Warhammer 40K: Kill Team Review

Posted By James C. about 1 year, 10 months ago

Warhammer 40K: Kill Team Review

Angry Joe Plays Warhammer 40K: Kill Team, 6.0 out of 10 based on 1 rating

Sons of the Primarchs! Of the Emperor! My brothers. I see in your eyes the same zeal that would take the heart of me and of every alien from here to the warp. A day may come when the bulwark of the Emperor, the Space Marines, fails, when we forsake our brothers and break all bonds of duty, but it is not this day. An hour of Orks and Xenomorphs born when the Age of Men comes crashing down, but it is not this day! This day we fight! By all that you hold dear, I bid you stand! For the Emperor!

Kill Team is a brief THQ tie in to the upcoming blockbuster third person shooter Space Marine, and while not directly tied to the Ultramarine-based title due in early September, it does serve as a succulent time waster if you’re a fan of dual stick shooters at a bird’s eye view. The legion that is the Space Marines has detected an Ork Kroozer, a juggernaut of a spaceship that is heading straight towards one of the human occupied forge worlds, a place of ancient technology that directly benefits whoever controls it. The Kroozer, stocked with thousands upon thousands of Ork troopers, could lay waste to the world’s populace in a matter of days and allow the Orks a new staging planet to expand and conquer.

This is where you, a Space Marine in service to one of six deployable chapters, will have your moment of blazing glory. Either going solo or as a team or two with a friend, the servants of the emperor will seek to destroy the spaceship before it reaches its destination.

Players will be able to control four different types of marines: the Librarian (melee hero proficient in the powers of the warp), Techmarine (ranged hero skilled in the technologies of the past age), Sternguard Veteran (ranged hero with access to heavy ordinance hardware), and Vanguard Veteran (melee hero with heavy armor and an ability to quickly close gaps on enemies). The marines all have their own weapons which are unlocked when certain score benchmarks are met, along with perks that improve certain points of play.

For example, when playing as a Vanguard Vet, it is always a good idea to perk increased health for survivability, as you are the only target when playing solo, or the first thing hordes will get to in co-op. While increasing your melee damage with a perk is helpful in stemming the horde when you have your starter chainsword, it will start to become unneeded when you obtain stronger weapons like the lightning claw. That’s when it would be a good idea to use other perks like increased special move duration (which you can charge either passively or by killing enemies) or the ability to charge special moves faster.

While all marines are balanced fairly, it's hard to disavow that the Librarian is the runt of the litter.

Kill Team plays like a dual stick shooter with an overhead camera, much like Alien Swarm or Smash TV, with extra button commands to melee, special attack, and throw group clearing grenades. While the stick handling is competent for movement, the stick handling for shooting can get a bit frustrating in certain situations. There’s never a dull moment once you get onto the ship as the Ork’s reputation in the 40K lore of having an almost endless waves of combatants to cut your teeth on is certainly the case. Boyz, Nobz, Shootas, Tankbustas; they’re all here and wanting you to leave the ship in little tiny armoured pieces. To assist your crusade in combating the horde with the finest tools of murder the empire of humanity has at its disposal, there are also power ups scattered across the ship which serve as various forms of defense, offense, and recovery.

While there is no doubting that THQ Warrington has captured the essence that is the Space Marine experience, there is something to be said about how repetitive the game play is. While there is a brief respite from the Ork horde in the fourth stage, it is only replaced by ANOTHER race that revolves around extremely superior numbers (not going to directly spoil it, but if you know the 40K universe, you know who I’m talking about). The enemy types are fairly typecast and easy to deal with all hero classes, but the game does throw some interesting scenes at you to execute while dealing with the throngs of enemies thrown at you, like having to defend a vital elevator power cell from hunter seeker mines, and luring a Xenomorph killing machine into a trap as conventional weapons have no effect.

Survival levels, while fun for a brief moment, test your mettle against an endless horde of enemies until you are defeated. These levels are unlocked upon stage completion, but feel fairly artificial and unnecessary in the grand scheme of the game.

Angry Joe Plays Warhammer 40K: Kill Team

By AngryJoe

Angry Joe talks his nerdy Warhammer 40K days while playing through Kill Team! Is this new twin sticks XBLA shooter based on the 40K universe worth your time? Find out!

Warhammer 40K: Kill Team Review

By James C.

When the Orks launch a Kroozer full of nasties and baddies at a forge world, a human occupied planet chock full of technology from ages past, it is up to the Space Marines, human embodiments of fury and zeal, to board this crude vessel and destroy it by any means necessary! FOR THE EMPEROR!