[STEAM] Most of Those Creepy Flying Things in Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 Aren’t Lobotomized Babies — the Truth Is Much Weirder

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has broken free from the shackles of its Warhammer 40,000 setting and made inroads into the gaming mainstream, and that means there are plenty of players new to its grim dark far future.

For them Space Marine 2 is a somewhat bewildering experience, as it leans on much of the lore that Warhammer 40,000 owner Games Workshop has built over decades, with hundreds of novels, rule books, and magazine articles fleshing out the background fans know intimately.

Warhammer 40,000 fans have enjoyed seeing newcomers react in shock at just how grim and dark Space Marine 2 is. And it’s not just the extreme gore, mass ******, and terrifying alien enemies that appear in the game either. Perhaps the most disturbing element of Space Marine 2 that newcomers are seeing for the first time are lobotomized *******.

In Space Marine 2, I really respect how cherubs are one of the first sights to see when on the barge. It's a good tone setter for those who don't really know what they're in for

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— Iggy (@IgnacioVitalis)

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A tweet from Forbes writer Paul Tassi, below, sums up the reaction to Space Marine 2’s winged *******, who seemingly fly about the Battle Barge, the spaceship on which the Space Marines live and plan their missions, performing monotonous busywork.

uhhh what

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— Paul Tassi (@PaulTassi)

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On the face of it, the apparent “good guys” of Space Marine 2’s story have lobotomized ******* cleaning up their mess. Sound messed up? Welcome to Warhammer 40,000’s Imperium of Man, a fascist regime always on the brink of extinction and an extreme vision of the far future in which pretty much anything goes.

Warhammer 40,000 is intended to be grim and dark, and so stuff like this is par for the course (lobotomized ******* aren't close to being the most disturbing thing in the setting, if you fancy some light reading, check out what the Drukhari get up to in their spare time). Space Marine 2's far future is a truly ********** place to be, a place in which countless humans **** every day from all manner of horrors, be those alien, ******, or humans themselves. Humanity, bogged down by excruciating bureaucracy and religious fanaticism, has collapsed. There is no respite, no joy, only inevitable ******.

With that in mind, Warhammer 40,000 fans are used to things like a “lobotomized ******* menial cyborg flying baby,” as X/

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user ChronoTheHarlequin pointed out. The thing is, with this one in particular, it gets even weirder.

Seeing tweets like these kinda make me realize how numb I’ve gotten to the weird ***** in 40k.

“Lobotomized ******* menial cyborg flying baby” isn’t something I’d even flinch at now

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— ChronoTheHarlequin (@ChronoHarlequin)

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As the unofficial Warhammer podcast Adeptus Ridiculous clarified, most of these things aren’t actually lobotomized *******. Most are built from the ground(?) up as flesh automatons with computers for brains (A.I is banned in the 40th millennium because of... reasons). Why do they look like *******? Apart from Warhammer 40,000 being all heavy metal and gothic, according to the lore, it’s for “ceremonial purposes.”

Don't worry, most of them are not actually lobotomized *******, most are built from scratch as flesh automatons with computers for brains and just made to look like ******* for ceremonial purposes.

Most of them.

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— Adeptus Ridiculous (@AdRidiculous)

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I’m loving Space Marine 2 and its attention to detail. The developers at Saber clearly love Warhammer 40,000 and made the effort to capture its oppressive, soul destroying atmosphere. I’ve particularly enjoyed the flavor dialogue you hear from the humans who are charged with keeping the Battle Barge afloat. Some bemoan a lack of sleep because of how hard they’re forced to work. Others express concern at the prospect of making even a single mistake. Given the truly ********** galaxy in which they live, these chaps are the lucky ones. And don’t get me started on the servitors.

We’ve got plenty more Space Marine 2 coverage, including

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, its

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, and the upcoming addition of class matching for co-op, after

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.

Image credit: Games Workshop.

Wesley is the *** News Editor for IGN. Find him on

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at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld.

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