Space Hulk: Deathwing is an FPS dungeon crawler in spaaaace

Space Hulk: Deathwing got a deeper showing at Gamescom 2016.

COLOGNE, Germany—Both developer Streum On Studio and publisher Focus Home Interactive seem unwilling to define it as such, but Space Hulk: Deathwing is essentially an old-school dungeon crawler masquerading as a first-person shooter. The basic setup is that your four-player squad, consisting of either human players or AI, battle through enormous space stations made up of various rooms, corridors, and doors that can be blocked off or opened up.

The layout of the Space Hulk (read: dilapidated star ship) highlights just how dungeon-like the level design goals are, particularly the overhead map I'm shown during the Gamescom 2016 demo. Pathways bleed into each other to create circuit board-like channels of parallel and intersecting right angles, while rooms have multiple entry and exit points to defend or exploit. Things get very confusing very quickly. Your location goal is indicated on the map, but how you get there is down to you.

As per the tabletop game that shares the Space Hulk name, and from which Deathwing takes its inspiration, the ceaselessly energetic Genestealers (a predatory alien species) pursue you without pause. Their presence both forces your squad of Deathwing Space Marines to keep moving, and prevents you from recklessly pushing forwards. They are reason and fear combined into one.

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