Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 1 & 2 – The Tedium of Man

My buddy Carl (AJnet’s resident IT guy) has spent the better part of the last ten years trying to drag me into the world of Warhammer 40,000.

At first I resisted. Not because I thought it looked bad, but because Warhammer fans talk about Warhammer the same way crackheads talk about crack. You can’t just casually like the Warhammer 40k lore. The moment you show even a slight interest, some pasty dork basically materializes out of thin air and starts explaining the Horus Heresy to you for six hours straight while showing off their tiny painted figurines that cost more than your car payment.

Eventually, though, I gave in.

From what I’ve seen of it so far, the lore of Warhammer 40k is fucking great. It’s grim, oppressive, violent, absurdly over-the-top, and somehow still compelling despite the fact that literally everybody in the setting is either evil, insane, corrupted, dying, xenophobic, or some combination of all four. I’ve read the first three Horus Heresy books so far, and I really enjoyed them (though it looks like there’s another 60 books in the series to go). I’ve also read Ciaphas Cain: Hero of the Imperium, which was another really fun read. The scale of everything is incredible. Entire planets getting wiped out over ideological disagreements. Massive crusades spanning the entire galaxy. Giant god-machines stomping around while Space Marines scream about honor and the Emperor. It’s all so ridiculous, but in the best possible way.

That’s part of why I was excited to play the Space Marine games.

Unfortunately, after finishing both games, I walked away feeling less like a mighty warrior of the Imperium and more like I’d just spent twenty hours working mandatory overtime at the Adeptus Administratum.

The first Space Marine game follows Captain Titus of the Ultramarines during an Ork invasion of an Imperial Forge World. The Orks are trying to seize control of a powerful weapon, the Imperium is getting overwhelmed, and Titus has to wade through mountains of green assholes to stop everything from going sideways. Naturally, because this is Warhammer 40k, the forces of Chaos eventually show up and make everything even worse. By the end of the game you’re fighting daemons and traitors while the Inquisition lurks around acting suspicious because apparently nobody in this universe is capable of trusting anyone for more than five minutes.

Space Marine 2 follows Titus again, this time during a Tyranid invasion. It’s the same basic idea as the first game. A giant alien threat shows up (this time it’s the Tyranids), the Imperium starts losing ground, Titus and the boys arrive to save the day. You fight through endless swarms of Tyranids, defend collapsing Imperial positions, and eventually Chaos gets involved again because Chaos has a contractual obligation to appear in every major 40k storyline.

Story-wise, both games are fine. They’re not amazing, but they’re not terrible either.

The characters don’t really stand out all that much. Titus is cool enough, but he feels like standard Astartes fare. Stoic, honorable, emotionally restrained, deeply loyal to the Imperium, constantly talking like he’s reading scripture from a war manual. Compared to characters like Ciaphas Cain (who, yes, I’m aware is not an Astartes) or Garviel Loken, Titus just seems… generic. The supporting cast isn’t much different. They all feel like exactly what you’d expect from a Warhammer 40k game. If you already like 40k, you’ll probably enjoy the atmosphere and lore references. If you don’t care about 40k lore, I don’t think these games are going to suddenly convert you.

Gameplay-wise, things start strong before becoming painfully repetitive.

At first, the combat is kind of fun. Mowing down bad guys with bolters or hacking away at them with your chainsword feels satisfying, the executions are brutal, and the whole thing captures the scale of 40k combat pretty well. For the first few hours, it genuinely feels awesome.

Then you realize the entire game is basically the same thing over and over again.

Fight swarms of xenos.

Fight a bigger xenos.

Fight more swarms of xenos.

Fight an even bigger xenos.

Chaos shows up.

Fight Chaos.

Defend another generic Imperium facility.

Repeat until credits roll.

Now look, I get it. This is what the Astartes do. They kill hordes of enemies. Tyranids literally fight using swarm tactics. I understand the lore justification here. But lore accuracy doesn’t automatically equal good gameplay.

The problem is that both games feel creatively limited despite taking place in one of the biggest fictional universes ever created.

Warhammer 40k has countless planets, countless species, countless battlefields, and endless opportunities for variety. Instead, I spent half the time running around what felt like Generic Imperium Base #1,096 fighting the same handful of enemies repeatedly. Where the fuck are the T’au? Where are the Necrons? Where are the Eldar? Why does every planet look like an industrial warehouse? It’s kind of like how everything in Star Wars seems to take place on Tatooine or another desert planet.

One of the coolest things about pre-Heresy 40k lore is how vibrant parts of the galaxy used to be. Isstvan III, before everything went to hell, was described as shimmering and full of beautiful marble structures and music (the capital city was actually called “Choral City”). That actually sounded interesting. Yet most modern 40k games insist on trapping you in endless gray military complexes while servitors moan in the background and skulls are glued onto every available surface.

Space Marine 2 especially disappointed me because of the absurd hype surrounding it. People were acting like this game was the second coming of the Emperor himself. Then I played it and realized I was basically just doing the same repetitive defense missions for hours at a time with prettier graphics.

The worst part is that the games occasionally tease more interesting ideas before immediately backing away from them.

In Space Marine 1, there’s a whole segment involving a Titan. A TITAN. One of the coolest concepts in the entire setting. We spend all this time getting the thing operational again, and I’m sitting there thinking “Hell yeah, I’m gonna control this monster and obliterate everything.”

Nope. You don’t get to use it, you just stand around it while other stuff happens.

I felt completely robbed. I know Space Marines can’t operate Titans, I understand at least that much of the lore. That’s fine. Just have my POV switch over to a Princeps for like five minutes and let me stomp around vaporizing Orks to break up the monotony a little.

Boltgun is by far the better Warhammer 40k shooter.

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun feels faster, leaner, and more focused. It understands that sometimes all you really want from a 40k shooter is to sprint through levels obliterating Chaos forces while metal music plays in your brain. It’s basically Doom wearing Warhammer armor, and that simplicity works in its favor. There’s less downtime, less slogging through endless corridors listening to exposition dumps, and less repetitive wave combat pretending to be depth. Boltgun knows exactly what it is. It throws you into the action immediately and keeps the momentum going. The exploration and secret hunting also help break things up.

Meanwhile, Space Marine 2 constantly interrupts itself with cutscenes and repetitive objective structure that drag the pacing down. By the end, I wasn’t excited anymore. I was exhausted.

For a game that cost $60 at launch, I expected way more variety and creativity. Thank God I grabbed it on sale, because if I had paid full price for this thing I’d have been furious. I’d have felt like a real jerk. An angry jerk, you might even say.

It frustrates me, because there’s a lot of potential here for a great game. The foundation is solid and the atmosphere is good. The combat can even be satisfying in bursts. But both games feel stuck in this repetitive loop that eventually turns the power fantasy into a chore.

I went into these games wanting to spread the glory of the Emperor. Instead, I spent most of my time spreading my mouth open in the galaxy’s largest yawn.

These games feel like they were cobbled together by Orks. They don’t make me feel like part of the Imperium of Man, they make me feel like part of the Tedium of Man.

They’re heresy.

Angry_Jerk

Adam “The Angry Jerk” Baker is the CEO of The AJnet Organization and Editor-in-Chief of AJnet Magazine. A grizzled internet veteran of over 20 years, he writes about politics, culture, and whatever else manages to annoy him that day.

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