Over the years we have seen plenty of great, well developed
titles which captured the brutality of the 41st millennium. From the
early days of Space Hulk to the long
line of successful Dawn of War
titles, there has been a lot of celebrate. Despite this, one of the most
beloved in recent years was Space Marine,
which captured the visceral ground level combat and prowess of a near immortal
warrior of the Emperor.
It brought dignity back to the Ultramarines after Matt Ward
all but ruined them and even proved to be a great multiplayer title. It just
had one major flaw: The tale ended on a cliff-hanger with Captain Titus being
taken into the custody of the Inquisition under suspicion of corruption. Fans
have debated back and forth on what would happen, but now we finally have our
answer from the game’s director for what was to take place next.
In an interview on Penny
Arcade Report, Raphael van Lierop spoke of his plans to have Titus
effectively go rogue in a sequel: “The second part of his story was to focus on a ‘Titus
Unleashed’ plot—basically there were forces arrayed against him that would see
his loyalty to the Adeptus Astartes pushed to its limit, and his reaction would
be to kind of ‘go rogue,’ and we'd see a different Titus, not quite as in
control as we saw him in Space Marine.” This action was to
lead to his exile, an effective death sentence for an Astartes, and start to
see his disciplined mind slip into more of a broader savage state.
While
not specifying exactly what would take place, van Leirop made it clear that the
action would be a test of true endurance and survival for Titus. Following
this, he would return stronger than ever in the following title. The third Space Marine game would then follow, to
quote van Lierop’s words, for him to return and “‘clean house,’ but as the head of a brand new Chapter that we would
build around him,”
How
well this would fit into established canon is unknown. Despite the outline here
it still leaves many questions unanswered, such as Titus’ resistance to the
corruption of the Warp, an aspect many put down to him being a pariah.
Similarly the idea of an entire chapter being built around him would be
something very unlike what we had seen before, especially given the considerable
control the Imperium has on Space Marines founding new military forces due to the
Horus Heresy. None the less, the idea of a disgraced character leaving,
surviving and returning stronger than ever is a theme in a number of fan
favourite book series. Both the Grey
Knights trilogies and the Bloodquest
saga contained elements of this idea and are considered classics.
van
Lierop concluded his statements by hoping that this would provide some closure
to fans of Space Marine.
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