Space Marine 2 has finally arrived, over a decade after its predecessor, and it wastes no time explaining anything about the setting, it knows that the chatter between and during missions will be enough to make sense of what’s going on.
It’s an accurate assumption, and the story isn’t confusing at any point, letting you focus on what’s truly important: scouring humanity’s foes anywhere they would appear.
That doesn’t mean, however, that some things can’t be elaborated upon, as there are many proper names without context, and many references without explanation. So let’s take a look at some of them, to help you get the most out of your Space Marine 2 experience.
This article will include SPOILERS for Space Marine 1 and elements of the SM2 campaign. They will be clearly marked whenever they appear.
Let’s get stuck in!
All 40.000 Warhammers: what is the setting about?
The first thing you need to know about Warhammer 40.000 is that it’s extremely over-the-top. It’s a blend of fantasy and science fiction tropes, as well as reimagined references to classics such as 2000 AD, Dune, and Starship Troopers. Keep the last one in mind, it’ll be relevant later.
Most of the “current” events of the setting take place in the 41 millennium, as the title suggests. There’s always a war happening somewhere, because the Milky Way galaxy happens to be home to numerous factions with mostly incompatible motivations and objectives.
The setting mixes styles and inspirations like a good bartender mixes drinks, with futuristic-looking mecha and space ships on one side, demons and sorcerers on the other, with lumbering machines looking like a cross between Battletech and neo-Gothic cathedrals somewhere in-between.
As WH40k is at its core a tabletop miniature wargame, each mini needs to be easily identifiable, which lent itself to the setting’s strong, distinct aesthetic both in general, and for each faction individually. When translated to high-detailed art, which includes video game assets, it creates a world that couldn’t be mistaken for any other universe.
For the purposes of understanding Space Marine 2, it’ll be enough to know three of these factions, and get the gist of two more, so let’s get to it.
Who’s who of the Space Marine 2 story
For such a focused story, SM2’s campaign has quite a roster, so let’s take a look at the Warhammer 40k factions relevant to the plot.
Space Marines
Space Marines, formally known as Adeptus Astartes, are cybernetically and bionically enhanced knights in bullet-marked power armor. They are the Imperium of Man’s most powerful warriors, more shock troops than a regular army.
Towering over regular humans, equipped with more and better organs, and undergoing extensive training and mental conditioning, they tend to appear on the most dire battlefields, usually to help turn the tide in humanity’s favor.
However, they don’t always play nice with other factions. They are also split into many, many chapters with about 1000 Marines on average, and these chapters aren’t all on friendly terms, despite nominally being on the same side.
The chapter featured in Space Marine 2 are the Ultramarines. They tend to be rather by the book, with the book in question being the Codex Astartes, a tome describing how Astartes should operate and conduct themselves.
Tyranids
Tyranids are probably the least complicated faction of WH40k. They are, essentially, big, scary bug-adjacent aliens governed by a psionically potent hive mind. They come in galaxy-threateningly gigantic hive fleets, intent on consuming all biomass they can find to turn it into more Tyranids.
If you throw Xenomorphs from Alien, Bugs from Starship Troopers, a heap of general chitinous horror, and disturbing psychic powers, you’ll get Tyranids.
They have simple motivation, come in many terrifying bioforms capable of ending your life in many gruesome ways, and look like humanity’s primal fears made manifest. They are absolutely perfect SF monsters.
Oh, and they are older than Starcraft’s Zerg, just to set the record straight.
SPOILERS FOR THE SM2 CAMPAIGN
If you want to be surprised, CTRL F the following: [/SPOILERS] and jump ahead.
This is your final warning.
Okay? Okay.
The third major faction present in the games are the Chaos Space Marines, specifically from the Thousand Sons legion. 10.000 years before the events of the game, a massive civil war, called the Horus Heresy, tore apart Astartes Legions and threw the Imperium into its current state of affairs.
One of the legions who ended up allied to the malevolent gods in the hellscape known as the Warp were the Thousand Sons, aligned with the Architect of Fate himself, Chaos God Tzeentch.
In Space Marine 2 you’re mostly fighitng the Rubric Marines. They are the ones which burst into prismatic dust when killed. It’s not just a bit of convenient blood censorship.
For reasons too complicated to get into here, they are now barely more than automatons: once dignified Astartes turned into enchanted dust in a botched attempt to save them from mutation.
Nearly mindless on their own, they rely on Sorcerers to give them direction, a role filled by SM2’s big twist villain, Imurah.
What it means for the plot, you’ll either need to find out for yourself, or you already have.
Either way, let’s move on to the minor factions!
[/SPOILERS]
The Imperial Guard
The Imperial Guard is the regular army of the Imperium. They are just humans, nothing uniquely special about them. It’s the faction to go for if you’d prefer something less SF or fantasy.
They’ve got artillery for days, tanks and transport vehicles, and come in many themes, often inspired by real world historical armies, but not exclusively so.
In Space Marine you meet Imperial Guard regiments from Cadia, a recently destroyed planet. They are the soldier’s soldier: trained from infancy, with reliable gear, and a well-justified grudge against Chaos.
Adeptus Mechanicus
They have a limited, but hard to ignore, presence in the game. They are the cyborg technicians in red robes you meet during the campaign. Known as techpriests, they are the members of the Cult Mechanicus, a technocratic sect providing the Imperium with scientific and engineering expertise, which for them takes a form of religious devotion.
They perceive flesh as weak, which is why they all bear extensive cybernetic enhancements. In extreme cases, more than 90% of their body is replaced.
What’s up with this “Titus” fellow? (Space Marine 1 spoilers)
The story’s regular references to Titus’ old… adventures aren’t just mystery for mystery’s sake, at least if you’ve also played Space Marine 1. You don’t need to play SM1 to understand the sequel, but it will make many things less “vague backstory” and more “explicitly the story”.
Long story short, over a century before the events of Space Marine 2, an Imperial Forge world Graia was invaded by Orks. To aid defense efforts, a few Ultramarines, led by then-Captain Titus were sent to protect the Imperium’s interests.
Graia also happened to be a place for research conducted by Inquisitor Drogan, studying the same artifact you see ominously returning in SM2.
Late in the game, it turned out that the Inquisitor was actually serving Chaos Lord Nemeroth, who wanted to use the artifact to become a Deamon Prince, threatening the destruction of the entire planet in the process.
The aftermath
Titus managed to stop him, discovering his uncanny (and, from certain point of view, suspicious) resistance to inherently corruptive and dangerous Warp energy emanating from the item.
This led to him being reported to the Inquisition by his squad member, Leandros. Following the arrest, Titus was subject to tortures by the Inquisitor who responded to the report, and after being freed, served a long time with Deathwatch, an Astartes-only task force dealing with especially dangerous alien threats.
The rest plays out in SM2 itself, so you’re going to be up to date by just playing.
Primaris?
In case you’re wondering what the “Primaris” mentioned a few times in the game is, we’ve got your back.
Essentially, a Primaris Marine is an upgrade on the regular one: they are taller, stronger, use better equipment, a full suite.
They are a relatively new addition to the lore, but in-universe this program has been worked on for thousands of years and now starts to bear fruit. Pretty all Ultramarines you meet in the game are Primaris Astartes.
Next steps
This concludes our Warhammer 40k primer, or a least the “Space Marine 2 lore” version of it. Since WH40k is nearly forty years old, the lore is not only always expanding, it’s also always changing, and has done so many times, and quite substantially, since the first edition.
This doesn’t cover all the details, like why it was meaningful that Chairon was on Calth when Word Bearers attacked, but some things are worth discovering through a good wiki-walk, or playing one of many 40k video games, with many attractive offers waiting for you on the G2A Marketplace.