The role-playing game Rogue Trader conveys the grim world of Warhammer 40,000 like hardly any other game – and that with shocking honesty. MeinMMO editor and Warhammer expert Benedict Grothaus played the new DLC “The Infinite Museion” in advance and found himself stuttering several times even as a hardened fan.
By now, most of you should know that Warhammer is a world where there is simply nothing “good”. Yes, everything is terrible – that is the whole premise. No one is supposed to live there want.
That is exactly what makes it fascinating, and Rogue Trader conveys the world like hardly any other game, the ideal entry into the setting. It is therefore not surprising that I have already spent over 290 hours in the RPG, about 12 of those in the new DLC.
Owlcat invited us to play the new DLC “The Infinite Museion” in advance, and even though I know that the studio and its head place great value on lore-accurate representations, I still had to read some texts several times. Is the Imperium really THAT insane?
The sober realization: Yes, it is.
Death does not free you from service to the Imperium
A little something in advance: The developers provided me with some save games to be able to review all the content. I did not play through the entire DLC. Additionally, I try to avoid story spoilers as much as possible – simply because everything I have seen is definitely worth experiencing for yourself.
One of the most formative experiences took place on a new planet, a jungle planet that could just as well be a death world like Catachan. Plants have taken over here and are trying to devour everything.
The few people that still exist there are descendants of a squad from the Astra Militarum and even after so many decades (or centuries) they still faithfully follow the last order that was given. I won’t spoil the entire story that takes place there, just one detail that I discovered:
Because people struggle for survival every day, cut off from the rest of the Imperium, they have to salvage everything they can. Yes, even the corpses of their fallen. We already know that humans are processed into corpse starch, but Owlcat takes it a step further.
The corpses on this planet are locked in plant cocoons, in which they are slowly decomposed. Skin, bones, and tendons are processed into equipment, and the melted bio-soup is made into medicine, poisons, and even food. And yes: Every soldier there knows his fate and serves gladly, even after death.
Warhammer 40,000 takes “Human Resources” literally
I am not sure if that makes it better or worse, but the new companion Eogunn Februs has a similar attitude toward death. He is a Genetor Extremis of the quirky Adeptus Mechanicus. Imagine him as a ripperdoc from Cyberpunk 2077, just with significantly less compassion.
Mild spoiler warning regarding the story in Eogunn’s first quest. I won’t spoil the ending, at least. Here you jump to the part after the spoiler.
Eogunn is assigned as a sort of borrowed aid for the free trader to perform augmentations, but he also occupies himself in the medical wing – among other things, by “saving” three ship servants:
- a sentinel torn to shreds by a grenade he threw himself on to protect
- a preacher whose throat was literally ripped out by a heretic
- and some sort of canal worker who sealed a leak to protect his unit and suffered a deadly blood poisoning in the process
However, the Genetor refuses to accept that something as mundane as death wastes valuable resources of the Imperium. So he decides to simply dissect the three and make a still-functioning servant from the usable parts – along with replacement parts made from blessed steel.
Space Marines are used to having to serve even after death. That the same principle could also apply to “expendable” resources like humans, I never expected from Warhammer. Normally, they are only turned into lobotomized cyborgs.
“In short: The Imperium is the meaning of life?”
To set all this in the dark, sarcastic framework of the setting: After the quest, there is a short conversation with Eogunn about the outcome of the experiment and the similarities between humans and consumables.
At the same time, Eogunn offers an opportunity for debate, the topic: the meaning of life. For Eogunn, the answer is “trivial,” as he says: The meaning of life simply consists of your duty within the Imperium.
If you weren’t sure yet how dystopian Warhammer 40,000 really is, this answer should help. By the way, I simply asked him afterward if he could also change my light bulbs. Yes, he can. Just for the record.
After 260 hours, loads of reasons to play again
What might sound like absolute madness to “normal” people elicits a morbid fascination and deep respect from me as a Warhammer fan for how strongly Owlcat can describe the absurd world. The head already explained to me why really no one wants or can live in the Imperium – Rogue Trader additionally shows it.
However, the DLC offers much more than just depressingly honest lore. What I’ve seen from the gameplay has excited me at least as much:
- One of the secret companions has been revised and now has thematically appropriate abilities that should especially please the heretics among you.
- Trazyn the Infinite, the legendary Necron collector, is a central figure of the DLC and the new story.
- His eponymous museum offers a ton of exhibits, which, while only standing around as details on the side, can still make fans utter a “Whoa, okay, that’s cool” occasionally.
- At several points, there are new cutscenes, sometimes with surprisingly groovy singing interludes.
In addition, there is the augmentation system, which allows (almost) every character to be endowed with new abilities … and which again shows how broken the world is. Instead of just getting a cool gorilla arm or mantis blades like in Cyberpunk 2077, the augmentation throne forcibly takes away your entire arm and replaces it with metal.
And yes, there is no going back, at least not completely. So you have to think carefully about whether the new advantages are really worth it or if you would rather keep your body given by the Emperor.
“The Infinite Museion” has made my mouth water to start a playthrough again, even though I told myself: only when the last DLC is released. Unfortunately, this could overlap with Dark Heresy, into which I have also already sunk a bit: New RPG for Warhammer 40,000 starts beta on Steam – I played the content and by the Emperor, is it a lot
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