Forever Winter is a game that when I saw the concept art for the first time it immediately made me very excited for the game. Such an interesting and unique style. The atmosphere truly makes you feel like you are in one of the worst dystopian nightmares possible. The concept art is great and they pull it off in game too.

As for the early access game play, I am not going to lie, it's rough. I typically do not mention low performance or stutters in games but this one does have that, and it's quite prevalent. But honestly, I will deal with it. I see the potential this game has and it's astronomical. So I am more than happy to provide the developers with the support purchasing this game in early access provides them. I also have no doubt that Fun Dog is devoted to fixing these issues. I hate to use this line because it's the most common saying from people when someone calls out an early access game for it's flaws. However, I do think it applies here. This is an early access game, and when you are purchasing it, you are paying to playtest the game for the developers. You should not be expecting a polished and finished product. So only purchase if you are looking to support the developer and provide some play testing... and of course, enjoy the game early, despite it's issues.

With that said, I do truly believe that even if you find this game even somewhat interesting, you should consider purchasing it to support an indie developer with an amazing concept that has this much potential.

Space Marine 2 reminds me of great shooters from the 2000s and the early twenty-teens. Games like early Call of Duty's, Kill Zone, Halo, and Gears of War. Shooters that had the just the right amount of action and variety to be very enjoyable for their run time. As well as having stories that range from good to great. I would like to call attention to the mention of "their run time." This to me is a very key part of this. Space Marine 2, and the games I mentioned that it reminds me of, are all relatively short games when comparing them to a lot of modern day games. Which have run times that call well exceed fifty hours. While long run times are not necessarily a bad thing. I have found that shorter games have their place. Especially for people who do not have the time to finish a hundred plus hour epic anymore. I also believe that if Space Marine 2 was any longer then its ten to fifteen hour runtime it would start to become monotonous. It ends right as the enemy variety and mechanics are coming to the end of their ability to engage me. Perfectly timed!

However, that isn't to say once you finish the ten to fifteen hour main campaign that you uninstall this game and not think about it for two years until you think it may be fun to go back and experience it before the sequel comes out. It also comes shipped with both a Co-op PvE mode and a 5v5 PvP mode. Which again, reminds me of the fully fleshed out games of the past. These two modes offer quite a bit of variety and are pretty dang fun.

The PvE mode has you following a secondary group of space marines that run different missions that Titus (The main character) orders to have done during the main campaign. Which is a cool concept for these PvE missions. These missions follow a formula similar to that of Darktide's gameplay. You march to an objective taking out large groups of enemies and the occasional elite enemy or boss, then complete that objective. It works in Darktide and it works here! However, I would not think of the PvE mode as a Darktide clone, but it has the same type of "feel". Which is again a good thing if you like the tide games. I will say however, there are, at the time of writing this review, only six of these missions and the objective variety and enemy variety due become kind of stale after a few hours of gameplay. But I would assume this is going to get some post launch support that will address these issues. At least I would hope....looking at you FatShark. Overall the PvE mode is a good way to extend your time with the game. Especially, if you have a couple of friends to help you purge the filthy xenos.

Now the PvP mode I believe is the weakest part of this game. That's not to say it's bad. But I will say parts of this game are good or even great, While I would classify the PvP as, serviceable. It's a fairly standard 5v5 arena style third-person shooter with the game modes that you have come to expect out of the base rotation from the likes of Call of Duty. It has the same class structure as the Operations mode, were you have to level up each class to get access to it's other weapons and cosmetics. Again, very standard stuff here. What I feel is the most rough part of the PvP, is that some of the classes just feel way to good, or I guess you could take the stance that the other classes feel bad. I assume this will also receive some post launch balance. But even still I feel this games strong suits are in the PvE modes and will always be.

To finish this up, I think Space Marine 2 is an excellent game that is well worth your money. It's a return to what feels like games from the past, fully fleshed out experiences that don't prattle on for way too long and while anecdotal, I did not experience any noticeable bugs while playing. So if you enjoy the 40k universe, would like to purge xenos a heretics alike as an angel of death in service to the holy emperor of man kind, and would like to support the idea that all games should release like this, pick it up!