Hands on the Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun II demo – So…. you have a Battle Sister?
by Stefan L · tsaOne of my favourite factions in the Warhammer 40,000 universe is the Sisters of Battle. While it’s Space Marines (and Ultramarines in particular) that are the go-to for the fanbase, being gene-seed augmented supersoldiers, the Sisters of Battle are out there like record-setting ultramarathon runners. They’re just ordinary women who put on some power armour and just believe in the Emperor’s divine will really, really hard while they go out and do some purging.
Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun II introduces Nyra Veyrath, turning up with bolt pistol, powersword and flamethrower in hand to battle the forces of Chaos alongside Malum Caedo. Or, more accurately, in place of.
Whether it’s with the newly released demo – which we’ve been hands on with ahead of its release for Warhammer Skulls – or for the full game release later this year, you have a choice between playing as Malum or Nyra. Not both. Boltgun 2 is set to be bigger, broader and more ambitious than the original, but its ambitions don’t extend beyond early Resident Evil in terms of picking one character to play as and sticking with them through the full campaign. You won’t switch back and forth between them, there’s no co-op, just a straight up choice and a reason (maybe) to play through a second time.
So having a demo is perfect for helping you make up your mind now on which one you’d prefer to play as. Malum Caedo is still a sprinting juggernaut of vindictive justice, with an Obliterating Charge to dash forward, with a Chainsword to rip and tear, frag grenade and health regeneration. Nyra, meanwhile, has a somewhat subtle variation on a theme. Her Bolt Pistol has just a handful of bullets before it needs reloading, so it encourages you to use her speed to get closer even quicker and finish enemies off with her Power Sword, while a Fervent Slide lets her shift forward rapidly and slow down time by leaping out of this. Oh, and instead of health regen, it’s her enduring, unbreakable faith that regenerates over time.
Playing as her through the demo, more of the typical Adeptus Sororitas weaponry comes into her hands. A crossbow is great for one-hit kills, with a fun quirk that you need to hold for just a moment in order to shoot, but the real fun comes with the flame thrower, which just unleashes a beam of molten liquid that sets everything alight and leaves fire all around you. It doesn’t seem to do damage over time a moment, and it’s certainly not a physics-based gout of flame that it produces, but setting everything on fire is still a ton of fun.
The demo features two levels which, strangely enough, remind me a little of the original Halo. Welcome to the Wilds drops you into a swamp with massive trees, reminiscent of the opening of 343 Guilty Spark, and it’s fitting that the climax has you fighting an oncoming horde of slow-moving mutated cultists while you wait for extraction. This level features units of Death Korps of Krieg, battling away with the Chaos beasts, cultists and Chaos Marines, but really it’s you that has to do the heavy lifting when you happen on a unit, and the final group waiting for extraction with you will be very, very lucky to survive… Their AI, in typical Boomer Shooter fashion, is basically non-existent, the same as with all the enemies that you run into.
The second level then jumps to an ice planet (Assault of the Control Room, anyone?), the visual noise of snow and the frozen landscapes contrasting wonderfully with the Khorne Berserkers, Hell Hounds, Bloodcrushers and more that you’ll run into. Nothing that Kyra can’t handle, especially as the climatic battle hands you a Heavy Bolter and has waves of enemies spawn in from the other side of the bridge. It’s a grim shooting gallery, but there’s fun to be had trying to drop batches of enemies through glass panels – who thought that was good bridge design?
All in all, it’s a great sneak peak at what Boltgun 2 is set to offer, but there’s plenty more promised for the full game. All four Chaos Gods and their factions will be represented, there will be more NPC friendlies dimwittedly wandering into battle, and the planets will stray further away from the gothic cathedral vibes that made for the majority of the original game. While not really shown in this rather linear demo, Auroch promise levels that are wider and have more moving parts to them, and we’re keen to see what they’ve cooked up.