Warhammer 40000: Rogue Trader

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We should probably all get ready for the far future. There’s a few options we can use to do that as far as media go, and I think we should probably go with The Jetsons. Imagine: robotic housekeeping assistants, advanced cars, a cold and uncaring work-a-day lifestyle where everything costs too much to afford and you’re in danger of being fired if your boss comes in with a hangover…well, er, maybe that hits a little too close to home. Instead, let’s look at the world of Warhammer 40000: Rogue Trader, the latest CRPG adventure from Owlcat Games.

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In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war. Sounds like a pretty nice place, right? That’s why you’re going to create a character and plunge yourself right into the thick of it. You’ll play as a Rogue Trader, a sanctioned explorer-privateer- industrialist-diplomat-badass who’s all things to all people, all in the name of the God-Emperor of the Imperium of Man. It’s a tough job, but you’ve got allies, weaponry and the Emperor’s will on your side. The scum of the galaxy might mess with you, but they’ll think twice about messing with Big E.

Rogue Trader calls to mind Owlcat’s previous Pathfinder adventures as a modern callback to the classic CRPGs of old. There’s plenty of turn-based blasting to enjoy, and when you aren’t popping heads with bullets, you can pop them with words in sidequests. There’s a variety of different classes to choose from for your created character, plus the ability to adjust your outlook toward faith, heresy or humanism, so you can create precisely the Trader you’d like to play. These choices also make noticeable differences in how quests play out, so there’s a fair chance you’ll want to muck around a bit and make sure you’ve got something you’d like before settling in for the long haul.

Said turn-based combat is probably best compared to something like X-COM or the Shadowrun Returns games. You’ve got replenishing stockpiles of Movement and Action Points to spend on various maneuvers each turn, and there’s a big emphasis on locating cover to avoid getting your head turned into chunky salsa. The diversity of character options means there’s a lot of ways to approach each battle, from giant guns to heretical psychic powers, and given the sheer number of baddies that will need blasting it’s good to know you’ve got choices for how you do it.

As a Rogue Trader, you’re allowed a lot more freedom than the average Imperium citizen. In the Imperium, the everyman mostly lives and dies as a Hive Sanitation Expert or whatever, but you’ve got a ship and license to do what you will with it. You’ll end up in all manner of bizarre situations dealing with xenos, heretics, the dread forces of Chaos and more. This is a treat for fans of Warhammer 40000, but the copious use of an ingame codex throughout could allow even novices to get a handle on the setting. A lot of 40K games aren’t quite so polite – the assumption likely being that only fans are going to be interested enough to bother – so this is a nice change of pace.

The sheer amount of content available in Rogue Trader is staggering. You’d think there’s not a lot that could be done with a setting that amounts to “everything is terrible and we’re all going to die,” but it turns out there’s a lot of variation in how terrible everything is and in what fashion we’re going to die! 40K is a surprisingly deep and involving franchise with its fungus-orks, xenophobic elves and soul-devouring daemons, and it’s great to see an RPG take itself quite this seriously when it comes to exploring the various facets of this universe.

This verges on content overload, and that runs headlong into Rogue Trader’s presentation. While this is a great-looking game, particularly given all the various locations you’re going to be exploring and dousing in the blood of heretics, maps tend to be a little too busy for their own good. Thank the Emperor for the Tab key, which is used to highlight interactable objects. Likewise, while there’s some voice acting here and there, the vast majority of text is only going to be voiced in your brain, so get ready to read. Maybe you can get some co-op partners together and take turns reading stuff off so nobody gets laryngitis and has to visit the Medicus.

Warhammer 40000: Rogue Trader is an RPG from an era that will likely fade away after the mega-success of Baldur’s Gate 3: it’s packed to the brim with lore and content, but leaves much of this on the player to discover. The sheer volume of things to see and do might be overwhelming, but patient players and 40K aficionados aren’t likely to mind. If you don’t mind the odd Hive-sized wall of text, then the Emperor thanks you for your service.