Developer – Owlcat Games

Publisher – Owlcat Games

Platforms – PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S/X, PC (reviewed)

Review copy given by publisher

The other big CRPG aside from Baldur’s Gate 3 to close out the year with is none other than Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader. This deep and complex role playing game from Owlcat Games has you take on the titular role of a rogue trader to explore the Koronus Expanse to conquer uncharted systems for the God-Emperor. As a rogue trader, it’s your goal to get rich, establish trade routes, and amass your ship’s crew. So let’s dive right in!

The Warhammer franchise is undoubtedly huge, and it’s easy to get lost in its seemingly endless supply of video game adaptations such as Space Marine, Darktide, or Age of Sigmar. The original Rogue Trader is actually a science-fiction story-based skirmish tabletop experience that uses the Warhammer 40K rule set, but now Owlcat Games have made it into a modern game in the same light as their Pathfinder titles. This isometric turn-based tactical role-playing experience is of course, set in the Warhammer universe, and uses the d100 TTRPG system.

Like most other computer role-playing games (CRPGs), Rogue Trader can come off as extremely daunting and overwhelming for new players. The learning curve is quite steep, although the payoff is well worth it for your time investment and dedication. Owlcat Games has done a fantastic job easing players into the game with balanced pacing and intuitive tutorials, though I would still suggest you watch some Youtube videos first beforehand.

Gameplay revolves around heavy dialogue exposition, exploration, and turn based combat. Movement is done via point and click from the mouse and you drag the middle mouse button to change the isometric view angle. Combat is very similar to XCOM style games, where you must use your environment and positioning to your advantage in skirmishes. You can mix it up between melee, ranged, and psychic abilities to come out victorious. Most of the battles are against weak squishy mobs but you do have the occasional boss battle and elite space marines to deal with.

Your party consists of a total of 6 members, with 5 characters accompanying your player character. The character creation screen is robust and detailed, allowing you to decorate your character to your heart’s content in addition to choosing their background, class, and starting perks. As you progress in the game, you’ll have to manage and optimize the gear and loadout of each of your party members.

When you’re not planet-side and in combat, you spend most of your time on your void ship, which acts as a central hub. You’ll be trading, bartering, and raising your reputation across the realms with different factions, and even participate in the occasional ship-to-ship combat. Dynamic events will also occur that further test your moral compass, which provides an extra layer of immersion to an already engrossing world.

What Owlcat Games never fails to do is immerse the player in the world of their game. They absolutely nail the atmosphere and worldbuilding of the Warhammer universe. There’s actually quite a lot of voice acting when it comes to narrative storytelling although much of the game is delivered through text bubbles. Every personality you meet has their own motivations, backstories, and goals, many times that won’t align with yours. How you choose to resolve each situation is up to you, whether that is a simple exchange of words or even bloodshed. The war-torn world of Warhammer is captured brilliantly here.

This game offers a massive 6 player co-op, with each player controlling 1 party member. It is done seamlessly when you create a lobby or join a friend’s with a lobby code. The cooperative features allow you and your pals to join forces and explore the galaxy together, adding a layer of camaraderie to the otherwise grim and solitary setting. Each player does need to own a copy of the game though, as there’s no local co-op.

On the other hand, Rogue Trader is not without its fair share of technical issues and bugs either. Performance unfortunately takes a hit, despite reviewing this on higher end hardware (RTX 3080 with 32GB of memory). First off, character models and details leave much to be desired, as the overall graphical fidelity isn’t that high. Load times are quite long and can take up to 30 seconds from a fresh launch and frame rates frequently take a dip below 60. 

Though there are no game breaking bugs, I did run into a handful of annoying ones where quest markers mysteriously disappear among other critical information not displaying. Soft locks are not uncommon and I do wish the developers push out a patch soon.

I was thoroughly impressed to find the freedom to customize the game’s difficulty to an experience of my liking. Aside from the wide range of preset defaults of Story, Normal, Daring, Hard, and Unfair, you can also set your own custom difficulty with a multitude of different sliders to toggle. There’s also an excellently implemented accessibility tab in the settings menu where you can toggle color blindness options as well as increase text font size.

Other settings include the ability to rebind controls, and change tons of visual settings such as FSR sharpness, SSR, bloom, depth of field, and shadow quality. Rogue Trader takes up a substantial amount of space on Steam PC, clocking in at 35.52 GB. The game offers both an autosave as well as a manual save option, which you should use often due to the aforementioned bugs.

There are two planned paid expansions coming next year. The first one titled: Void Shadows is slated for a June 2024 release whereas the second one titled Lex Imperialis should be coming in December 2024. A free DLC outfit is available for anyone who owns the game to claim right now, and grants you the Exclusive Rogue Trader Mask and Magnificent Rogue Trader Cloak so go get it!

Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader stands as a testament to the rich and expansive universe of Warhammer 40,000. With its captivating storyline, immersive visuals, and strategic depth, it caters to both Warhammer enthusiasts and strategy game aficionados. I have no doubt that Owlcat Games will iron out the few technical hiccups that exist in an otherwise authentic Warhammer gaming experience.