Warhammer 40K: Space Marine Master Crafted Edition Review - Screenshot 1 of 4

At the tail end of last month, SEGA surprisingly announced that it was bringing a modern version of the original Warhammer 40K: Space Marine to Xbox Game Pass - and that time is almost here as the game goes live on the service tomorrow, June 10th. Naturally then, we've been pumping some time into Space Marine Master Crafted Edition in recent days, and it's been a rather nice throwback to the Xbox 360 era - even if certain elements of the experience are somewhat dated in 2025.

I'll admit that going into this one, I'd never played the 2011 original, although I'd certainly heard good things about it. Plenty of my mates back in the day recommended it, with its likeness to Gears of War — a series I'm a massive fan of — and I can certainly see where they came from. Space Marine is very 360-era Gears, with its brown and orange colour palette, chunky third-person shooting, and even chunkier space marine soldiers. I'm somewhat surprised by how solid the game feels mechanically I must admit; doubly so with this updated version.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine Master Crafted Edition Review - Screenshot 2 of 4

Here in the Master Crafted Edition, we're getting improved texture work, 4K resolution, a modernised control scheme and updated UI - all running at 60FPS on Xbox. The improvements make the game feel smoother to play and nicer to look at, for sure, but it's probably best not to expect anything like last year's Space Marine 2 on a technical level. The only other complaint I have is that the game's weapon wheel controls are still pretty clunky in this remaster - but other than that, the team has done a decent job at modernising things here.

As for the game behind all of this remastered goodness, well, your mileage may vary is the way I'd put it. On a surface level this is a fun third-person shooter that is easy to pick up and play, and let's be honest, blasting away hordes of Orks will never get that boring when you've got satisfying shooting to mess around with. The game is certainly more action-oriented than Gears I'd say — particularly the earlier games in Xbox's famous series — and you can expect to be doing non-stop shooting during certain stretches of Space Marine Master Crafted Edition.

Every now and then, though, the game does try to mix things up - although in my opinion not quite often enough. For instance, early on in the campaign you get to mess around with a jetpack that lets you boost miles up into the air and perform devastating ground slam moves - and this is genuinely one of the most fun parts of the game's combat loop. But, Space Marine strips you of this mechanic every time you go underground in more restricted environments - and even in some open-air spaces too, for no apparent reason. To let you mess around with this in the early game only to remove it from your arsenal for the majority of the experience is mildly frustrating - and means you'll be spending most of your time with boots on the ground as a result. The fact that Space Marine strips its Gears-like gameplay of a proper cover system doesn't help things in this regard either. The game is solid, as I've said, but those jetpack moves really help mix up the experience and they're not present often enough.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine Master Crafted Edition Review - Screenshot 3 of 4

Speaking of heading underground, going back to Space Marine's grimdark vibe and muted colour palette definitely takes some getting used to these days. I'm not into Warhammer at all and I do get that it's the franchise's vibe to a large extent, but Space Marine Master Crafted Edition is proper grim to look at for large parts; assisted by having that Xbox 360 era one-colour tone that defined the times. The remaster has modernised certain things, but for better or worse, it's kept the game's overall look and visual tone intact. Purists will probably love this, but for me, I'd have liked a bit more inspiration from Space Marine 2 put into the graphical overhaul of Master Crafted Edition.

While I've now outed myself as not being into Warhammer at large here, I'll talk a little bit about the game's story - well, I'll try to. You see, if you go into Space Marine Master Crafted Edition with little to no experience in the Warhammer universe, this story is going to almost completely pass you by. In fact, I finished the game like a day ago and I don't remember any of it; Space Marine is very lore-heavy, and the moment-to-moment storyline is mostly about hunting down a big bad boss that's going to end the world, or something. Proper Warhammer fans will probably get much more from Space Marine's grimdark tale, but if you're a Warhammer newbie playing this simply for a fun third-person shooter, you're not going to get as much out of it. It might actually be better played alongside a rocking soundtrack than listening to these dudes talk incomprehensible war strategies for 8 hours.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine Master Crafted Edition Review - Screenshot 4 of 4

The PR folks told us that Space Marine takes roughly 7-9 hours to blast through, and they were bang on the money, which is a fair time. We'd have liked a couple more hours here, especially if the game let us mess around with that jetpack a bit longer - but alas, the campaign is a satisfying experience overall. Master Crafted Edition also comes packed in with co-op and multiplayer modes so that should extend the game's life cycle a bit, but naturally, we haven't had chance to test these out during the pre-release phase. Server popularity should pick up once the game goes live on Xbox Game Pass!

Conclusion

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine Master Crafted Edition (that's a mouthful) is a proper 360 throwback, for better or for worse. The game's tight shooting mechanics make this one worth a play for anyone who's into the genre, but its 2011 foundations are still showing here in this modern remaster. If you're properly into your Warhammer lore I'd expect you to get a little more out of the experience than I have, but the game itself is still a fun time, and we recommend giving it a go on Xbox Game Pass. The short and snappy campaign will take you just a few nights to finish, and who knows, maybe the multiplayer will find a cult following here in 2025. I'll be hopping on in the coming days to find out!