Games Workshop Is So Protective of Warhammer 40,000, It Told the Space Marine 2 Dev They Got the Ankle Armor Wrong

ign.com:

Games Workshop is famously protective of the Warhammer 40,000 intellectual property, so much so that it carefully controls adaptations of its grimdark tabletop game to make sure everything is as lore accurate as possible.

That protective work went on during the development of Space Marine 2, now the most-played Warhammer video game of all time on Steam. Developer Saber Interactive worked closely with Games Workshop over Space Marine 2’s four-year development to ensure it was as authentic as possible, right down to the nuts and bolts of a Space Marine’s armor.

Speaking to IGN, Saber Interactive Chief Creative Officer Tim Willits discussed its working relationship with Games Workshop, and some of the challenges it faced ensuring Space Marine 2 passed all those lore checks.

“Let me give you an example,” Willits began, “the ankle armor we had, the ankle armor was the wrong size and they told us that the ankle armor was wrong.”

It’s a funny problem to fix, but building a virtual Space Marine was no mean feat. After all, Space Marines were introduced in 1987 with nary a thought for how they might be made to work on a video game battlefield.

“45 years ago when the guy that made the little Space Marine that sat on the table, he probably was not imagining them animating in a video game 45 years later,” Willits said. “And let me tell you, that was hard to make it. I mean, when you walk and run and fight as Titus, it feels so good. But you've seen people cosplay as a Space Marine, right? They can't even walk down a hallway without falling.”

Digging into the details of the process of working with Games Workshop, Willits revealed the Warhammer 40,000 custodian has a system that runs content and assets created by licensees through an approval process, then dedicated staff at Games Workshop work with those licensees to offer feedback.

“They will help steer,” Willits explained. “And even when we're coming up with Tyranid attacks, they're like, oh, that Tyranid doesn't really attack like