Space Marines
- Thread starter Benjeezy
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They are the easiest army to play with, the cheapest army to collect, the easiest army to paint, the army that's in all the starter sets, the army that gets most novel and comic book attention, and the army that most people play. All of those reasons contribute to people hating it because, well... it's popular!
Personaly, I still play them because, as with a lot of people, I was introduced to 40k through them.
Personaly, I still play them because, as with a lot of people, I was introduced to 40k through them.
Who hates space marines? They're great!
"Gimmie somethin to shoot!"
"Fired up!"
Also the name isn't that bad... marines are a fighting unit involved with the navy, right? Well, because in space you fly ships, it's the space navy, so the marines are space marines. What else do you expect?
"Gimmie somethin to shoot!"
"Fired up!"
Also the name isn't that bad... marines are a fighting unit involved with the navy, right? Well, because in space you fly ships, it's the space navy, so the marines are space marines. What else do you expect?
Yeah, if space marines were to actually vary more than just merely cosmetically from game to game, I may enjoy them more. But, they're all super-masculine, super-muscled, super-grizzly hulks of meat with guns. I don't much care for shooters (the genre most star in) to begin with, so I'm not likely to play a game with space marines in it anyway. The seeming requirement that sci-fi games have space marines nowadays is kinda ruining sci-fi games for me. I keep hearing awesome things about Mass Effect, but I'm turned off by the prospect of playing a space marine shooter, even if it does have RPG elements.
Though he isn't a soldier so it doesn't apply too well.Benjeezy said:If you want, then sure!thethingthatlurks said:I've never thought of it that way
Anyway I have nothing against space marines, and I think most of hate is actually aimed towards bad and uninspired movies/games then towards soldiers themselves. But yeah there must be people who are sick of them appearing all over the place, sure.
Space Marines are difficult to fit into fiction well as anything but an instrument. A few are given personality in mainstream media, but much of the time they're one of a dying breed or exceptional in some way (Lookin' at you, Master Chief).
As a Warhammer 40K buff, I enjoy the prospect of Space Marines, but Games Workshop's offspring are truly post-human weapons with a mindset that is centered on servitude and defense of the Holy Emperor of Terra... Except for those Chaos ones... That just seem to want to party (kill) and hang out (burn everything) all the time...
Not that there's anything wrong with having hobbies!
Regardless, Space Marines are either portrayed as a) shock troop fodder with a do-or-die mentality or b) the trump card in any military engagement, kicking so much ass their feet are adorned with shoes made of pressed stale excrement - with a do-or-die mentality.
I cannot deny there is something really cool about 7'+ gene-altered armored-to-death combat monsters with state of the art weaponry and pretenses of nobility. They're just... Clumsy.
Clumsy as protagonists, as story devices, and as fixtures of a given situation. Their role is to fight, and they fight well. Suggesting otherwise or expecting them to be humanized and relatable is contrived.
Besides, the Imperial Stormtroopers of Star Wars fame were seen as a menace (well, more of a nuisance by episode VI) before Episode II 'introduced' them as cloned space marines. And at first, they were really cool! They were shootin', an blowin' stuff up, and all flying an' stuff.... And went right back to being military fixtures in Episode III. It's difficult to take Space Marines seriously or stay interested unless a story sticks with a group or a single one, showing contrasting experiences of pre- and post-transformation. But again, that kind of setup undermines the principle of an elite warrior and injects relatable/likable human frailty, raising the question of whether the adage of 'Space Marine' was necessary or if they could have just said 'Really tough guy/gal with power armor.'
On a related subject, Tactical Dreadnought Armor is awesome.
As a Warhammer 40K buff, I enjoy the prospect of Space Marines, but Games Workshop's offspring are truly post-human weapons with a mindset that is centered on servitude and defense of the Holy Emperor of Terra... Except for those Chaos ones... That just seem to want to party (kill) and hang out (burn everything) all the time...
Not that there's anything wrong with having hobbies!
Regardless, Space Marines are either portrayed as a) shock troop fodder with a do-or-die mentality or b) the trump card in any military engagement, kicking so much ass their feet are adorned with shoes made of pressed stale excrement - with a do-or-die mentality.
I cannot deny there is something really cool about 7'+ gene-altered armored-to-death combat monsters with state of the art weaponry and pretenses of nobility. They're just... Clumsy.
Clumsy as protagonists, as story devices, and as fixtures of a given situation. Their role is to fight, and they fight well. Suggesting otherwise or expecting them to be humanized and relatable is contrived.
Besides, the Imperial Stormtroopers of Star Wars fame were seen as a menace (well, more of a nuisance by episode VI) before Episode II 'introduced' them as cloned space marines. And at first, they were really cool! They were shootin', an blowin' stuff up, and all flying an' stuff.... And went right back to being military fixtures in Episode III. It's difficult to take Space Marines seriously or stay interested unless a story sticks with a group or a single one, showing contrasting experiences of pre- and post-transformation. But again, that kind of setup undermines the principle of an elite warrior and injects relatable/likable human frailty, raising the question of whether the adage of 'Space Marine' was necessary or if they could have just said 'Really tough guy/gal with power armor.'
On a related subject, Tactical Dreadnought Armor is awesome.
I'm tired of seeing Westerns with Japanese influences (Samurai Western, Red Steel 2, etc.)Daemascus said:
Let's have a new genre...how about...
1: One of the 300 Spartans in WW1
2: A Pirate who fights robots in feudal Japan
3: Adam West as James Bond fighting Mr. T
...yeah, I ran out of real ideas after the first one...
I kind of hate the ones from 40K because they give off this really unpleasant Nazi vibe.... plus the endless chanting of:
"For the Emperor!"
Has made me officially want the emporer to have his genitals ripped off and fed to a Kroot hound while his body gets mangled and burned and then his head removed so I can show it to the Marines and cripple their ideology and then have them all lit on fire... and then I kill all the human civilians... and then I BURN THE ENTIRE PLANET... MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!
.... I should probably see a psychiatrist.
In any case, I don't really have ire for Space Marines as a concept, because I mean Christ it's the future and you are going into war with an enemy that has plasma guns.... you wanna go in the heavy armor or the leotard?
However, I can see why people get annoyed by there being so many space soldiers in games, (however I discount the ones from Gears of War, Fallout and all others where the game is solely set on Earth (or metaphor of Earth) because to be a 'Space Marine' one needs to be in 'Space'. We need a new term for those other guys.) but as it stands I don't think its such a big deal. There are still plenty of FPS's where you play as a soldier or an alien or a civilian stuck in an underwater warzone... point is, I can see why it bothers people and while I could never say I've been greatly amazed by them either, their presence in gaming doesn't really bother me.
"For the Emperor!"
Has made me officially want the emporer to have his genitals ripped off and fed to a Kroot hound while his body gets mangled and burned and then his head removed so I can show it to the Marines and cripple their ideology and then have them all lit on fire... and then I kill all the human civilians... and then I BURN THE ENTIRE PLANET... MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!
.... I should probably see a psychiatrist.
In any case, I don't really have ire for Space Marines as a concept, because I mean Christ it's the future and you are going into war with an enemy that has plasma guns.... you wanna go in the heavy armor or the leotard?
However, I can see why people get annoyed by there being so many space soldiers in games, (however I discount the ones from Gears of War, Fallout and all others where the game is solely set on Earth (or metaphor of Earth) because to be a 'Space Marine' one needs to be in 'Space'. We need a new term for those other guys.) but as it stands I don't think its such a big deal. There are still plenty of FPS's where you play as a soldier or an alien or a civilian stuck in an underwater warzone... point is, I can see why it bothers people and while I could never say I've been greatly amazed by them either, their presence in gaming doesn't really bother me.
When you look at the space marines in the movie genre, say between Alien and Doom, there is a very distinct and clear difference. In Alien, they were average guys you could relate to because they appeared to still ACT like people. In Doom, they were a bunch of elitist dildos that thought they were invincible, despite half the team being idiots.
In video games, when the main character is a space marine, usually he is a dedicated man who has years of service to his credit (if not genetic enhancements to make his superior to us "average people") and his persona is likened to a superhero-ish stature. Gordon Freeman could be considered to be an average guy who is thrust into the role of a hero, thereby making him easier to identify with. But who among us can say we know what it is like to be a genetically-modified superhero (aside from the test-tube babies of the 80s)?
Sadly, I think that perhaps space marines are becoming too much of a cliche anymore because of the over-abundance of movies like Alien and Starship Troopers and Jason X. We have a lot of characters from movies and pop culture to draw from, and the stereotype has likened the character to one from an action movie from the late 80s and early to mid 90s. We've just seen it so much that the character doesn't really having any individual meaning any more. We see a space marine, and we already have preconceived notions of what to expect. Would Riddick from Pitch Black or The Chronicles of Riddick be considered a space marine?
In video games, the space marine is usually a guy who is gruff and macho and afraid of nothing and shoots first and asks questions later... sort of like a John Wayne-type of space cowboy. He always wins, he always gets the girl, and everyone thinks he is the penultimate hero. So where is the growth in this character anymore? They all seem to do the same thing, and having a moral choice in a video game adds a little depth to the story, but never much to the character. They will always win and make it to the end of the game, the universe will always be saved in one way or another, and all their previous mistakes are forgiven because they end up saving the day. Look at Luke Skywalker from Star Wars... he was an everyday person who happened to be the son of the most powerful person in the known galaxy. So before he really gets to establish himself as an individual, we are already told he is anything but an ordinary person and that casts a different and heroic light on his character because we believe that he is better than us. While trying to maintain his sense of humanity and not get caught up in his powers, we can't help but think that he is better than us because he can do things we only dream about. Does this make him unlikeable? Not really... he still shows emotion and compassion towards his friends without acting like a wuss or some sort of emo anti-hero. He was a moisture farmer with special abilities, but had he not had the chain of events that showed him his actual potential, he would have lived and died a lowly and boring moisture farmer.
I'd like to see a more down to earth sort of space marine like the ones we knew in older movies. Why do they need some power armor or magic abilities to be a hero? The people in those movies we can relate to end up becoming killed by some rookie mistake or an alien's lunch... we rarely see the little guy get his day. I like space marines, I'd just like to see a different character take on the role as the underdog hero.
In video games, when the main character is a space marine, usually he is a dedicated man who has years of service to his credit (if not genetic enhancements to make his superior to us "average people") and his persona is likened to a superhero-ish stature. Gordon Freeman could be considered to be an average guy who is thrust into the role of a hero, thereby making him easier to identify with. But who among us can say we know what it is like to be a genetically-modified superhero (aside from the test-tube babies of the 80s)?
Sadly, I think that perhaps space marines are becoming too much of a cliche anymore because of the over-abundance of movies like Alien and Starship Troopers and Jason X. We have a lot of characters from movies and pop culture to draw from, and the stereotype has likened the character to one from an action movie from the late 80s and early to mid 90s. We've just seen it so much that the character doesn't really having any individual meaning any more. We see a space marine, and we already have preconceived notions of what to expect. Would Riddick from Pitch Black or The Chronicles of Riddick be considered a space marine?
In video games, the space marine is usually a guy who is gruff and macho and afraid of nothing and shoots first and asks questions later... sort of like a John Wayne-type of space cowboy. He always wins, he always gets the girl, and everyone thinks he is the penultimate hero. So where is the growth in this character anymore? They all seem to do the same thing, and having a moral choice in a video game adds a little depth to the story, but never much to the character. They will always win and make it to the end of the game, the universe will always be saved in one way or another, and all their previous mistakes are forgiven because they end up saving the day. Look at Luke Skywalker from Star Wars... he was an everyday person who happened to be the son of the most powerful person in the known galaxy. So before he really gets to establish himself as an individual, we are already told he is anything but an ordinary person and that casts a different and heroic light on his character because we believe that he is better than us. While trying to maintain his sense of humanity and not get caught up in his powers, we can't help but think that he is better than us because he can do things we only dream about. Does this make him unlikeable? Not really... he still shows emotion and compassion towards his friends without acting like a wuss or some sort of emo anti-hero. He was a moisture farmer with special abilities, but had he not had the chain of events that showed him his actual potential, he would have lived and died a lowly and boring moisture farmer.
I'd like to see a more down to earth sort of space marine like the ones we knew in older movies. Why do they need some power armor or magic abilities to be a hero? The people in those movies we can relate to end up becoming killed by some rookie mistake or an alien's lunch... we rarely see the little guy get his day. I like space marines, I'd just like to see a different character take on the role as the underdog hero.
They're not that bad, they're just unoriginal. When I play a game about fighting aliens in dark, grimy corridors whilst wearing very bulky armour in space, I question why this new game is more impressive than the 40 that came before it
Now, when people take that forumla and change it, I love marines (I.E. Resistance:FoM had the awesome idea of bringing the aliens to England, having a real "normal" marine fight them, and having battles in places like York, Grimsby and Manchester (who thought that would ever happen?!)
Now, when people take that forumla and change it, I love marines (I.E. Resistance:FoM had the awesome idea of bringing the aliens to England, having a real "normal" marine fight them, and having battles in places like York, Grimsby and Manchester (who thought that would ever happen?!)
I personally dislike the human race in space games because they are just more of the same and in most games(I can think of), they're always way too much like America for my liking. aggressive, xenophobic and willing to do everything to show everyone that they're the best, because they're too afraid to show there's other spices out there who are also pretty good at stuff.
bring the hate (not really, don't be pissed, please)
bring the hate (not really, don't be pissed, please)
