Ever since Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2’s 2024 launch, players have said that the Chaos enemies are harder to fight than the Tyranids. Well, now Space Marine 2’s game director has come out and admitted that is indeed the case — and confirmed plans to do something about it.
For the uninitiated, the Tyranids are a swarm-type enemy type that packs the screen with a mix of smaller foes and much bigger, harder-hitting foes. There’s a bloody minded pleasure that comes from chewing through scores of Tyranid enemies as a Space Marine, sweeping your Power Sword through xenos flesh, parrying a strike that gives you a clean response, and — my personal favorite — punching those Tyranids in the face with my Power Fist.
In contrast, the Thousand Sons present a more measured challenge. You are, after all, going up against fellow Space Marines here and their daemonic forces; they’re supposed to be tough. When those Terminators spawn and spam their missile barrage, playing against Chaos can feel like pulling teeth. The Thousand Sons are less of a ‘switch your brain off and cleave through it’ proposition, and more of a, ‘if Space Marine 2 wanted to be a bit like Elden Ring, it would probably go a little like this.’
The effect is more pronounced the harder the difficulty you play. At easier difficulties, the Tyranids and Chaos are much of a muchness in terms of challenge. But ramp the difficulty up — which you need to do for certain levels of progression in Space Marine 2 — and Chaos becomes an absolute bloody nightmare, whereas the Tyranids often still feel manageable.
For this reason, Space Marine 2 players have for years now said the Tyranids are more fun to play against than Chaos, and I certainly agree. But in a Reddit AMA, game director Dmitry Grigorenko not only acknowledged that Chaos are harder, but said there is work being done to tweak the balance between the two enemy factions.
“We understand that Chaos is more difficult to fight against Tyranids, yes,” Grigorenko said. “There will be some pass on this in the future. I don’t think it will be about bots being good vs Chaos specifically, though.”
That latter part of the answer is a response to the suggestion that Space Marine 2 should balance Chaos Operations (PvE missions) so it’s easier to fight against them as a solo player. With that ruled out, what could Grigorenko be talking about here? Perhaps it’s about a nerf to the entire faction, whether it be toughness, damage, or even spawn intensity. There are lots of things Saber could do here, although the fundamentals of how Chaos works in the game versus the Tyranids won’t change. Chaos are Space Marines after all.
I suspect that no matter what Saber does here, the Tyranids will always be more fun to fight than Chaos. That’s because you simply can’t beat the feeling that comes from carving your way through the swarm, or pumping scores of alien monsters with bolter fire. That’s kind of the way this works. Still, I wouldn’t mind a tweak that makes me wince a little less whenever I’m up against Chaos.
My thoughts have inevitably turned to Space Marine 3, which is in development. What will be the “swarm” enemy here? Most believe Space Marine 3 will feature the Necrons, based on hints sprinkled throughout Space Marine 2. But what other factions would fit the bill? A return to the Orks seen in Space Marine 1? (Orks are the primary antagonist of the 11th edition of the Warhammer 40,000 tabletop game.) How about a focus on the relentless Death Guard and swarms of shuffling Plaguebearers?