Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters

Introduction

Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters is Complex Games' turn-based tactics game, published by Frontier Foundry and released on 5 May 2022 at NZ$55.99. Players lead a squad of Grey Knights, Warhammer 40,000's elite anti-daemon Space Marines, hunting down a spreading Nurgle plague across a strategic campaign layer. It sits at 78% positive ("Mostly Positive") across 9,414 English-language Steam reviews. This review read the 100 most-helpful negative reviews of 2,091 total, plus a sample of the 100 most recent English reviews.

Warhammer XCOM, done well

Reviewers on both sides of the score consistently praise the core tactics combat. "Warhammer XCOM - a fantastic but challenging game," reads a representative recent review. Another, with nearly 300 hours logged: "If you liked xcom 2, get ready for a smoother and more polished" experience. This review found the presentation and voice acting drawing similarly consistent praise, with reviewers crediting the game for capturing the grim tone of the Warhammer 40,000 universe effectively.

Punishing difficulty is the dominant complaint

What holds the game back for a meaningful share of reviewers is difficulty, appearing in some form across 37 of the 100 negative reviews read — frequently tied specifically to a wound-recovery system that keeps injured units out of action for extended periods. "The difficulties are almost nonsensical in how punishing it can be," reads one review, describing a mission built around defending an escort NPC against overwhelming enemy numbers. Another, more blunt: "Game is just stupid hard sometimes and even the weakest of enemies just eat bolter rounds like crazy."

A DRM complaint that never went away, and a persistent bug

A separate, recurring complaint concerns Denuvo DRM, present in the game since its May 2022 launch and still cited in 9 of the 100 negative reviews read this review sampled — some citing performance concerns, others objecting to the technology's root-level system access on principle. This review also found a specific, recurring technical complaint: a turn-ending hang or freeze bug appearing in roughly 15 of the 100 negative reviews read. One 2026 reviewer describes it as an unresolved, long-standing issue: "Every other mission, after a few turns the whole game hangs at end of turn. I tried absolutely everything, found out people have been having this issue since game launched, still not [fixed]."

Verdict

Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters remains, by wide consensus including reviewers marking it down, a genuinely strong entry in the XCOM-inspired tactics genre with combat and presentation that consistently earn favourable comparisons to the best of that genre. What holds it back is a real difficulty spike some reviewers find disproportionate rather than merely challenging, a Denuvo DRM complaint present since launch, and a specific turn-ending freeze bug this review found recurring across its sample as recently as 2026. Worth it for tactics fans who want a genuine challenge — just go in with realistic expectations for the wound-recovery system's punishing edge.