Let’s get the insignificant stuff out of the way Space Marine follows Captain Titus of the Ultramarines in his efforts to repel an Ork invasion on the Forge World Graia. An Orbital Bombardment might suffice but Graia is too crucial as it is directly responsible making Titans, big piloted bots that bring superb firepower to the battleground.
Humanity wants these weapons for their unending wars but they obviously can’t let the Orks take them so in come the Space Marines. Overall the tale is kind of good.
It’s reasonably simple with some twists and turns but the direct nature works in the games favour. There marines are only doing what they have to at each step and there isn’t any point where you need to scream at your TV as they do something monumentally foolish. Unless that is you have played the Dawning of War series. Then you’ll instantly be suspicious that some events will happen and they do. But it is not exasperating enough to spoil the experience. What may provoke some is the ending which is such follow up bait it’s nearly unpleasant but even this reasonably dour ending is in tone with the Warhammer forty thousand fiction. Melee combat is deadly thanks to the very amount of damage individual enemies can deal. Any individual melee Ork can do plenty of damage if you get caught ignorant and while you’ve got a good deal of health and a regenerating shield meter you will be shocked at how swiftly Titus can go down. So melee combat will be full of fast attacks, diving away, shocking enemies and then going in for the kill.
It’s really pretty thrilling. The 1st time you wipe out a grouping of enemies without taking any real damage will be an enjoyable time. Complicating matters is how you heal : Titus ‘ shields regenerate after avoiding damage for enough time but your fitness never regenerates.
The sole way to fix is to perform executions on enemies. This is both awe-inspiring and rather irritating. It’s awe-inspiring in that to fix you’ve got to stun enemies ( a requisite to do the execution ) then slam them to floor, stomping their face into gravy. Or gutting them with. Or cutting thru their midsection like a hot knife thru butter. While doing this blood will be splattering all over Titus leaving him looking like he washes in gore. But on the other hand Titus can still be damaged while performing executions so if you are in major need of healing a melee rush or sharpshooters can still bring you down as you despairingly try and heal. Last but definitely not least is the web multi player. It’s reasonably basic, pick from either a death match game mode or king of the hill and pick from 1 or 2 maps. Next select one of 3 classes ; one concentrating on heavy weapons, one concentrated on fast melee strikes and one that could be a mixture of the 2. Each class can have its load out specialised and there’s a surprisingly detailed personality customizer that can let you actually build your own special look for your personality. It’s pretty awe-inspiring. Since more unlocks over a period higher level characters can have wildly sundry weapons and gear. Overall it’s…
Well its fine. The most important thing about the gameplay of Space Marine is that it’s not that fast. Sure, you can run very fast or dodge but when making an attempt to exchange gunfire characters move stupendously slow. What this implies is that the combat is pretty much orientated toward the melee side of the equation. Running into melee range or employing a jump pack to get in close are much more effective than staying at range. This is doubly annoying as the key damage dealer, the Devastator, has to remain utterly immobile to use his heavy weapons at full efficacy. This leaves him a sitting duck for folk to close in and take him down. Graphically Space Marine is reasonably the heavyweight. All the main characters and most enemies are quite detailed down to the littler marks on their power armor. When pairing up the solid visuals with the liquid personality animations it only boosts the impact of the combat. But what truly sell the visuals are the environments.
If it’s the trashed wonder of a town, its gothic design in mess, or the rusted grace of a manufactorum ( factory for you laymen ) it truly feels like you are fighting your way thru the 40k universe.
