Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
If anyone has been following me for the past few years here at Chalgyr’s Game Room you know how big of a fan I am of NeocoreGames. While I may have named Haemimont Games’ Victor Vran as King, The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing are not far behind. The work that has gone into those titles both for launch and thereafter gave me high hopes for their delve into the Warhammer 40k universe. Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor – Martyr is currently in Alpha staged Early Access and while still fairly rough around the edges there’s a lot that can come out of it.
Martyr puts you into the role of an Inquisitor who starts off their hunt on a derelict ship before eventually giving you access to a much wider space to explore. This ship, and the five stages within, act as a tutorial to most of the game’s functions. I’m glad that I plowed through these five stages because they are currently empty and devoid of much other than the occasional enemy with little to no AI that walks towards you in order to be put down. They are seriously boring and even if you’re on your fourth character they have to be plowed through in order to move onto a lot more combat intensive stages which are loads more fun.
Unlike their previous entries, Martyr is mission based and constructed in stages instead of a world that can be run and teleported through. Furthermore, until the tutorial is completed the hub remains locked off in order to buy and sell equipment as well as try to find people to play online with if you tire of playing alone.
The hub itself is small and there’s no a whole hell of a lot to do other than buy, sell, perform inventory management and then queue up for the next mission. Because of the stage design, equipping items has to be done within the hub and can’t be done while out in the field so make sure you equipped yourself right or the mission may be a bit tougher than you had intended it to be.
While the tutorial missions were bland the rest seem to perk up a bit with loads more enemies and a bit more creative AI. That said, I’m still hoping to see the AI kicked up a notch as most mobs can be dispatched by sitting back and blasting them away while they slowly shamble forwards.
Some neat features are doubled together such as destructible environments and taking cover. These work both for you and your foes so weapons like grenades and rockets come in very handy unless you have a move that lets you jump up and over rendering the cover useless. For right now taking cover is a bit hit and miss as unless an enemy is actually in range, your character won’t peak over but instead shoot in the direction that they are facing which is the opposite direction. I am hoping that in the future you can control how you aim while in cover.
Neocore have never disappointed when it has come to classes and Martyr is no exception. There are three base classes of melee, ranged and magic though within each are three subclasses that have varying skill trees and proficiencies. The previously mentioned tutorial comment comes from having tried out each of the classes through the tutorial and into at least one or two missions outside short of my eventually chosen main choice. While I may not have personally enjoyed the magic class as much as the other two it still had interesting features and could well be a favorite for many.
Trying out multiple classes does have its benefits however. Unlike your typical Action Adventure Hack & Slash, Martyr levels up characters through skills trees based on an account level. So if you’ve experimented a bit with one character then a new one will instantly have skills to be placed allowing for a faster transition once out of the tutorial which becomes even easier as your characters are more powerful.
In regards to the “overall”-ness there are elements that are a bit off. One that both Robert and I both agreed on was that the chat is always on filling up your screen whether or not you cared. That means that anyone who wants to type in varying levels of stuff that you don’t care about you’re stuck seeing it pop up and take over screen real estate even if you’re alone. I would like to see an option to disable it because it gets quite annoying.
The other odd choice isn’t that only one of the three classes can dodge, but it’s in how they dodge. The mechanics between using a keyboard or using a controller really make a difference. With they keyboard dodging is in relation to the direction that your camera is facing while using a controller feels more natural as you can essentially dodge in any direction. It was odd and can take some time to get used to but overall it’s a fun feature to have even if only one of the three have access to it.
So as a base, Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor Martyr has a lot that it can provide once it’s been refined from its current stage. I would like to see either a more fulfilling tutorial to guide new players in or the ability to skip it all together once it’s been done once in order to simply get to the good stuff. The class variations are awesome to have and the stage design works quite well when it’s packed to the brim with enemies that give you harder and harder challenges. I look forward to seeing what comes next.
Score: N/ANote: Previewed with Robert through another provided key
