Like I’ve stated earlier than, there are too many Warhammer video games, and one of many huge downfalls of that carefree licensing is that when there are such a lot of video games popping out with the identical branding they only grow to be background noise. Which is a disgrace when one comes alongside that deserves to face out.
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate – Daemonhunters launched on PC earlier this week, and if all you noticed was its silly title and fundamental premise—it’s a turn-based 40K recreation the place you management Area Marines—you’d be forgiven for utterly ignoring it. In spite of everything, didn’t we simply play one among these?
Sure, we kinda did, however whereas Battlesector was extra of a recreation of the board recreation expertise, that includes bigger battles, Daemonhunters is attempting one thing else—straight-up cloning XCOM—and it doesn’t care how shamelessly it does it.
Whereas there’s an entire style of video games which might be XCOM “clones”, few are as express as Daemonhunters is. Actually each core system and menu on this recreation is lifted straight from Firaxis’ traditional, from a central base (that needs to be repaired and upgraded) to roster administration to the passage of time, proper on all the way down to little cutscenes for every dramatic battlefield second and a parasitic blight that’s rising over time and might’t be allowed to take over.
This can be a little bit of a disappointment. It’s so overt that it’s an actual stretch at instances to make the extra intimate XCOM formulation a thematic match for the grand, 40K-scale motion happening, and it’s fairly unhealthy that I can sit down with a completely totally different recreation made by a unique developer and never even want the tutorial as a result of, having performed XCOM, I do know what each button and command does.
However actually, in most methods I don’t care. I actually like XCOM, and I actually like 40K, and all the pieces XCOM does properly this recreation does virtually simply as capably. It does one thing XCOM—and Gears Ways simply to unfold the reward round—recognise as being important on this style, and that’s being stable, chunky and visceral. Your characters have actual weight and function on the map, and there’s nothing extra enjoyable on this recreation than opening a door, as a result of in Daemonhunters you don’t open doorways, you run as much as them and kick them along with your large Area Marine boots, smashing them into 1,000,000 items, and all the pieces goes WHOOSH and THUD and it guidelines.
It’s additionally, when not stretching itself skinny to suit the XCOM formulation, an amazing use of the 40K license. I might take or go away the character artwork, however the voice appearing is straight from the highest shelf of Foreboding Britishness, and your Marines actually come to life with their designs, weaponry and grim willpower to take care of a stiff higher lip irrespective of how a lot wild demonic shit is happening round them.
Most significantly, although, it’s a blast to play. Your Marines, every of them named and in a position to be levelled up and specialised, permit for an enormous quantity of tactical flexibility, which you’ll most undoubtedly want. Even Daemonhunters earliest missions will throw some goal curveballs at you, and the flexibility to impose sure restrictions—like taking part in a mission with three Marines as an alternative of 4—in return for larger post-mission rewards retains even probably the most fundamental encounters fascinating.
I’ve had a greater time with Daemonhunters than I’ve in a lengthy time with 40K, possibly even since Area Marine, its mixture of tactical brilliance—irrespective of how a lot of it’s borrowed—and an understanding of the license making this an important recreation for 40K followers, an important recreation for turn-based techniques followers and perfection for anybody discovering themselves trapped on the level these two venn diagrams overlap.
