Games Workshop is the company behind one of the most popular fantasy worlds on the market. Back in the day it was Dungeons & Dragons and soon after Games Workshop. Their dark fantasy Warhammer world ventured forth the idea of Chaos daemons mixed in with a full menu of fantasy races. Their iconic designs can be seen across all games and top designers now-a-days still play Warhammer or Warhammer 40,000 on table top.
This past week Vermintide 2 made its way to the market, a game that captures the essence of first person horde survival combat. I hope I got that right? Here is why Vermintide is such a win.
The game has been a success out of the gate on PC and there are more platforms to follow. GW’s licensing team has a lot of products which get approved and find their way onto different systems. Some are fantastic, while others don’t ever make the cut to the top tier. Vermintide 2 is quickly blazing its way into the top of the PC market at a time when battle royale style games rule the world. While millions of players are trying to hunt each other on an island, Vermintide 2 offers players the sort of “team up” and fast paced experience that fans of the genre look forward to. Word of mouth alone is boosting sales and that is when you know you have something special.
In Vermintide 2, you play as one of the iconic characters in a dark world ravaged by skaven and chaos. These heroes fight hordes of monsters and bosses in a destroyed medieval world akin to the Warhammer universe. Action is chaotic and fast-paced. Heroes follow progression paths and can take on some of the more popular characters in the world like the Dwarven Slayer or Dark Elf Daughter of Khaine. The gameplay is where Vermintide wins for fans. It is fun and quick to get comfortable with, as the bosses roll in, it does get harder to master when facing down a Chaos Spawn.
The Gateway Drug
The game introduces a whole new generation to the Warhammer universe which is perfect for GW. They sell table top models at their core and having new fans leave their keyboards to purchase a hero or villain they see in the game is only the beginning for collecting and building table top armies.
Similar to the Dawn of War series which captured an RTS version of Warhammer 40,000 extremely well and launched an entire new fan base into the genre, Vermintide 2 is poised to bring in a new audience for GW. The game promises more maps and heroes and continues to do well in sales, you may see a lot of crossover at your local hobby store (a rarity these days). The thing to remember is before we had video games of this level, your local hobby store is where everything began. Old school developers will tell you how they spent days at their stores playing games and learning to use their imagination.
Vermintide 2 does an excellent job bringing that imagination to the screen and its fast paced game mechanics will fit perfectly with competitive gamers of this generation. We hope it continues and more fans take a break to sit down and paint a model once in a while.
