Space Marine 2 launched proper yesterday, September 9 after four days of early access, and soon shot to record-breaking success for a Warhammer 40,000 game.
Saber Interactive’s action game sees Titus of the Ultramarines go up against the Tyranid horde as well as Chaos Marines in a sequel that arrives 13 years after its predecessor. It includes a campaign that can be played co-op, co-op focused Operations, and a PvP mode.
Space Marine 2 saw a huge 24-hour peak concurrent player count of 225,690 on Steam, the highest peak ever seen for a Warhammer 40,000 game on Valve’s platform, alongside a ‘very positive’ user review rating. Indeed, Space Marine 2 is now the most-played Warhammer 40,000 or Warhammer game ever on Steam. To put the launch into context, Space Marine 2 knocked Total War: Warhammer 3’s 166,754 peak concurrents into second place.
Of course, Space Marine 2’s true concurrent peak will be even higher, given the game launched on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S also. The expectation is Space Marine 2 will enjoy even bigger concurrents as it heads into its first weekend following the global release.
This week, Saber and publisher Focus Interactive detailed Space Marine 2’s first update, which will hopefully fix server problems and crashes, among other things. IGN has reported on the upcoming addition of class matching for co-op, after players found themselves locked in a class standoff ahead of Operations mode missions.
Meanwhile, we also have details on what fans can expect from Space Marine 2’s seasonal post-launch content model. Season 2 runs from October until the end of 2024, and includes a new Operations map, a new enemy, a harder difficulty level, a new weapon, and various other improvements.
IGN's Space Marine 2 review returned an 8/10. We said: "Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 may not break the third-person shooter mold, but it looks amazing, makes good use of its Warhammer lore, and has brutal combat that just feels great."
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
