Same here. The only friend I could play video games with is my dog, and I don't play with him because I hate losing. So, AI bots are important for me in games with a multiplayer component.Thanks for the answer
Sadly, all of my friends are no gamers, so I don't.... I start to wonder if it's worth just for (short) main campaign. I'm a bit sad, but well I have plenty of other games in my library I want to play. I will add the game on my wishlist and maybe one day
If I understand, PVE is cross platform (all I think, PS included) but PVP isn't.
I'd say that there's no rush. The game's selling really well, and will be around for a long time. What's available now is just the first part, with a lot of new missions planned for release in the future.
I didn't really have any expectation, because I didn't play SM1. I've thought about picking it up while it's on a deep discount right now ($12 on GOG, $15 on Steam).
SM2 has a number of balance issues in my opinion, but I do like the core gameplay and I love the environments. I've stopped playing it for the moment, but I think it has a lot of potential. I'm hoping that the big patch coming later this month that adds private lobbies also fixes some of the balance issues.
If we let us to become cynics, then the question is: is this game worth about $100, for example, or not? )
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I think, the game design industry is bogged down in some framework that there's just no one to outline. It seems to me that what is needed here is both a person familiar with the game industry, and at the same time a person from the outside, with an unclouded view. It is he who will correctly set all the accents, correctly outline the framework and show the deadlock in which the game industry has driven itself, and he will do it using the right language, the right system of terms. So far there is no such person...
The point of my post is that games are similar to each other, and their creators follow some strange, not explicitly defined models, solutions that objectively exist (long enough), but are not labelled by anyone. It's like archetypes in the collective unconscious, like childhood complexes or post birth traumas )) There's something like that, but you'd be hard pressed to identify it.
Meanwhile, these models permeate literally all components of modern games: graphics (or what is now called graphics), game interface, character's motor skills.. As far as I'm concerned, Spacemarine, Stalker 2, Lost Arc, Valheim, Starfield...they're all the same in some way. Good thing Cyberpunk is the exception to the rule - at least for now ).
I'm ‘excited’ about many things in the game, but in particular: what is the Space Marine supposed to do when he's surrounded by enemies and cutting through their bodies? The developers' answer - he should slow down!!! The battle scene should be thinned out with micropauses ‘to allow the player to enjoy the nuances of the graphics’...How did we used to play without such a slowdown in our early days!
At least you can tell yourself that! I know quite a few people who have been waiting for Space Marine 2 for quite a while now, and...have been "disappointed" too. So, they don't have the courage to be honest about how they feel! Now can't admit to themselves that the game is not what they wanted, mildly speaking. Funny and bitter to watch.
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I do agree that the game needs to provide a better mechanism not to get surrounded. I didn't play SM1, but from what I've read, the player had a kick mechanic to clear out room around them. I don't have much problem avoiding getting surrounded by just dodging backwards or to an open side, but somehow that doesn't seem very Space Marine to me. A kick would feel better.
The game has plenty of mechanisms to avoid being swarmed.
It's all about using the right weapons and positioning yourself correctly.
The chainsword has multiple combos to clear swarms. A quick attack followed by a strong attack will result in a kick. Two quick attacks followed by a strong attack will result in a shoulder bash. Both of these will clear nearby enemies. Three quick attack followed by strong attack will result in a powerful ground stomp that will send enemies flying all around you. The longer the combo, the bigger the AoE effect basically.
The power sword has both a single target and an AoE mode.
The thunderhammer will clear anything from around you with large swings.
The power fist has it's own set of room clearing combos but is only available in MP.
Granted the "knife" is a lot more single target focused and it sucks against swarms. Clearly you should be avoiding it in SP as much as possible. It can be used against swarms but it's really terrible. Then again, the game tells you that right off the bat.
That's just the melee options too, throw in a melta gun and you're clearing swarms in no time.
While you may feel a dodge isn't very space marine like, it very much is. They are walking tanks but they are also genetically enhanced so much that they can be extremely fast too. Furthermore, this particular chapter of SMs is known for it's expertise in tactial adaptability. While certain chapters would prefer taking a hit head on, an ultra marine will dodge if it gives him tactical advantage. It makes perfect sense to dodge. Or you can kick if you want. Plus, lore-wise, a lot of the Tyranids have weapons that will slice through ceramite armor like a hot knife through butter, dodging makes a lot of sense.
The game does require you to adapt on the fly, much more than the first game ever did and to some people that's an issue, personally I welcome it. Even the antenna mission you mentioned earlier. Had a bit of trouble at first, then I notice there is a bolt rifle with a grenade launcher when you turn right off the elevator. 2-3 grenades would clear the antennas. Then you only need to clear the enemies. It suddenly became easy peasy. That's on Angel of Death.
The first game was a much more "arcade" game. It was really just a "go-in, bash skulls in" game. A very good one for it's time to be fair. I see it as the same evolution that God of War went through between the 4th game and the 2016 reboot.
I'll have to look for the grenade launcher. That would definitely make the antenna mission easier. Although, wouldn't the grenades destroy the antenna? Well anyway, I'll have to try it.
As for the Tyranids, I admit that I didn't know a lot about them going into the game. I've been trying to do some reading, and it turns out that they're definitely bad news. I was hoping for them to be introduced into Rogue Trader at some point, but after reading about them, I don't think my main Psyker would survive very long against them, at least not if it's lore accurate.
In other game news, Thursday evenings are my mental downtime, when I'm looking to chill. If anybody is looking for a beautiful, low stress game, I recommend giving American Truck Simulator a look. It's from the same company that produces Euro Truck Simulator, but is in the wide open spaces of the Western U.S. states. So, rather than trying not to hit guard rails on narrow European expressways, you just sort of zone out while driving along and looking at the scenery, and listening to either your favorite music or a real-world radio station.
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No need to worry about damaging the antennas, friendly fire is turned off during the SP campaign and that includes the antennas. Whether it's the grenade launcher I spoke of or your hand grenades. If you can find krak grenades during the mission, they would also work wonders but that would mean not using them until the antenna part as I don't recall any on the platform.
That's the only thing that doesn't make any sense with game's story.
Saber did an incredible job faithfully adapting what a Tyranid invasion looks like but, since it's a game and people want to feel heroic and win, they made it so and I understand that. But by doing that, I think they failed to show how much of a threat a Tyranid invasion actually is. Especially for people like yourself who don't necessarily know much about the universe. If memory serves, canonically, there are only two instances of a full on Tyranid invasion being repelled. In both cases, the two imperial worlds had weeks/months to prepare and a garrison of over ten thousand space marine (a concentration of SMs that hadn't been seen since the days of the Horus heresy 10K years earlier) with millions of well prepared guardsmen fighting with them. Outside of these two instances, victory against a full scale Tyranid invasion is measured in whether you get away with your life or not.
In this case you have a few hundreds SMs stretched thin over two worlds. Wining is canonically impossible. A single hive ship can easily contain billions of individuals. Every source of biomass (even their own dead) is recycled and used to create more Tyranids. They are an unstoppable, endless, tide of ravenous creatures that obliterate worlds. Canonically, there is only one faction that truly stands a chance against them and it's not the Imperium. That other faction also doesn't give two shits about the nids.
As much as I would like to see an actual, faithfully represented, Tyranid invasion in Rogue Trader, loss and all, I think Owlcat made the right decision going with "just" a Genestealer cult. Outside of the fact "regular" humans wouldn't be able to handle a Tyranid invasion, there is the game aspect of it all and the game engine just isn't the right medium for that. On the bright side, I've no doubt that Owlcat will faithfully represent the horrors of a Genestealer cult.
I'm looking forward to the failure of Borderlands 4 or whatever comes out starting now )).
I have my little idea* but I could be wrong, my knowledge about W40K is quite limited, so just to know, what's the faction which could stands a chance against Tyranids?
*Could this be the one we meet at the very end of Rogue Trader?
It's the Necrons.
The Tyranids need organic life to produce biomass which they in turn use to produce more Tyranids. The Necrons being essentially robots, are not organic thus unusable to produce more 'nids. Furthermore, their weapons obliterates organic matter. Meaning the Tyranids can't use their own dead to produce more 'nids. That's not necessarily an automatic win for the Necrons, the Tyranids are still able to fight the Necrons just fine based on numbers alone but they are effectively the only faction that can negate the Tyranids biggest strength.
But, they don't care about the Tyranids. They don't need to eat, they don't need organic life thus they don't care if the Tyranids devastate the entire galaxy and rid it of all life. They could go back to their tombs and sleep for another 60 millions years at which point the Tyranids would have destroyed everything (assuming no other faction finds a way to stop them) and moved on to greener pastures and reclaim what used to be theirs. Obviously, that's not going to happen because that would be an incredibly boring way of ending the 40k universe but it's theoretically possible.
There is also the Orks, which are theoretically the only other faction right now that could stand a chance against the Tyranids. They're the only ones which share the 'nids strength of being an endless tide but that would require them to unite under a single warboss and the most likely scenario if they were to unite is grinding down the Tyranid advance to a halt. Effectively becoming an endless slaugther where neither side is losing or gaining ground. The Orks uniting under a single warboss is a huge "if" though. They just don't work that way lol.
There is more to all of this than what I'm putting here, especially about a possible united Ork kind vs. Tyranids but I don't want to bore y'all with too much details lol.
I hope that they weren't counting on the recent Borderlands movie to generate interest for Borderland's 4. If they were, then "failure" is probably an understatement.
Yeah, for what it was, I was having fun with the game. The problem is that I played the living toofus out of Space Marine 1 and absolutely loved it. Many times over the course of the last 23 years. It was an almost perfectly balanced game based on being offensive the entire time to stay alive. There was no "block" button and no "parry" mechanic. There were no "medkits" or chances for revival. That's what the 2 tons of armor you were wearing was for. If you were low on health and seconds from going down, you didn't take cover or worry about protecting yourself from enemy attacks...you activated Righteous Fury mode and went on the complete offensive, executing enemies in an unbroken chain to get full health and armor back and annihilating the entire enemy force in front of you in a few, golden seconds.
It wasn't that the first game was easy, by any means. There were many sections that were brutally challenging, especially on the higher difficulties, and you would be killed in a heartbeat if you weren't careful. You had to prioritize targets, be aware of heavy fire coming your way, and make sure you dodged rockets or plasma rounds, which would both stagger and be able to kill you in 2-3 hits. But the thing that set SM1 apart was that you could only deal with those situations by attacking even more fiercely -- and that resulted in both amazingly fluid gameplay and an incredible sense of power. It was an often stiff challenge that resulted in a total power fantasy after almost every fight.
...
By comparison, Space Marine 2 does the exact opposite. You're an extremely fragile character that must try to avoid being hit at all times. You cant trade blows with more dangerous enemies; you need to go completely on the defensive, dodging and blocking, and wait for those rare windows to make an attack of opportunity. You will be hunting medikits and Golden Relics like they're the most valuable thing in the world (unless you're playing the Bulwark or specifically relying on ranged attacks). You're actively punished for being directly aggressive and going directly for important targets -- especially in melee. Everything in SM2 is about being cautious and careful, remaining defensive, being sure you don't take more damage than you need to, and relying on "help" if you get bumps and bruises. With this core design, it could not be much further from everything that made SM1 fantastic. I spent the first 5-6 missions feeling: "Oh...you can't...? Why is there no way to...? They just aren't damaged by...? I have to wait to use my jump pack until...?" It's not a succession of the first game's mechanics; it's a completely different game that is far more tame and delicate at its core. That creates frustration instead of fun for those expecting an experience that follows SM1.
Now, all of that being said -- it's cool! SM2 is by no stretch of the imagination a bad game. It has made one, critical mistake: it chose to wear the mantle of "Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine". For players that have little to no experience with the first game, there's no issue, as they don't know what they're missing. Or if players didn't like the first game, this may be exactly what they were looking for. SM2 is a solid and challenging squad-based, horde shooter and an absolutely gorgeous visualization of the WH40K universe...but it ain't no "Space Marine" nuthin'. Once again, a game (or film, or television show) has taken the masterwork of others and piggy-backed on it to do their own thing, resulting in something that is far, far away from what made the source material successful.
It's not "bad". It's like biting into something that is labeled a "gormet chocolate chip cookie". It looks like a chocolate chip cookie. But when you bite into it -- what the @#$%! -- it's an oatmeal raisin cookie. I like oatmeal raisin cookies! But not when I was expecting a chocolate chip cookie. Now, I need to wait for my brain to reset and try it again for what it is. But I can already tell, I will never enjoy it as much as SM1. In fact, I just played SM1 again to see if I was being nostalgic or something. Had an absolutely incredible time with it yet again. They are very different games.
A lot of truth to it.
For my part, I was never a fan of the SM series, but I remember the first part too. For me personally, this one, SM-2, was an attempt to transition, to move me so to speak, into a new world - and it failed. I won't say that the game is bad - it's just not my game and apparently it will never be. I can't stand it when game authors try to decide something for me or push me to do something, and that's exactly what happened here. In SM 2 you are given ranged weapons - and they are never enough to solve problems (well, I'm a fan of guns, riflemen, grenade launchers, etc.). You'll still have hordes of new enemies coming at you all the time, and you have to fight them in hand-to-hand combat. And then you are forced to dodge and block, which I generally don't like either. I don't play Wukong either, and I won't just because of the same logics. And they also shove the lore of the game into my head (I've seen all these factions of super-warriors in the grave, I don't care about them, I don't want to dig into their universe!) And this particular form of realisation of ‘cold weapon combat’... this chain sword. Holy arahants.
It's unacceptable.
I'm broken ) Give 2 hours of my life back!
I agree it's "unacceptable" as a direct sequel to Space Marine.
As a "Helldivers 2" clone set in the WH40K universe, it's pretty good. I really wish this had just been released as a standalone game instead of riding on the first game's curtails. It set expectations it couldn't live up to. I don't think it tried to live up to them. I think they went with the Titus stuff because they knew it would sell more copies, but they clearly had no intention of following suit with the gameplay at all.
Absolutely.
I don't even want to dive into the infernal abyss of Reddit, and read there all the things that users think about Warhammer now, just so I don't get too upset.
Actually, maybe they should throw in an idea: let them better make Starcraft in first person?
After all, it's more the Starcraft universe than WH40K, isn't it? Although...what exactly would they do?...))
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I strongly disagree here.
Not only on the idea that the game isn't a good successor to SM1 but on using Titus to sell more copy because, simply put, the first game couldn't make you care for Titus if your life depended on it. He was a typical jarhead Space Marine with zero depth and an unknown resistance to the warp. I have a hard time believing anyone was more interested in the game because of Titus, let alone buy the game because Titus came back. It certainly allowed to delve deeper into him as a character at least. Not that much deeper but he's a more likeable sort now but had it been an entirely different marine, I doubt most would have cared even one bit.
Gameplay is certainly different and, while you dislike that, I personally like that it's not in the same vein of game. The first SM was very good.... 13 years ago. I played the crap of the game back then but I don't want that arcadey gameplay in 2024. I expect more and I got exactly what I wanted. A deeper game requiring more than just rushing in and bashing my way through Orks. Again, it was a lot of fun in 2011 but I don't want that in 2024. It's entirely fair that you don't like the change, to each his own after all, but game series have to evolve to remain relevant and I honestly don't think a game like SM1 would have fared nearly as well as SM2 is doing right now.
It's not.
It's well documented by now that the original Warcraft game was almost a Warhammer fantasy game. It's heavily inspired by Warhammer Fantasy. WH40K was released September 87. Starcraft was released a decade later and while it certainly was inspired by other major science fiction of the time like H.R Giger's Aliens and Heinlein's Starship Troopers, there is no doubt WH40K was a huge source of inspiration for Starcraft's universe.
I haven't played Helldivers unfortunately, it's hard for me to judge here. But I have played the first versions of Starcraft, Warcraft and Dune. And I don't know whether to talk about successful or not successful cloning, thus attracting arguments to justify Spacemarine 2, too wide field for speculation is opened here. I think the failure should remain a failure, and the company should get a full-fledged blow from the game's fans, because too many expectations were attached to the game, and too many hopes were buried.
The key question is what Saber Interactive will do now, now that's something that could be of some interest in the future.