


A welcome departure from the relatively vanilla marines of before, Ascension allows players to change equipment loadouts, appearance and upgrade skills from XP earned from kills and objectives completed during missions. Once on the squad screen, one of the biggest improvements over Space Hulk’s 2013 debut comes into clear view.

For many folks who come here for the strategy and the progression side of things that won’t matter, but for others who hunger for something a little more substantial from their storytelling, the litany of text-based mission descriptors will prove at least a little unsatisfying.

If there’s one gripe with the presentation of the missions, it would be that they’re not framed particularly impressively from a narrative standpoint. Even more ridiculous is the fact that between all three campaigns, there are over one-hundred unique missions a far cry from the meagre offering of last year’s effort and more than enough content for even the most die-hard Space Hulk aficionado to get stuck into. Each have their own strengths and weaknesses in ranged and melee skills and other than one additional weapon type, they all play pretty similarly.Īfter choosing a chapter with which to swear intergalactic, alien-skull bashing fealty to, Ascension then presents the player with not one or two, but instead three stupendously massive campaigns to choose from. Once into the game proper, Ascension confronts the player with a choice of three different space marine chapters, the Ultramarines, the Blood Angels and the Space Wolves. An in-depth tutorial helps rookies get started and proves to be up to the task of establishing the myriad of mechanics encompassed within the game. It’s still not perfect, but Space Hulk Ascension not only stands as the absolute closest players will get to the boardgame made digital, but it also cuts a fine figure as a formidable turn-based strategy effort in its own right.įrom the beginning, the game is welcoming to new, unpractised hands. A little over one year later and Space Hulk Ascension is now with us a rejuvenation of the original game that ably fulfils the lofty promise of its forebear with a raft of improvements and a veritable mountain of content. When developer Full Control released Space Hulk last year, the potential for a great adaptation of the classic boardgame was clearly there but it was largely undone by a number of nagging issues.
