that can help us understand how Space Marine 2 it doesn’t Warhammer‘s satire justice.

“Freedom and beauty surpasses all scripture—always, always, always.”

I don’t hate the game. Honestly I enjoyed my time and the whole way. I enjoyed it as much as I did the first one A Space Marine when I played in high school. The problem is there is a trivial sexism, racism, and the toxic part of Warhammer fans who often think the Imperium is righteous in its ways. Newcomers may play it and not understand what the setting is really about. That would be a shame.

In Space Marine 2you play as Titus, the titular space marine who is expelled from his chapter under false accusations of treason by the fanatical and paranoid Imperium. He reunited with his chapter, the Ultramarines, and was sent to stop an array of Tyranids from the Hive Fleet Leviathan there to devour several planets and all their inhabitants. The Imperium doesn’t really care about that since it’s a weapon of such power it shouldn’t just blow up all three planets to stop the attack there too.

And then with a little introduction, get into it. You hack your chainword through waves of hormagaunts and termgaunts with little time for whys. The first task you take on in this game is to launch a virus bomb into the atmosphere of the first planet you visit, a jungle world called Kadaku. In 40Kthese are formidable weapons of destruction. They not only kill one species of predatory insects, they destroy and destroy all living things on earth. Books like Galaxy in Flames again Tallarn show the damage caused by those bombs and the “life-eating virus.” But in Space Marine 2being blown up doesn’t do anything in the world. Only, it is said, slows down the Tyranids. A missed opportunity to show the destruction the Imperium can wield. It is too busy with heroic last stands and empty declarations of brotherhood.

The story of Space Marine 2 continues directly from the first game released almost 13 years ago. In that title, Titus is sent to a different planet to stop an Orks attack. In the process, he is betrayed and becomes involved in another attack by the forces of Chaos, the mortal enemies of the Imperium. After killing almost every Ork he encounters and stopping an ork attack one-on-one, instead of being treated like a hero Titus is embarrassed. He was taken in by members of the Inquisition—the Imperium’s jackboot intergalactic secret police force—simply because his people were confused about how he stood up to the metaphysical powers wielded by the forces of Chaos.

The sequel begins with Titus being forced to hide his identity as a blackshield-member of the Deathwatch, a pan-chapter anti-xenos task force of excast and penitent Space Marines. He was reunited with his chapter, the Ultramarines (on the table, they are called “Smurfs”), after being seriously injured fighting the invading Tyranids. He is given another chance, but those who know his past remain wary. It’s subtle but players can tell that our main character still feels the pain of betrayal. He doesn’t appear at all with the rest of his team, but he’s the only one who protests when the Imperium seems intent on reviving the powerful weapon that caused the chaos attack in the first game.

Tithu will never question the program that hurt him. He will never voice his grievances about the Inquisition or the chapter that rejected him. Instead, the game focuses more on how much good sea space Titus has. His arc revolves around him learning to trust his brothers again after being abandoned for so long. In the final chapters of the game, Papa Smurf himself, Chapter Master Marneus Calgar, descends as an angel to Titus in his hour of need. He tells our hero that he’s been right all along, that the reason he can withstand the chaos is because he’s so good at being a Space Marine. They are winning. Titus is honored and given a place alongside Calgar. Everyone is happy.

The story of Space Marine 2 it’s not nearly as beautiful and historic as its fields, plots, and locations. Titus’ voice actor, Clive Standen, gives a performance that underscores the fundamental power stored in the centuries-old Space Marine. And yet, so much you understand about it 40KThe sarcasm comes from a spare dataslate audio log and a few sequences where you watch human soldiers bravely shot to escape 8-foot-tall ravenous monsters. All the while, you move from one area to the next, ready to kill deadly bugs or chaos cults. The frame is a hero. Beauty is badassery. It doesn’t matter the context of the game, even if it is successfully presented.

Other 40K games, as in the beginning Dawn of War RTS, can handle sarcasm better, but I don’t think there was a better example of how to do it than the latest Owlcat RPG. Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader.

I ran and passed Rogue Trader from start to finish on Steam Deck before the latest patches and updates made it, apparently, more playable. It was buggy and uneven. The last chapter of the game is obviously sped up, and part of the story comes to a heavy end like I’m at the end of a train where each car crashes into the next. But the game hosts both the Imperium and the Space Marines which are much more friendly than this latest third-person shooter. The RPG allows you to take three different tracks. He may be an imperium sycophant, a worshiper of chaos, or an “iconoclast.” In other words, you are an anti-imperialist trying to carve out your own empire in a small space.

Owlcat is an RPG, so you have friends you collect throughout the game. At some point in the game, you meet Ulfar, a spaceship from the Space Wolves chapter. This chapter is coded as the 9th and 10th century Vikings, and they generally start out as good people compared to the Imperium’s obtuse paranoia and xenophobia. In Rogue Traderthe writers of Owlcat have managed to make Ulfar completely different from you or your other human friends. His voice actor, Oliver Smithhe has given us the deep, loud, brutal song of a noble soldier whose personality is twisted and almost disintegrated. The way to gain his trust is to get to know him and his culture.

Or, as a good member of the Imperium, you can criticize him and his unruly ways. There’s a lot of silliness in this game, and that helps. Warhammer silly setting. It was born out of the 1980s anti-Thatcherism movement. The name of the Ultramarines does not come from how beautiful the Space Marines are, but from the deep blue color of their armor. Warhammer it’s big, it’s explosive, it’s stupid, and it always bites. The taunt has to sting more than a Tyranid Hive Tyrant or a ripping chain name. In Space Marine 2it tries to ignore the issues at the heart of the setting for the simple fantasy of power.

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