Games Workshop has added a Black Library brand to its official Big Summer Warhammer Preview showcase, sparking hypothesis the firm might announce new novels that lastly transfer the overarching Warhammer 40,000 narrative ahead.
Big Summer Warhammer Preview, set for this Friday, July 18, will comprise reveals for Games Workshop’s essential tabletop video games, together with Age of Sigmar, The Horus Heresy, and in fact Warhammer 40,000. Its initially launched digital poster for the occasion didn’t function the brand for Black Library, Games Workshop’s in-house e book publishing division. Nevertheless, on July 16, it launched a brand new model of this poster with the Black Library brand added, sparking hypothesis that followers will get new novel bulletins as effectively.
Why is that this thrilling for followers of the setting? There’s an excessive amount of hypothesis that Games Workshop might lastly be prepared to transfer the Warhammer 40,000 narrative ahead with both a model new sequence of books, the teased meet-up between two returned primarchs, or the long-awaited third e book in Dan Abnett’s Bequin trilogy.
IGN has reported on the now legendary Pandemonium earlier than, when followers speculated its delay might need one thing to do with Games Workshop and Amazon getting their narrative geese in a row forward of the Henry Cavill-fronted Warhammer 40,000 Cinematic Universe. It’s maybe the most-anticipated e book in all Warhammer fandom. The primary novel in the Bequin sequence, Pariah, got here out in 2012. Its sequel, the Warhammer 40,000 lore treasure trove that’s Penitent, adopted almost a decade later, in March 2021. Pandemonium doesn’t have a launch date, and the anticipate an announcement is quick changing into Warhammer 40,000’s model of George R. R. Martin’s M.I.A. Recreation of Thrones e book, The Winds of Winter. Some followers are speculating — maybe extra with hope than expectation — that now could be lastly the time for a Pandemonium reveal.
There’s heightened curiosity in Pandemonium as a result of it guarantees to really transfer the overarching Warhammer 40,000 plot ahead. Penitent ended with a major lore revelation (it has to do with the id of the mysterious King in Yellow, which we gained’t spoil right here), and so the ramifications of Pandemonium for the wider Warhammer 40,000 universe might be big.
Maybe extra lifelike is a brand new novel sequence set throughout the interval generally known as The Scouring. That is the largely unexplored time in Warhammer 40,000 historical past when the Imperium ran down the traitor legions following the defeat of Horus 10,000 years earlier than the present setting. With the Horus Heresy seemingly wrapped up following the launch of Period of Smash, The Scouring looks as if a pure subsequent step for Games Workshop if it desires to proceed filling in the gaps in the Warhammer 40,000 narrative.
Or this may increasingly all be a lot ado about nothing, and Black Library’s presence at the present finally goes down as a disappointment. You’d like to assume that Games Workshop knew what it could do to fan expectations by slapping the Black Library brand on its preview poster, although.
Which leads me neatly into why Warhammer 40,000 lore followers get excited by teases like this in the first place. As I’ve reported earlier than, the Warhammer 40,000 story, reminiscent of it’s, is a sluggish shifting beast. The scribes at Games Workshop typically take years to inch the overarching plot ahead. Take, for instance, the return of beloved primarch, Lion El’Jonson, which was introduced in March 2023. Now, over two years later, the character is but to do a lot of something in the setting, his hotly anticipated reunion along with his brother, Roboute Guilliman, seemingly additional away than ever. May a brand new novel lastly element this certain to be spicy meet up?
Perhaps, on Friday, we’ll lastly get some solutions. The Big Summer Warhammer Preview is ready for 7pm BST / 11am PDT on Friday, July 18.
Wesley is Director, Information at IGN. Discover him on Twitter at @wyp100. You may attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.