- 1,963
- Hereward
- Herewward
This one sneaked out under the cover of darkness, or rather under the cover of Resistance 3's tidal media........Shame really, as it's a better game, ok ok I take that back, put the pitchforks down and extinguish the tourches LOL
So what is space marines? well think gears of war then expand it! Going back 40k space marines started out as a gamesworkshop board game back in 1987 and is still going strong today, this however is the first incarnation on the modern consoles and as such it captures the imagery and feel of the game which has developed over the past 24 years........if you want to know how influental the warhamer 40k game serise and the space marines have been in gameing then look no further than the likes of Halo or Gears of war or prety much the majority of space based shooters, you'll find a nod towards the 40k series in most of them!
So the game, well it's the standard third person shooter fair with added slashy bits and a large sprinkleing of story, Which is a key part, the story has been writen by the games workshop team rather than relic the game desighners, drawing on the large number of novels and the detailed history of the game for inspiration, this translates into an involveing story line in campaighn mode which is a refreshing change for most shooters. There is then of course the online aspect of the game.........
Online is split into 2, the usual adverseral modes where the space marines face of against the chaos marines and then theres the co-op mode which uses the current trend of "zombie" mode, or horde style gameplay, 4 of you go against the horde, but there are a few twists with missions being given as the battle rages on. Ok all sounds prety standard apart for one thing, the Customizer..........
The customizer adds that little extra, for those who know of the board game will know that the modeling and painting of the figures would be more time consuming than the game itself and for some would be the main draw to 40k. Well relic have graced the game with what can be best described as the Forza customizer for shooters! Your online marine, both space and chaos can be custom made to a rediclious level, from simply selecting one of the myriad marine pre "painted" leigons down to custom painting a marine and changeing various parts of his armour which are unlocable as you perform certain criteria in the game. They have so faithuly recreated this that they have even recreated the gamesworkshop paints and inks! Ok you had to be there to apreciate this LOL
So the game..........well single player is reportadly about 10 hours long if you just run through it on easy, medium will start to get hard about halfway through, whilst hard will have your bolter melting and your chain sword gloged with ork gore! aditionaly there is a sub mission of collecting hidden "easter eggs" or com skulls in this case which all hold recorded messages that deepen the story, well worth the effort to hunt them all down. Game play wise you have a large selection of weapons of the usual variety, and even jet packs.....but when the enemy crashes over your positions then it's hack and slash time as things turn gorey.
Multiplayer works especialy well, with the space marines faceing of against the chaos marines in either a death match senario or point capture senario, with many unlocks both visual and "perks" the battle feild is quite a sight to behold, maps are well thought out with a good mix of huge and small play areas, there are issues at the moment though but relic seems to be ontop of it with patches in QA already. The co-op aspect will be released in about 3 weeks time as a free DLC, other DLC in the form of special legion characters are already on the US PSN priced at 90c, not esential, don't give any advantage but if you want one then there there.
So finaly.......you lot actualy read this far? I'm impresed! well the scores on the door.........It's prety useless me giving you a mark out of 10, I'm an old fan of 40k so I'm hugely biased, love the game, if you've never heard of 40k then alot of the referances will be lost on you both in the story and the whole graphical look of the game, I'd put it on par with gears of war but with a better online aspect. you may find the story less acesable than gears though with no prior knowledge of it. Online is turning out to be very tactical though very quick paced, unlocking the right perk and matching it with the right weapon and character class is everything so as a noob expect to strugle until you hit around the mid teens level wise.
Last word, I would say some of the videos of the gameplay are a little deceiveing in that they tend to show you wadeing in hacking and slashing....that usualy only happens either if thats your thing or if you've been over run, most of the time you'll be unloading huge amounts of ammo into the enemy and they won't get close to you......you can of course scream "for the emperor" and run headlong at them with your power axe swinging LOL There is a demo on PSN which gives a flavour of things but without the background story it's a bit detached and theres alot of graphical "polish" missing which is in the final game.
So what is space marines? well think gears of war then expand it! Going back 40k space marines started out as a gamesworkshop board game back in 1987 and is still going strong today, this however is the first incarnation on the modern consoles and as such it captures the imagery and feel of the game which has developed over the past 24 years........if you want to know how influental the warhamer 40k game serise and the space marines have been in gameing then look no further than the likes of Halo or Gears of war or prety much the majority of space based shooters, you'll find a nod towards the 40k series in most of them!
So the game, well it's the standard third person shooter fair with added slashy bits and a large sprinkleing of story, Which is a key part, the story has been writen by the games workshop team rather than relic the game desighners, drawing on the large number of novels and the detailed history of the game for inspiration, this translates into an involveing story line in campaighn mode which is a refreshing change for most shooters. There is then of course the online aspect of the game.........
Online is split into 2, the usual adverseral modes where the space marines face of against the chaos marines and then theres the co-op mode which uses the current trend of "zombie" mode, or horde style gameplay, 4 of you go against the horde, but there are a few twists with missions being given as the battle rages on. Ok all sounds prety standard apart for one thing, the Customizer..........
The customizer adds that little extra, for those who know of the board game will know that the modeling and painting of the figures would be more time consuming than the game itself and for some would be the main draw to 40k. Well relic have graced the game with what can be best described as the Forza customizer for shooters! Your online marine, both space and chaos can be custom made to a rediclious level, from simply selecting one of the myriad marine pre "painted" leigons down to custom painting a marine and changeing various parts of his armour which are unlocable as you perform certain criteria in the game. They have so faithuly recreated this that they have even recreated the gamesworkshop paints and inks! Ok you had to be there to apreciate this LOL
So the game..........well single player is reportadly about 10 hours long if you just run through it on easy, medium will start to get hard about halfway through, whilst hard will have your bolter melting and your chain sword gloged with ork gore! aditionaly there is a sub mission of collecting hidden "easter eggs" or com skulls in this case which all hold recorded messages that deepen the story, well worth the effort to hunt them all down. Game play wise you have a large selection of weapons of the usual variety, and even jet packs.....but when the enemy crashes over your positions then it's hack and slash time as things turn gorey.
Multiplayer works especialy well, with the space marines faceing of against the chaos marines in either a death match senario or point capture senario, with many unlocks both visual and "perks" the battle feild is quite a sight to behold, maps are well thought out with a good mix of huge and small play areas, there are issues at the moment though but relic seems to be ontop of it with patches in QA already. The co-op aspect will be released in about 3 weeks time as a free DLC, other DLC in the form of special legion characters are already on the US PSN priced at 90c, not esential, don't give any advantage but if you want one then there there.
So finaly.......you lot actualy read this far? I'm impresed! well the scores on the door.........It's prety useless me giving you a mark out of 10, I'm an old fan of 40k so I'm hugely biased, love the game, if you've never heard of 40k then alot of the referances will be lost on you both in the story and the whole graphical look of the game, I'd put it on par with gears of war but with a better online aspect. you may find the story less acesable than gears though with no prior knowledge of it. Online is turning out to be very tactical though very quick paced, unlocking the right perk and matching it with the right weapon and character class is everything so as a noob expect to strugle until you hit around the mid teens level wise.
Last word, I would say some of the videos of the gameplay are a little deceiveing in that they tend to show you wadeing in hacking and slashing....that usualy only happens either if thats your thing or if you've been over run, most of the time you'll be unloading huge amounts of ammo into the enemy and they won't get close to you......you can of course scream "for the emperor" and run headlong at them with your power axe swinging LOL There is a demo on PSN which gives a flavour of things but without the background story it's a bit detached and theres alot of graphical "polish" missing which is in the final game.
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