Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus is probably one of the best Warhammer games ever to grace our PC screens since Space Marine. It's a beautifully simplistic mix of unit customization, dungeon crawling, and turn-based battling against a wide variety of truly unique and interesting enemies. There's plenty of room to grow attached to your own little concoctions of techpriests, and there's enough diversity between units on both sides to make each one feel like it has a clear and concise role. Honestly, it's just plain better than it ever needed to be and has outdone all of my expectations.

Not all is perfect, however. My main criticism is that the game is probably a bit too easy – even the missions labeled as "Hard" initially presented a challenge by pitting you against big and scary named units with very interesting abilities, but they were still fundamentally easy to beat with utter brute force. I feel this may come down to an aspect of the game that makes it different to most TBS games – units can move, shoot, and use abilities in any order whatsoever. There are no rules about moving first, shooting, penalties to moving and shooting, or even phases to use abilities. If you wish, you can shoot one gun, move twice (provided you have spare Command Points), shoot another gun, use an ability, and then hit a unit with a melee weapon. At first, I thought this was wonderful, and it is, but I feel like this particular approach is what makes the game too damn easy. Either enemies need to be scaled up in their actual threat or your own units need to get nerfed a little. I was also a little disappointed to see no cover system in a universe that's basically built on it. There's also the issue with the video options simply not working. Getting stuck with VSync on at a 40hz refresh rate unless you play in windowed mode is not ideal, but I'm hoping it's just an issue with GSync monitors that will be fixed soon.

What it lacks in challenge, however, it makes up for in every other department. You can accept missions in any particular order, can kit out your techpriests in more ways than I can count, and enemies all actually feel extremely well designed. Even the simple Necron warriors felt visually imposing at least. You can specialize your units into ranged or melee combat, fit them into a support role, and buff troop units like the Skitarii rangers, or even run them as backline Command Point farmers. There is a tremendous amount of freedom, and none of the possible builds are particularly detrimental to your success. There's a huge range of items to use, each with incredibly defined roles and associated drawbacks, making the battle rounds feel very strategic in terms of unit movement and placement. Even small missions that have very little to do with the storyline all add to the doomsday timer warning of the Necrons impending awakening. They even managed to create interesting boss battles in a strategy game without simply resorting to creating bullet sponges.

If this is what Bulwark Studios is capable of, I'd very much like to see more.