When Games Workshop announced a line of young readers’
books titled Warhammer Adventures, there
was something of a mixed response. Which is to say the primarily adult fans of
Warhammer 40,000 and Age of Sigmar reacted with a mixture of
anger, disdain, and mockery. I’ll admit I was in the last category. The various
Warhammer products have been “toned down” throughout their history to
accommodate a younger audience. But Warhammer
Adventures is the first time Games Workshop has tried to explicitly market the
settings that coined the word “grimdark” towards young children. The
idea of converting the violent, oppressive worlds of Warhammer into kid’s books seemed downright laughable. But having
read the free extracts, I’m surprised to say that Warhammer Adventures is surprisingly decent, all things considered.
The major concern about Warhammer
Adventures was that they’d water down the settings. Some saw it as a
personal attack on the hobby they loved. I was more confused how they intended
to do that with Warhammer 40K, which
is by design the worst future imaginable. My concerns about the setting being misrepresented were met by Warhammer
Adventures: Attack of the Necron’s significantly abridged version of 40K’s
iconic opening text. It begin with “Life in the 41st millennium is
hard” and skips over the “eternity of carnage and slaughter and the laughter of
thirsting gods” and “whatever happens, you will not be missed” portions. Aside
from that, it’s a surprisingly faithful if more concise rendition the original. It
reflects the rest of Attack of the Necron, which is accurate to the
setting while still very much for kids.
The book isn't the most stimulating of reads for an adult, or even
someone in their teens. But Attack of the
Necron is perfect for what it is. It captures the mechanics and tone of the
setting as accurately as it can. The story follows a group of kids at an archeological
site for various reasons, brought together by circumstance and an invasion of
Necrons. The book actually explained they aren’t robots, a common
if understandable misconception. It didn’t get
into the Faustian bargain that cost the ancient species their minds and souls
but I didn’t expect the book to. I also have to compliment author Cavan Scott for
avoiding the obnoxious “Space Marines as heroes” narrative that gains more
traction with each passing year. The power armored super soldiers save the
heroes by accident and even the children know it’s not safe to be around them. My main concern is that Warhammer Adventures would make the nightmarish Imperium of Man out to be the good guys. Thankfully it seems to have remembered they're far from the good guys. This is especially notable when you consider how the Warhammer media aimed at adults has trouble remembering that.
As for how Attack of the Necron reads, it has pretty decent characterization
and dialogue for a children’s book. There’s a real peril to it and Scott wisely
has the adults fully aware of grim realities that the kids are oblivious to.
Though the older characters reactions are enough to tell them that something’s
wrong. By the end of the excerpt I had a good grasp of who everyone was and what they value. I’d go as far to say that Attack
of the Necron is in many ways superior to a lot the content Black Library
puts out. Their books have long been referred to as “bolter porn” by the
fanbase for their emphasis on fight scenes and little else. Even the excerpt of
Attack of the Necron proves to be more inventive than that.
City of Lifestone drew
a lot less derision than Attack of the
Necron, mainly because Age of Sigmar has
very little influence outside of the hobby, especially compared to 40K. However, I’ve always thought that Warhammer Fantasy Battle’s successor was
closer to a Saturday Morning Cartoon than its far future brother. The much less
developed setting also makes it a bit more suited for what Warhammer Adventures is trying to be than
the comparatively rigid background of 40K.
Age of Sigmar also sports a
“good vs evil” cosmology that’s largely absent in most other versions of Warhammer,
though this clear morality works better for a young readers’ book.
However, City of
Lifestone is much darker than its Attack of the Necron, despite the opposite usually being true when Age of Sigmar and 40K are usually compared. Most of the
excerpt takes place in a slave camp, and the protagonist’s adventure starts
with the death of her mother. Her subsequent arrival at the titular city, in which she discovers its little more than ruins and not the promised paradise, was handled in a very tragic way. Author Tom Huddlestron
also doesn’t beat around the bush about the sort of moral code (or lack thereof)
worshippers of Chaos follow. It’s not as graphic as I make it sound but
it’s a lot more than I expected from a young readers’ book.
City of Lifestone
reads very similar to Attack of the
Necron, even in terms of setup, circumstances, and story beats. While I’m
not compelled to read the full versions of either book, I will say that 40K got the better end of the deal than Age of Sigmar. Attack of the Necron has
a little more going on with its setup and the way it handles certain elements and takes a lot less time to get interesting. That being said, City of Lifestone managed to make me laugh with the line “The Realm
of Life was rightly named, every corner of it overrun with living things. The
trouble was, most of them wanted to eat her.
Both Warhammer
Adventures stories are accompanied by illustrations done by Magnus Norén.
They’re better than most of what I’ve seen in children’s literature (a genre I
admittedly haven’t been exposed to in a while.) However, it does run into
a problem with Attack of the Necron.
So much of 40K’s aesthetic relies on
skulls, cyborgs, and other horrors. It’s difficult to translate
all that into something kid appropriate and the at times simplistic art shows that. It doesn’t help that 40K art
traditionally has a very intimidating, oppressive atmosphere that’s just hard
to emulate in this playful style. Norén does a decent job for Attack of the Necron but his work is much better with City of Lifestone. The much tamer art direction of Age
of Sigmar is better suited to the sort of atmosphere Warhammer Adventures is trying to capture and for its target demographic.
It goes without saying that Warhammer Adventures is for children. While the books don't contradict
anything in the main material, it clearly isn’t meant to be a substitute or
even a "real" addition. Barring extreme circumstances, I don’t
expect a 35$ finecast Mekki miniature to come out. That makes the more vitriolic
reactions even more confusing. I fail to see how Warhammer Adventures threatens the hobby and settings in anyway, despite the insistence of asmall but vocal group of fans. Warhammer Adventures is only meant to
introduce younger people to the settings of Warhammer 40K and Age of Sigmar and I think it will do a decent job of
that, at least from what's in the free sample.
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