Space Marine: And they shall know no fear

Engine Room: We've had a sneak peak of the next Warhammer 40,000 game, Space Marine, and it's looking like the best 40k game yet.

The grim dark future of the Warhammer 40,000 universe is no stranger to our PC screens. Games of every scale have been set in Games Workshop's fanciful pastiche of sci-fi tropes, from epic strategy games to claustrophobic corridor shooters. Until Relic's relatively recent foray into the Dawn of War games, 40k, as it's known to its fans, has never really been a mainstream hit with computer gamers, but that's all changed now. DoW has gotten a tonne of critics awards, and Dawn of War II currently has a Metacritic rating of 85. But for all that the setting's now a hit, there's never been a 40k game like Space Marine.

Following E3 in June, THQ flew us up to sunny Vancouver for a visit to Relic's studio to get a sneak peak of how the game's shaping up. Just walking into the office you know these guys are serious - the eight foot tall faux stone statue of a marine is one giveaway, and the lifesize and lifelike suit of power armour in the other corner of reception is another giveaway.

But when we sat down for our demo, we got a true sense of just how excited the Relic team is about Warhammer.

The right team for the job
The current crop of devs working on a game are like a who's who of the industry. Not only are there Relic veterans from the Dawn of War series working on the game, but the company's sought out talent from the likes of EA, Ubisoft, Rockstar and even Microsoft. These are some serious industry heavy hitters who get gaming on a deep level, and what's more, they're loving the game they're working on - always a good sign!

"What we have building this game," said Andy Lang, one of the producers at Relic, "is a really passionate group of people, who love Space Marine, and really love Warhammer 40,000." In fact, more than once during our time in the studio and chatting with the Relic crew the subject of their tabletop armies would often come up. These guys are really living and breathing the hobby. They get the game's subject matter on a deep level - and we say that as passionate 40k fans ourselves.

"The Warhammer 40,000 universe is a lot like the Roman Empire," another producer, Raphael van Leirop explained to us, "you've got this expanding power in the shape of the human Imperium, spreading out into the galaxy and finding out about the alien threats out there." It's an interesting historical analogy, and apt, too. "And so you've got all these alien threats pushing back now, and really, humanity's now on the edge, and there's only one thing that stands between the Imperium and extinction - the Space Marines," he goes on to say - giving us goosebumps, incidentally, but we're nerdy like that - before adding: "Like the famous Games Workshop saying says, 'In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war'."

"And this is the world we're bring you into in Space Marine."

What is a Space Marine?
Adeptus Astartes. Angels of Death. Space Marines.

The elite super soldiers of the Imperium of Man go by many names, and come from many chapters (semi-monastic military orders), but they all have one thing in common - they kick major butt.

They are genetically modified, armed with the best equipment the Imperium can forge, and loyal to the point of death. According to the deep and at times complex background of the 40k universe, when the Emperor of Humanity decided he needed an elite cadre of warriors, he created the Primarchs, 20 superhuman clones of himself with enough drift in their forms to be independent and different. From the Primarchs came the geneseed that is implanted into each acolyte Marine, and in turn boosts their muscle growth and bone density, mental acuity, resilience, and lifespan.

With you playing one of these Angels of Death, Relic's gone to great pains to understand what makes a Marine tick.

"Marines are a really interesting collection of warrior archetypes," Raphael told us. "They're bound by honour like Samurai, serious and devout like knights and steeped in their own mythology, and disciplined like the Roman legions - expert tacticians on the battlefield."

"They're also relentless, like the Spartans, and they will never stop or give up," he said. "They are the pinnacle of 10,000 years of warfare, and this is the role you get to take in Space Marine."

Can we play now, please? No? Okay, we'll just keep talking about the game then...