My review after playing campaign (spoilers)

[Mesond]

Big. Massive. Spoilers. You might want to do the campaign first.

This is going to be a long one. Details matter. I can't talk about my concerns without bringing up spoilers.

Now is your opportunity to play the game first before reading ahead. People might accidently read the name if I type it near the top of the page. So I'm going to leave some spaces first.

Space

Space

Space

Space

Space

Still here? You do know this is a spoiler, right?

Spoiler below.

One word for you. Tzeentch. Great fight, but flawed as a character in this game. Why? Because he has zero personality. That isn't a metaphor. He says nothing. The devs took the chaos god that is most likely to gloat and just had him be a boss without a word. Like he's a meat shield. Even khorne has proven he can do better then that. So it seems very out of character for Tzeentch. And since the game doesn't ever give a reason for that then this makes Tzeentch look incompetent. When he's the chaos god of tricks and plans and cunning. In other words, in terms of warhammer lore Tzeentch in Space Marine 2 doesn't seem to be faithful to warhammer. In terms of character development and lore alone.

Gameplay wise it's a different matter. Great fight in terms of gameplay mecahnics. But without the context, without meaning and reason then it's "Just a fight". And no, having other characters explaining what's happening without the chaos god speaking for themselves isn't cutting it. Have Tzeentch be more of a presence. In terms of motivation. Have him try to play people for fools himself if he's clearly there. If you've at least reached the last mission then you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. Show him off by all means, but make it MEAN something.

If there's one complaint I have about this game it's that it forces certain situations. I'll give you an example. "Character shows up and is just there. Also will kill you if they think you're an illusion, but we've known each other for a very long time. Also now you're a hero. Turn that key around and the game is over." All being crammed in. It's ham fisting it at that point. At least have more debates and big converations after events like this. Instead of ending the game on that note.

Slow. It. Down. How can people even think and process if it's so forced like that? Context and pacing is important. Context and pacing is everything. Situations like how the space marines in the same squad conflict with each other work a lot better. There's more screen time and they all say something and debate. But it seems the main squad in the campaign gets all the attention, with other characters having none at all, beyond trying to be stupid meat shields. Does this sound like Tzeentch to you? He's not the chaos god of "brute force alone". He's the chaos god of tricks. He's the most likely to debate. Manipulate. Degrade. etc. Work with that.

The dreadnaught at the end also seems more like comic relief. Purely because it one shot kills a dragon, subtracting from the serious high stakes tones. Warhammer works better when struggle is shown. Both in terms of fights and debates. We could have had a back and forth between the dreadnaught and the dragon instead of things being one sided. It just ends up making it look like the devs couldn't figure out how to make a boss fight with the dragon work. If that's the case at least have a scripted struggle before the dreadnaught wins, even if brief. For example, you could have the dragon swoop down and push back the dreadnaught, resulting in the dreadnaught bringing down their arms on the dragons head before putting their weapon inside of the dragons mouth and then shooting. That would have had more of an impact, displaying how intimidating both units are with the dreadnaught still coming out on top.

Back to my biggest complaint. Tzeentch look dumb instead of cunning. I've had more engaging interactions with a warboss. Even Space Marine 1 proved that. When an orc is more interesting then a chaos god then what have you done to that chaos god? Only Doom Guy pulls it off, and even he says more.

My point is mute characters only work if silence is their whole thing. Tzeentch isn't about that. He's less of a "Pure action" character and more of a "You got played for a fool and I tricked you" character. This requires verbal communication. Debates. Challenging ideals and viewpoints. He's basically Sun Tzu. Instead of seeing that I am seeing a meat shield trying to brute force it. While it's a good fight it's not fitting his character if he's so silent. With more context and contrast it would work much better.

I like the energy of Imurah, but he never really seemed to be a real threat beyond his introduction. Imagine Kefka from Final Fantasy, except the boss doesn't really accomplish anything before the final showdown. And even then it's so quickly turned around in the space marines favor that the boss just doesn't seem to have any real weight. The only time the boss seems like a real threat is in their introduction, but once the illusions are stripped away? Different matter. The power of Tzeentch and his capable followers isn't just in assumptions and illusions. The true power of Tzeentch (and anyone doing the same tactics) is when people fall victim to the truth. After the illusions are stripped away. There has to be motivation. Plus seeing characters break and struggle because of the truth after playing themselves for fools is good entertainment. That's the whole point of Tzeentch. And it's not taken advantage of.

A chaos god that doesn't even say anything or gloat? That's when I stopped being immersed altogether. Then other characters show up as if they've known the main character for a long time. But it's all just too breif and too lacking in context to come across as meaningful. The polish at the end of the game is lacking. I was hooked before that. I was getting really invested. But then it's over and it's done. It's a flaw in terms of story and plot. Not in terms of gameplay. Gameplay is sacrificing character development. And once that happens with a chaos god of all things then I just have to bring that to attention, spoilers or no. If warhammer games do this with chaos gods then I don't see that ending well. There has to be more context. Character development first and foremost. It was a good attempt, and it almost was done well enough to remain engaging. But without the character depth from key characters that are so important it's falling short.

As good as Space Marine 2 is in terms of gameplay it's just too short. Calgar also feels like he's "Just there". Yet the game makes it out like he's known the player very well. Treating the player like some kind of hero at the end is not the same as actually having character depth with context. I bet people want to see more of someone like Calgar, but if the series just keeps going "Leave it at implications" at the end of every game (as so many games do) then people are going to lose interest sooner or later. Because the game won't actually show any real meat with those characters. It's important to consider that people that are not fans of warhammer will have no idea who people like Calgar (or Tzeentch) are. Thus it's important for the game itself to provide context about that. Beyond "Random guy/boss showing up from nowhere".

Let's address the in the face multiplayer features. Since the game is forcing players to jump through extra hoops for the other PVE missions and dressing up then I stopped playing the game. Once I feel like I have to jump through extra hoops for single player content just to dress up my character, after failing to do a chaos god justice (in terms of plot. Not gameplay) then I'm done. That works in a game like "For Honor" because even if there's a campaign and multiplayer it focuses on one or the other. Without PVE. Space Marine 2 has PVE. Outside of the campaign. It's not "Multiplayer only" with the PVE missions. If you force features on players and make them jump through extra hoops then people are going to be put off due to everything being "obligated". EA is infamous for doing that for example. It's why it puts people off. Space Marine 1 never seemed like a game focused on multiplayer and coop being forced either. Make it an "addition". If Forumsoft can make it work with Dark souls and Eldne Ring, games that have PVP has a focus, then Space Marine can. It's the "obligations" people are going to take issue with. Regardless of the reasons or excuses for it. Just to dress up for playing with bots? Pass. Had this not been the case I might be telling myself I want to play the game more. Even with the single player flaws. Dark Souls 3 never presented these complications. Thus I kept playing it. That's the difference between making players feel obligated or not. Seriously, try playing Space Marine 2 offline. Popup after popup of "Play PVP or PVE before you even do the campaign". I get it, the game wants people to play PVE and PVP. But force it in players faces and that ends up making players feeling like they "have too" instead of "wanting too". More so when you make players have to sign up online JUST to dress up their characters. And that's if players only want to play with bots in PVE. And what happens if people aren't connected to the internet for whatever reason? I don't have to concern myself with that in a game like Dark Souls 3. Space Marine 2 seems to be leaning too much towards multiplayer at the expense of single player. A concern I didn't have with Space Marines 1. I don't mind the addition of multiplayer but I do mind it being so in the players face to the point it makes players feel obligated to be online just to dress up. And that's with online in the game being disabled. Can I go five seconds without it being crammed in my face like that? The last thing I want to do is play multiplayer if a game can't even let me dress my character first without obligations when it's bombarding me like that. Consider this long wall an example in that regard.

As for the enemies themselves, I have only good things to say there for the most part in terms of gameplay, certain objective missions aside. That reactor mission is just the worst. Swarmy enemies serve their purpose otherwise. Chaos marines put up a good fight. Lichter enemies (post boss) were too squishy on the second to hardest difficulty. I want to "fight" the enemy. Problem: Enemies stop coming and are limited in waves and numbers. The tyranids are an endless swarm aren't they? But they never seem to be an endless wave. I want to be knee deep in it. I want an endless hoard that I can keep fighting for as long as I don't touch an objective. Plenty of players want a fight to keep going. It's simple enough. "Do objective to stop swarm. Don't touch it to keep fighting." The only problem I see here is that the player can struggle with regaining health. But I'm sure that can be balanced out. Enemies dropping healing items. Minor healing per kill (grey health bar aside). Things like that. At the very least it's an idea for a survival game mode. Why limit yourself to scripted enemies coming in waves instead of living up to the full might of the tyranid swarm in an endless wave? If other games can pull it off and Space Marine 2 is working with an endless swarm then BE an endless swarm. If ammo and healing is the concern then work in drop pods with supplies and NPCs as backup. We get a bit of this in the last Tyranid mission. Guardsmen that keep coming from the doors. Tyranids that keep coming.

Space Marines 2 actually seems to draw inspritation from World War Z with the way the enemies tower over each other. Just need that "swarm factor". Really keep the enemy coming. From chaos as well as tyranids. I want an endless tide.

On a whole the game is a good game. In terms of gameplay alone the game does what it's intended to do in terms of gameplay. But again, it's just so bloody short. And due to the scripted enemies arriving at the same locations it's lacking replay value. I've played games since orignial doom so for me it's like playing another game with scripted events that I can predict and see incoming. Which a game like Remnant 2 manages to make more interesting due to special enemy types with elites and more RNG enemies where anything could be coming your way. I don't get that element of unpredictability and varitiy in Space Marine 2. Which, if added, would surely add to the games replay value.

It also doesn't help that the game shows three planets on the campaign map. Looking at the campaign missions alone we only seem to have two missions for two planets and just one for the third. So just at a glance people can see how few missions there are. At least when it comes to the campaign. PVE only missions don't count. Nor does "But it's part of the story" hold up. While that may be true it still doesn't excuse the fact the main missions are few, with a lack of character development for very important characters being lacking. No amount of extra PVE missions will change that. Only expanding on the main campaign itself will.

Honestly, I mostly just want to see Tzeentch be more involved beyond "boss fight here". I want a round 2 with bigger debates and tension against him. I want to see him try (maybe even succeed) with breaking a space marine. Go all out with it. Perhaps there can be DLC adding necrons as a faction while still having to deal with chaos. Something like that would really expand on the game. I'd likely get invested in the game again at that point.

Add in some different game mechanics (such as special elite enemies) and add some bigger DLC at some point and I see that working well. Remove the PVE obligations (at least for dressing up) and more people will be interested too. The less obligated players are the more they'll be playing. If the devs get on top of this when the game is still new then Space Marines 2 has the potential to expand into something that can last for a decade or longer with some TLC. A few patches expanding on the content can go a long way. Even older games have done that. It's proven to be effective.

Part of my concern with Tzeentch is that other games make the same mistake of having a boss "just show up" when they're the whole point of an entire game. Dragons Dogma 2 is guilty of this for example. While the first Dragons Dogma game nailed it better (Grigori made it all work). My theory is the devs couldn't find a voice actor good enough and didn't want to pay more when it comes to Tzeentch. But having Tzeentch say nothing is much worse then not even trying to make him say anything at all. Not so much as a "Foolish space marine" line from him. Can we have him do something? Anything other then "I try to hit you".

Good game in terms of gameplay mechanics. It does that well enough. But in terms of lore and character development, when it comes to some of the most important characters in all of warhammer then I can't say it's good in terms of lore with certain characters. Anyone else feel that way? The game picks up after the reactor mission, and gets more engaging right up until after the second Imurah fight. Then it seems to fall flat due to rushing everything. Before that point I was more invested. When it comes right down to it I want to see the big characters matter and mean something. With their own motivations from the chaos gods mouth.

[Get Jinxed]

Damn, to many words

[Alastair]

Hmmm so it seems the main issue you have is that Tzeentch doesn't do anything like talk or interact. But the thing is that is 100% accurate to how the Chaos Gods behave.

Thing is and as far as I can tell Tzeentch never actually appeared in the campaign. We were simply fighting Tzeentch aligned chaos entities. For example that big big bird thing at the end wasn't Tzeentch that was a Lord of Change, who are the Greater Daemons of Tzeentch.

The other guy Imurah was simply a Sorcerer Lord of the Thousand Sons Chaos Legion, who used the artefact to enhance his power, in order to allow him to summon and control said Lord of Change.

In general the Chaos Gods basically never directly interact, let alone talk with anyone. Unless you are a Primarch or maybe Abaddon. We simply aren't important enough to them.

BEYOND HERE IS JUST EXTRA RAMBLING.

To continue the biggest potential involvement that Tzeentch has, is potentially giving Leuze the knowledge in his dreams. Thing is that not only could that have actually been Imurah, that did it. But even if it was Tzeentch, giving people forbidden knowledge is fairly normal, especially for Tzeentch in particular.

A similar example is Khorne who sometimes gives random people power, without said person even knowing about it. Simply because it would be interesting. It happened in Warhammer 40,000: Fire Warrior to the main protagonist, though technically that is out of game information.