Get Out Of My Head

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 is a beautiful recreation stuffed with industry-best visuals and performances.

It is usually not terribly enjoyable to play.

Admittedly, I used to be not the most important fan of the primary Hellblade, which additionally was stunning and well-acted. The puzzles and gameplay didn’t fairly land for me, however with an open thoughts heading into the sequel, I hoped to see extra enhancements and evolution within the sequel. As an alternative, a couple of issues appear to have gone backward, even, and I’m realizing that this model of storytelling is generally not for me. As such, you might interpret a few of these points right here could also be about Hellblade extra typically. Although it has related strengths as properly.

Hellblade 2 is gorgeous. Its sweeping Icelandic landscapes, deep underground caves, massacred villages and ritual sacrifice loss of life pits are among the many greatest I’ve ever seen within the medium. Engaging in this on a Collection X as a substitute of a maxed PC working Cyberpunk on path tracing is actually one thing else. The environmental element right here is unparalleled and there’s no likelihood it is not going to take your breath away on a number of events. It truly is jaw-dropping on this regard.

The identical is true for the appearing work, with one other highly effective efficiency from Melina Juergens, which is able to little question be remembered come award season subsequent winter. I additionally appreciated Chris O’Reilly because the slaver Thórgestr, specifically.

Hellblade has a relentless concentrate on being “cinematic,” miles past even what video games like Uncharted and The Final of Us try. There’s no UI in any respect. No “upgrades” to search out, extraordinarily restricted exploration, however largely simply marching straight by the story. This cinematic expertise extends into fight with dynamic sequences which have enemies crashing into you and one another in between player-controlled segments, and lots of the battles can really feel like one-take John Wick Viking combat sequences consequently. That half is neat.

However I simply don’t get pleasure from this as an precise recreation. The time period “strolling simulator” was thrown round some indie video games some time again, however right here? It’s fairly correct. There are lengthy stretches of time the place you’re doing nothing however holding down ahead, or sometimes, the run button to improve that to a lightweight jog. Certain, it’s time to soak up the panorama, nevertheless it will get previous, particularly in a recreation that’s fairly brief to start out with. I used to be past bored in an absurdly lengthy cave sequence peppered by a few puzzles. Then later, you undergo a mind-bending foggy woods the place you fairly actually do nothing however stroll. There aren’t even puzzles there. It’s most likely 20 minutes of simply strolling, which for a seven hour recreation, is just not ultimate.

Sure, seven hours. Positively no more than that. Ninja Principle is unapologetic for the brief size of its titles, and I gained’t maintain it in opposition to it. My playthrough was brisk, although I suppose it may very well be prolonged if you happen to chanced on puzzles or fight sequences. The issue is just not size, however pacing, lengthy, dragging sequences with a sudden dash close to the top that was not constructed out sufficient in any respect. I want I had spent half the time within the caves, skipped the woods fully and did extra with the ultimate house.

The story this time round feels much less pressing. This isn’t Senua’s earlier saga of non-public tragedy, that is her serving to strangers, and by proxy her unseen “folks” by slaying quite a few giants throughout the land. By the top I understood how this course of connects to her personal story, nevertheless it’s lacking that deeply private hook from the primary recreation.

I do know that it is a signature of the sequence, and I did play with the really helpful headphones, however the voices in Senua’s head, and subsequently in your personal, are nearly insupportable. It’s continuous narration that nearly by no means says something helpful or fascinating. I get that it’s attempting to convey real psychological sickness, however as a recreation, I shortly grew bored with two bickering voices saying issues like “It’s a torch! A torch! Choose it up. It’s giving us mild! It can present us the way in which. What if it goes out? We’ll be misplaced in darkness. Preserve the torch alight! The torch!” It was simply an excessive amount of, too typically, and deeply disagreeable to play. That could be the purpose, however that doesn’t make it a great expertise.

As for the remainder of the “recreation” recreation, one purpose it may well look so superb is that it’s so linear and on-the-rails. Like the primary recreation, you primarily have one path and one path solely. Perhaps a couple of occasions you may stroll 15 toes down a tiny offshoot to discover a secret little bit of a narrative, however that’s it. It’s simply strolling, working, climbing as you push additional and additional forward.

Fight too, although it’s dynamic in its presentation, could be very rote in follow. You will have a heavy assault, mild assault, dodge and parry. That’s fantastic, normal, however enemies often solely have simply two units of patterned strikes that shortly develop into simple to work round. The method for each single enemy is block, dodge then hit them a couple of occasions to construct up your mirror, then put them in slo-mo for what is basically an autokill. Although it’s all very “cinematic,” there’s no depth right here.

Among the puzzles are fascinating, notably some “flip items of the room the wrong way up” ones. I used to be much less amused by the return of the “discover the form within the panorama” ones getting back from the primary recreation which is generally bumbling right into a eye-level partitions or knee-high out-of-bounds rocks you surprise why you may’t bypass to get a vantage level. I’m unsure I counted greater than three sorts of puzzles in whole, solely one among which I’d take into account considerably fascinating.

I loved many elements of Hellblade 2, and there are some environmental/music sequences specifically, one close to the start, the opposite nearer to the center, which are going to stick with me some time as a result of absolute crushing, horrifying, intense environment paired with superb audio. However as a recreation? One thing I loved enjoying? Typically talking, no, it wasn’t actually for me.

Rating: 7/10

A code was supplied for the needs of this overview.

Observe me on Twitter, Threads, YouTube, and Instagram.

Choose up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller sequence and The Earthborn Trilogy.