Alright. Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader is done and dusted. This. Was. Epic. Like seriously, this is one of the most expansive and detailed games I think I've ever played, and as a CRPG, my personal favorite genre, it's easily top five all-time. I realize it had a bit of a shaky release, but as it is right now (April 2025), the game is magnificent. It's like GRRM and Simon R Green and Clive Barker and Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson were all consultants for this one. Which, to be fair, is kind of WH40K in a nutshell anyway, but it really really stands out here. You take on the role of a newly minted Rogue Trader, and the game does an amazing job of taking you from your inception as a Rogue Trader through all the trials and tribulations you will face, all the way to a conclusion that completely reshapes the world around you.

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As I wrapped up Rogue Trader, I couldn't help but feel a bit exhausted. Not because it's in any way bad or cumbersome, but rather because it takes you through so much, and the growth of you and your companions is so vast from start to finish, that it just took a heavier emotional toll on me than your average RPG typically has. It really makes the player feel so invested in what is happening in the game, that as you sit back and reflect on everything that happened, it can take a bit to process everything taken in totality. The crazy thing is, in the 116 hours or so that I played this, never did the game stop moving forward. And just when you think things couldn't get crazier or more out of control, they do. And when you think you've got things under control, things take another turn and you realize it was just a smaller part of a greater whole and your control is tenuous at best. The game will let you rest for a little while, but it mostly keeps you on your toes the entire playthrough. It is quite riveting from a story perspective.

And the story really informs the gameplay. Which is a very dialed in and yet system dense and diverse CRPG, with what should seem like an overwhelming number of things to keep track of. But the game does a great job of introducing things at a pace that makes everything feel natural. Eventually, you will be managing a cast of twelve characters, including your own character, the Rogue Trader (potentially thirteen characters if you unlock the secret character via your choices in game). You will also be managing your ship's crew and dealing directly with its officers. You will be managing your Rogue Trader's little empire, which includes solving problems and using resources and standing to research different things to help your empire and your ship and your crew. You will also engage in some politics dealing with nobles, other Rogue Traders, Xenos, etc...

And on top of that, you will be exploring. Exploration actually borrows from the Mass Effect series fairly heavily I would say. You'll travel to various solar systems, scanning planets for resources and anomalies. Sometimes, the anomalies are handled in choose your own adventure style. Other times, you and your party will drop down to investigate in person. The wrinkle to space travel and exploring though is that you will be dealing with the Void, which is how your Voidship travels between systems. And the Void is pretty much a Lovecraftian place where daemons and spirits abound. Sometimes, travel is safe. Other times, you will have to defend your ship from Void denizens, who do such fun things as possess your crew and destroy your sentient AI computers. Stuff like that.

You will be called on to handle things yourself of course, from time to time, and for that, you can form your party with yourself and up to five of your companions. This is pretty standard isometric CRPG stuff overall. With of course some wrinkles pertaining to the Void as well. Because some of your characters are Psykers, who pull their powers from the Void itself and open themselves up potentially to the dangers held within, lol. Beyond that though, it's real time exploration with turn-based grid combat. With a very large variety of maps, that contain obstacles, cover, and sometimes multilevels.

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When combat starts, wherever your characters were standing is considered their starting point. You can place them anywhere you want within their total movement rate. So, if your character can move 8 squares then that's your placement radius. After that, it's an initiative-based system and nothing you haven't seen before.

There is also ship combat, which is also turn-based grid style, but you don't get to place your ship. It just starts where it starts. You do have a lot of combat options with your ship though, depending on who you select to man its various stations (weapons, maneuverability, etc...) and whatever weapons and such you have equipped your ship with. And your ship does level up much like your characters do.

The level up system for characters is about as deep as you're going to see in a game. And actually, this is where I would anticipate people feeling a bit overwhelmed, due to the sheer volume of options available. But fortunately, there are a lot of build guides online, and this is something I would suggest taking a look at. Don't be scared to level up the way you want to, but the guides will sort of clue you in to how to do so more efficiently for various types of builds.

Visually, this game is a feast for the eyes. The sheer quantity and quality of set pieces is stunning. Character designs are super cool. Combat animations are top tier. Cutscenes are animated movie quality. And the same goes for the audio. The voice acting? Chef's kiss. It's about as good as things can be. And a special shoutout to whomever voiced UIfar. The way that actor dove completely into the role was impressive. Equally impressive though was the soundtrack, which all seemed to be original compositions, and Owlcat hired an orchestra to record it. All of the musicians are credited, and there are a lot of them. This is the way to do it. John Williams would be proud.

This carries over to the dialogue, which is so well written. Something I personally enjoyed is that the game always knows exactly who it is dealing with. Your companions factor heavily into this as do your own morality choices (from three basic paths: Iconoclast, Dogmatic, Heretic). They have a lot of banter of course, but something I truly appreciated is how NPC dialogue changes based on who you have in your party at any given moment. Some of your companions have their own relationships or reactions to different NPCs, and vice versa.

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I would like to note here that the addition of the current expansion into the game was as seamless as I've seen. I'll speak more on that in my review of Void Shadows, but it's easy to forget that you even are playing DLC content, so perfect was its integration into the base game. Flawless execution there.

Honestly, this game deserves far more than the character limit Steam imposes on reviews but suffice to say that if you are in any way a CRPG and/or Warhammer fan, this is a must play, and sci-fi fans in general should be taking note of this game. It's definitely going into my top 10 all-time favorites, newness bias be damned, and it absolutely earns every bit of its asking price. It has been bundled though and is on sale pretty frequently these days, so you know. Make the decision that seems right for you in that regard. :)