If you’re like me, you enjoyed the first Boltgun for its visceral combat and deep understanding of Warhammer 40K, but noticed the gem’s rough edges—level design and communication. Well, Boltgun 2 is almost here, and it’s sanded those edges down… and maybe scuffed the gem a bit in the process. I was lucky enough to play the first two levels of Boltgun 2, so let me give you some insights into the new installment.
I usually start these previews off with the story, but I didn’t get much here. The first Boltgun started with a cinematic, so I assume that there’s going to be one and that it just wasn’t in the preview levels. What I can say is that we have a new playable character, Nyra Veyrath, a Sister of Battle who is voiced by Alanah Pearce (who does an excellent job selling Nyra’s fanaticism).
Our glorious main characters.
Before starting the game, you can choose to play through as our beloved walking tank, Malum, or opt to go at it as Nyra. There are a few differences between the two protagonists, such as abilities, weaponry, and movement. Let’s run through the powers of both, starting with our new Celestian sister, Nyra. Her movement ability is called Fervent Slide, which allows her to dash forward, damaging enemies and briefly slowing time while leaping out of it. She can sustain a decent chunk of damage if she tries to slide through a horde, so it’s better for sheer mobility than for combat. Her explosive is a timed Melta Bomb that will also slow time if you hold the throw button, and can be manually detonated if you press said button again after the toss. It’s an absolutely devastating bomb that will reduce all but the most powerful enemies to nothing. I love that the air surrounding the detonation is distorted by heat. It’s a visual effect that really displays the overwhelming thermodynamic force that is a Melta Bomb.
Nyra’s melee weapon is a power sword, visibly pulsing with energy, which is as powerful as it is clunky. The primary Power Sword attack is a slash, and holding the attack button will charge up a lunge. Both a basic slash and a lunge will kill most chaff units in one hit, but the range of the slash feels just a tad bit too short, and the lunge sometimes fails to connect against enemies it definitely should have hit. As in, the chaos worshiper was directly connecting with my blade and took no damage. The Power Sword lunge is also incredibly terrain sensitive. If you’re slightly above an enemy, you might just stab past them. Let’s compare that to Malum’s Chain Sword, which in both this game and the previous one has a lock-on effect, essentially grappling Malum towards the chosen target. That would be a great quality-of-life feature to add to the Power Sword before the game is released. Despite the sword’s jank, connecting blows eviscerate enemies with speed and power, and it just feels so meaty in the best possible way.
Nyra’s final ability is a passive called Enduring Faith, which automatically regenerates a portion of her shields when they run out. Her whole kit seems to be designed for a fast-paced, precise, mobile playstyle. While our original blueberry, Malum Caedo, is a massive force of nature who is capable of explosive bursts of speed, Nyra is nimble and consistently agile.
Power Sword hitting dead on but dealing no damage and the absolute power of a Melta Bomb.
Moving on to Malum, he’s almost the exact same old Ultramarine we love from the first game, but better. His Obliterating Charge is stronger than ever, as now you can charge it up to increase the damage and distance. His grenades are back and follow the same time-slowing rules that Nyra’s Melta Bomb does. Then there’s his Chainsword, which cuts through smaller enemies with ease. His Chainsword’s lunge is still a great mobility tool, which Nyra lacks. They even gave him a regeneration ability similar to Nyra’s shield regen, but Malum’s is for health. Overall, I prefer to play him over Nyra, and it’s not really close. I’m confused as to why they gave Malum a regeneration ability, too, as well as a timed explosive. Their kits feel a little too similar in my opinion.
After selecting your method of heretic slaughter, you’ll be choosing one of four difficulty settings: Low, Medium, Hard, and Exterminatus. I ran through the game on Hard on my main gaming PC. I later managed to beat the first level on Hard, deathless, using a laptop with a wonky trackpad without dedicated left and right mouse buttons. It’s not a very hard game, especially if you engage enemies from a distance.
Allies and Malum charging through enemies with the ease of someone walking through a doorway.
Since there’s no intro cinematic, I was sort of just plopped down on a Death World in a swampy area overrun by the forces of Nurgle. Both Nyra and Malum have a servo-skull like the one in the first game. It still makes comments on the happenings occurring around them, but now players don’t have to solely rely on the skull’s random comments for info. If you press N, you get the direct route to your objective, appearing as a path on the ground. It’s a bit blunt, but as someone who complained about the confusing layouts of the first game, I’ll take it! As you progress along the tangled masses of roots, you find a boltgun lying in an archway of rock and wooden tendrils. It’s not as fancy as the first game’s introduction to the weapon, but the gun still works just as well. Cultists litter the swampy jungle, and the boltgun kills the normal ones in a few hits at most, with some falling into a pile-’O-person with a single shot.
While Nyra and Malum both find the boltgun and heavy bolter, they also come across weapons unique to their playthroughs. Nyra will get a condemnor stakethrower that can fire holy bolts that one-shot even larger enemies, whereas Malum will find a red-mist-making shotgun in the same location. I definitely enjoyed the majority of both arsenals. Though when obliterating enemies, it becomes obvious that something is missing. There’s no number on their health bars, nor on the weapons. The strength/toughness system has been gutted. For those who didn’t play the first game, the aforementioned system required players to match a gun’s strength level to an enemy’s toughness level, ideally matching or exceeding it. It was directly inspired by how Warhammer 40K works on the tabletop. From what we were told in the preview, there are still some elements of the system going on behind the scenes, but it’s largely gone. That leaves me with one question: why? If we still have some of the strength/toughness system behind the scenes, then getting rid of the numbers is just failing to communicate necessary information with the player.
The power of the stakethrower and navigation assistance.
While the strength/toughness system is essentially dead, the gunplay is still quite fun. Blasting enemies into piles of gore is a brilliantly guttural experience. Now, it’s easier to swap between your guns via a weapon wheel. It’s such a small addition that brings a lot of quality of life to the table. That’s not where the new stuff ends, as we get to fight alongside the Deathkorps of Krieg as well. They’re not the strongest allies, but they can put a dent in the enemy forces while you clean up. Dashing through the crossfire, obliterating the forces of chaos, and delivering the Emperor’s will just feels great. In addition to new allies, there are new enemies as well, some of whom are even mounted atop beasts. Wrapping up the new additions that I came across, the level design seems more interactive now. The second area I played past the swamp had a snowy theme, with breakable walls of ice that hid secrets. Some ice sheets were built into the ground, allowing you to send oncoming enemies tumbling to their doom. It added a good bit of engagement to the fights, deciding strategically when to pull the frozen rug out from under enemies.
Overall, I’m a little conflicted on this new installment. The gunplay is still fun, and Malum is better than ever, but Nyra felt a little bit underwhelming to me personally. The removal of the strength/toughness system felt really unnecessary and unfortunate. Still, the visuals are compelling, and the new areas feel more dynamic with new allies backing us up, new enemies charging us, and interactive, breakable elements. I’m excited to see how the rest of the game unfurls from here.
A broken ice sheet puts distance between Malum and a mini boss + skirmish between allies and chaos.
Warhammer 40K: Boltgun 2 will release on Steam sometime in 2026. Stay tuned to GamingTrend.com for more on Boltgun 2.