Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 is set to receive a number of new features, tweaks, and improvements in the future, with publisher Focus Entertainment breaking down what is (and isn’t) coming, based on player feedback, in a recent Q&A.
For those who love customizing their Space Marines, more options are currently in the works, including the ability to change faces (a great feature for those who prefer their characters to go helmetless).
“Not a quick fix, but we will add an option to change your Marine’s face,” Focus said.
Other pieces of Space Marine armor, including decals, hands, and facemasks, will be able to be more fully customized in future patches as well. More colors from the various successor Space Marine chapters are set to be added too, and Focus said it is still discussing if players will be able to customize the appearance of their AI squadmates.
While many players have asked for it, Focus said class-restricted cosmetics like cloaks and tabards won’t be coming to all classes, as they are a part of the identity for each class and help players quickly identify the class in combat. Players also shouldn’t expect the ability to customize their Battlebarge or Thunderhawk, as Focus said it would be “very cool,” but not a priority, with the art teams currently focused on creating new maps. When it comes to customizing Chaos Space Marines in the game’s PvP mode, Focus said there are lore restrictions preventing some customization options. However, the team would like to expand Chaos customization, but “the reality is they won’t be as modular as the Loyalist.”
On the gameplay side, Focus said adjustments will be coming to some of the game’s harder difficulties. The Veteran campaign difficulty will be adjusted to be “more fair,” and the campaign’s AI squadmates when playing single-player will be made less passive and participate in specific objectives more in a future patch. For the PvE Operations mode, Focus said it recognizes that enemies at higher difficulty can be “too bullet spongy,” which makes certain weapons, like the various Bolt Rifles, feel underpowered.
“That’s the core issue, rather than the Bolters themselves,” Focus said. “For now, we are testing some tweaks in difficulty to make the enemies have less health but keep the engaging difficulty.”
Matchmaking connectivity improvements is a top priority for the team, with a bigger patch coming soon alongside new content to address the issue. There are also specific improvements to PvE and PvP matchmaking in the works. Focus said it is working to make it so players who have selected the same class in Operations mode won’t be matchmade together, but will be keeping the one-player per-class restriction in place, at least for matchmaking. The team is instead considering removing class restrictions when playing in private lobbies–another feature the team is currently working on. On the PvP side, the team is “looking into” a feature that will rebalance teams after a match.
Other information revealed in the Q&A includes why Focus won’t add a FoV slider or the ability to swap shoulders when firing guns, as well as why players aren’t temporarily invulnerable when performing a cinematic gun-strike attack. For more details, be sure to check out the full Q&A.
Focus has already outlined a content roadmap for Space Marine 2, with updates planned into 2025. The game’s Season 2 update, slated to come later this year, will add new PvE missions as well as a new enemy, weapon, and difficulty. Updates for 2025 include more PvP modes and maps, an expansion to the Battlebarge, and even further in the future, a horde mode.
Space Marine 2 quickly became the most-played Warhammer game of all-time on Steam when it released earlier this month. In GameSpot’s Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 review, we called Saber Interactive’s sequel “a more than worthy successor to the 2011 original,” with “brutally gory action” that “brings the tabletop game to life in all its grimdark splendor.”
