Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Reviews
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide offers an authentic representation of the 40k lore, and while the cooperative action gameplay can be occasionally satisfying, it lacks content, has a few strange design choices, and suffers from too many performance issues.
At the end of the day, Warhammer 40K: Darktide is a thoroughly enjoyable experience (especially when you can run it).
The gameplay is great, brutal and dynamic, at the same time the game came straight with a decent selection of maps, albeit very similar. You will enjoy slashing, shooting and throwing out hordes of enemies with grenades. But the authors have literally not put many systems into the game yet, and more content will come later.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
One day, Warhammer 40K: Darktide will be a great game. Fatshark, like many developers, has yet to perfect the art of the rough landing. A polished core experience can't overcome woeful performance and blatantly unfinished features, like the (almost) entirely missing crafting system. I'm confident, however, support will continue until Darktide ends up being the game we all hoped it would be.
If you enjoyed Fatshark’s previous projects on Vermintide and its sequel, or you’re just an overall Warhammer 40K fan, then you will feel right at home with Darktide. As long as you can dig past the rough state the game is in right now with unfinished content and performance issues, then there’s truly an addictive and satisfying cooperative horde shooter lying underneath all those corpses.
The lack of content and repetitiveness do not prevent Warhammer 40,000: Darktide from being extremely fun.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Overall, Fatshark’s latest four person co-op, first person shooter, and hack and slash Darktide is a blast. The modifications to the core gameplay design from Vermintide and Vermintide 2, as well as the support to fix unforeseen issues, continue to show Fatshark’s stride for creating great gameplay experiences.
Overall, I enjoyed the time I spent with this game. Its immersive surroundings, sounds and action made you feel in the thick of the action. The graphics were extremely detailed. The sound was fitting with the feel of the game. The voice acting was great and so were the animations by all of the characters. It could be overwhelming at times with constant hordes being thrown at you. This just meant teamwork and sticking together were vital for survival and completing the levels. It may not be for some, however. I tend not to choose these types of games but I do appreciate them. For those who like the visceral action given by games like Doom Eternal, Metal: Hellsinger, and Vermintide this game is for you. With updates and additions planned for the game by the developers, it’s well worth getting if you have been meaning to for a while. I award Warhammer 40,000: Darktide the Thumb Culture Silver Award!
Much like its endless enemies, Darktide's many small issues add up to a real nuisance - but stupendous atmosphere and vicious action just about prevails.
I have no doubt that these will be fixed in time but when are WE as gamers/consumers going to stop allowing this to be the norm. I feel like I say this on far too many reviews, fact of the matter is the game should have launched without these technical issues but I won’t start preaching here… we have a podcast for that. Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is coming to Xbox at a later date and my hope is that all of its extremely rough edges are grind down to perfection by then, the moment to moment in battles is a blast to play but the pitiful rewards and technical issues just turns it into more of a chore than a joy to serve the Emperor.
Fatshark's bone-crunching co-op is deliciously gory and grim, but an uninspiring progression system and short, repetitive missions hold this Vermintide successor back from reaching peak rampage.
The transition from killing Rats and Chaos Warriors to fighting the Scabs and Dregs couldn't have gone smoother. Warhammer 40k: Darktide adds enough new ideas to differentiate itself from the previous Vermintide games without ostracizing the fans of that franchise.
Warhammer 40,000 Darktide is still not the production that miniatures game enthusiasts and Vermintide lovers were expecting. In what is the core of the gameplay experience, the slaughter of hordes of enemies, it works just fine, and diving into that riot of death leads to a macabre ecstasy. Lacking, however, is an adequate structure to support the ludics: too slender progression, poor variety of missions, questionable solutions implemented in the two stores.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Darktide is amazingly fun and disgustingly beautiful, but it's by no means perfect.
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is the 40K-version of the Vermintide games and Fatshark delivers again a fantastic co-op experience. The combat feels visceral and meaty and is a true upgrade compared to the former games. There are however a lot less classes, even though they all feel unique. Some features are clearly removed during production, so hopefully they will get added next to more classes. Fatshark has already released some updates, so the future is looking bright for Darktide.
Review in Dutch | Read full review
Darktide is an absolute blast. Its heavyweight blend of melee and gunplay ensure that the flow of frantic runs into the hive city just keep on coming.
In its current state, Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is a very fun and beautiful co-op shooter that's probably one of the best of its kind. It's the rough foundation of a great game, but it hasn't achieved greatness yet. There's a limited selection of maps and character classes, a lot of grinding, and very pronounced technical issues that hold back the title significantly. If you can tolerate that, Darktide is fun to play with a group of friends. Otherwise, I'd advise you to wait for future updates or test the waters with the PC Game Pass.
While it wasn’t what I expected, Darktide still does Warhammer 40k well, which is all many fans of the franchise could have asked for. While it could stand to improve in some places, I believe Darktide is fundamentally a good game that many players will enjoy, and given time may improve on many of its faults.
I am sorry that the game has come out so stripped of content, with such a marked service game philosophy, and with so many polishing problems, and especially performance, that make it practically unplayable on Steam Deck, where by the way it is not yet available. verified. Although I should almost say thank you for being able to try it on the Deck, since Vermintide isn't even playable on Valve's handheld yet. Something I don't understand because if games like God of War (2018), Death Stranding, Red Dead Redemption II or Elden Ring, to mention a few recent ones, work without problems, why can't I play the fantastic FatShark titles properly? That's why I think it's best to leave it in the fridge for a while, and give it a second chance when it hits consoles, where I'm sure we'll already have a more stable version, and with more things to do.
Review in Spanish | Read full review