Here's 2 minutes of gleeful carnage in Warhammer 40K: Darktide

There's a moment in this Warhammer 40,000: Darktide trailer that I think succinctly sums up this videogame. The player holds their chainsaw sword in front of them to block an incoming strike from a mutant-looking dude dressed like he's about to fight Mad Max in Thunderdome, then retaliates with a charged-up slash, eventually sawing him in half. Three skulls attached to the mutant's belt—presumably his most prized posessions—shake around as he flops to the ground.

The thing is, this is not a big moment. It's three seconds in a two minute trailer. But it's got basically everything it needs: skulls, chainswords, mutant bisections, skulls. This is still a Fatshark game, every bit as weighty and bloody as Vermintide 2 but set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, as proven by a completely inconsequential moment in this trailer involving a guy being casually sawed in half.

All those three seconds are missing is the guns, and the rest of the trailer has those in ample supply. There's the Ogryn's shotgun, which looks more like a semi-automatic cannon. There's a lasgun with a scope that looks like it would be right at home in Call of Duty, except for the part where it fires lasers. There's a moment where a mage concentrates their power onto a hulking brute's head and pops it like a balloon, which technically doesn't involve a gun but it's a ranged attack so I'm counting it.

It's a very good two minutes of carnage, and a reminder that Darktide is tantalizingly close but still frustratingly far away. The co-op FPS is out on September 13 on both Steam and Xbox Game Pass.