Category: Video Games

Space Marine 2 is off to a great start. Yesterday, Saber Interactive announced that its Warhammer 40K action game reached 2 million players, and it has retained consistently high concurrents on Steam.

Now Saber Interactive CEO Tim Willits, who served as studio director at id Software until 2019, is claiming that Space Marine 2 is selling many of the games in id’s famed franchises. He’s backed up by former CEO Todd Hollenshead, who departed id Software in 2013 and currently works with Willits at Saber.

Todd Hollenshead (former CEO of id Software) and I believe that Space Marine 2 is the fastest selling game we’ve ever worked on, including all the Quake, DOOM, Wolfenstein, and RAGE games over the years. #SpaceMarine2

— Tim Willits (@TimWillits) September 11, 2024

“Todd Hollenshead (former CEO of id Software) and I believe that Space Marine 2 is the fastest selling game we’ve ever worked on, including all the Quake, DOOM, Wolfenstein, and RAGE games over the years,” Willits claims.

IGN has reached out to id Software for a response.

Willits departed id Software in 2019, meaning he would have had at least some oversight over 2020’s Doom Eternal. Both Willits and Hollenshead spent many years at id Software, joining in 1995 and 1996 respectively, which was the heyday of games like Doom 2. In the years that they were with id Software, the studio developed the Quake franchise, various Doom sequels and reboots, and Rage and its sequel.

While the actual sales data around its various games are a bit hazy, 2016’s Doom was able to sell at least 2 million copies by 2017. Doom Eternal, meanwhile, was estimated to have reached 3 million at launch.

One way or another, Space Marine 2 is doing well for itself, buoyed by strong reviews and player sentiment. We recently called it an “Xbox 360 shooter in the best way possible,” writing in our review: “Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 is a terrific third-person shooter with a compelling story, loads of weapons that are a blast to use, and a healthy variety of enemies to use them on,” It once again borrows many of its ideas from the Gears of War series, but they’re good ideas, and Space Marine 2 does a fine job of making them its own.

“And while the Operations PvE mode that accompanies it doesn’t currently offer enough to keep me coming back, the deep customization options for your Space Marine do look promising if it’s supported in post-launch updates as planned. Besides, when you’re eviscerating aliens on planets as pretty as these, it’s hard not to leave satisfied.”

For more, be sure to check out guide to Space Marine 2’s multiplayer as well as campaign tips and tricks and much more. Space Marine 2 is out now on PC, Xbox, and PlayStation.

Kat Bailey is IGN’s News Director as well as co-host of Nintendo Voice Chat. Have a tip? Send her a DM at @the_katbot.

I find the word “cozy” to be dreadfully overused when assigning genres to video games these days, but it’s hard to find another adjective that so perfectly captures what I love about Dragon Quest. Straightforward but rewarding turn-based combat paired with a classic hero’s journey told in a picturesque fantasy world result in a wonderfully traditional RPG experience I’ve always found so comforting. So when I was given the choice at a recent preview event to try out Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake on either PlayStation 5 or Nintendo Switch, the choice to settle in on the couch in the Switch’s handheld mode was an easy one.

And rest assured, Switch owners, Dragon Quest 3 looked and ran great on the aging Nintendo system. Square Enix’s other HD-2D games like Octopath Traveler and Live A Live were perfect for playing in short bursts before bed, and Dragon Quest 3 is looking to fit that mold as well.

Unlike our first look at Dragon Quest 3’s remake which showed off how faithfully it’s sticking to the roots of the 30-plus-year-old NES RPG, the hour I played Dragon Quest 3 was spent with some of the remake’s brand-new additions. And so far, I’m extremely pleased with the new content that spruces things up without unrecognizably transforming the original experience.

First, I hung out in the revamped Monster Arena, where you can send monsters you’ve defeated and recruited throughout the game to do battle against other teams of creatures. In the original Dragon Quest 3, you could simply bet on the outcome of fights in the Monster Arena, but this remake lets you get in on the action yourself. Monster collecting has been a big part of both the main Dragon Quest games and the Monsters spinoff series for decades, and it’s great to see that legacy continue here.

I entered the arena with a preset team of a Slime, Healslime, and Spiked Hare, but this side mode is clearly set up for me to make my own teams with monsters I recruit across the main game. You don’t directly command your team in the Monster Arena tournament, but rather set how they should act in battle from four distinct options: Show No Mercy, Fight Wisely, Focus on Healing, and Don’t Use MP.

For the first few rounds, I instructed my Healslime to focus on healing its allies while the Slime and Spiked Hare dealt all the damage, but once I realized I had this fight in the bag, I had my whole team go all out. This monster auto battler seems like a fun distraction from the main adventure, and I can see myself swinging by regularly to fine-tune my team and enter them in tournaments.

While watching my team do battle I found myself mesmerized by the enemy character models. I’ve felt that Dragon Quest and the HD-2D art style were a match made in heaven since this remake’s initial reveal, and seeing it in action confirmed how much I love seeing these classic enemies in Square Enix’s enticing art direction. The killerpillar (an evil caterpillar, if you couldn’t guess) I faced in my first fight had a very detailed idle animation where it bounced back and forth, and the way it wriggled its entire body when gearing up for an attack made the whole turn-based fight feel so much more dynamic.

The same can be said of the awesome character models for Robbin’ ‘Ood and his set of Robbin’ ‘oodlums, the boss fight I faced at the top of Skyfell Tower. Ascending the tower was a classic, atmospheric dungeon experience filled with random encounters. Here, I was impressed with how flexible Dragon Quest 3’s combat system is. Remember those four preset orders I could assign to my team in the Monster Arena? In Dragon Quest 3’s core combat, those presets are still available to you, with the added option of “Follow Orders”. This means you can rip through the low-stakes random encounters in a dungeon by telling all four of your party members to Show No Mercy, but when a challenging boss fight begins, you can take control of every decision to ensure you emerge victorious. This, combined with the ability to crank up the battle speed whenever you like, adds to that cozy, relaxing game feel I mentioned earlier. It’s enjoyable to kick back and watch the experience points roll in during the low level fights that only take a few seconds at max speed, but when I reached the top of the tower to face off against Robbin ‘Ood, I wanted to make every choice myself.

And it’s a good thing I did take control of the boss fight, because it was a nail-biter. I had to use my Priest to heal my party several times, while my protagonist and Monster Wrangler – which is a new class introduced to the remake – dealt the heavy blows. I let out a big sigh of relief when Robbin ‘Ood finally fell to the ground, and it just made me want to rush straight to the next dungeon to face off against the next big boss.

I also want to shout out this remake’s new party customization feature. The party members in Dragon Quest 3 are blank slates, but the remake revamps Patty’s Party Planning Place, a tavern where you can design your own party members, choosing their class, name, appearance, hair color, and voice. There aren’t very many customization options, but enough to make a rudimentary version of myself that I inserted into my party. I imagine players will have a ton of fun customizing their party and making changes to it throughout the game.

Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake is out November 14 on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, with Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake arriving sometime next year.