Senua's Saga: Hellblade II

[Lemming42]

Liked the first game even though it was kind of shit mechanically. Watching a stream of this one and it looks great, love the fight against the slaver near the start where Senua and the dude just rip absolute fucking chunks out of each other and keep fighting like Fist of the North Star characters. Laughed out loud at the fight "ending" and then abruptly continuing like six times.

I wonder if the plot can sustain itself for another game though; the whole hook for this character is that she experiences auditory hallucinations and lives in a time period where the cause and nature of her condition isn't understood, and there's not really much to either her or the game's setting outside of that. Hearing the voices also stopped being unnerving after about 20 mins of gameplay in the first game, then they became irritating for a while, then eventually just became unremarkable background noise (which might be what it's like to have real psychosis, I guess), so for this game their presence is pretty much entirely incidental unless the plot takes some weird turn with it. Seems so far like it's just a game about a very accident-prone individual who keeps tripping over and nearly drowning or breaking her neck.

 

[Dodo1610]

The first one was a great and unique audiovisual experience, I just have no idea why anyone thought that it ever needed or deserved a sequel. The whole point of the first game was that all the supernatural stuff was just the result of Senua's schizophrenia and her PTSD from losing her mate due to a Viking raid. But now the game has actual fantasy elements like giants, meaning they completely retconned the first game's setting and plot.

 

[Tyranicon]

The first one was a great and unique audiovisual experience, I just have no idea why anyone thought that it ever needed or deserved a sequel. The whole point of the first game was that all the supernatural stuff was just the result of Senua's schizophrenia and her PTSD from losing her mate due to a Viking raid. But now the game has actual fantasy elements like giants, meaning they completely retconned the first game's setting and plot.

Plus, didn't the first game have like a definitive ending?

Really don't understand why this needed a sequel. Besides sequel bucks, I guess.

 

[AlwaysBrotoMen]

most overated game

 

[Ezekiel]

most overated game

It's a piece of shit. Story, gameplay, how combat defies the story, all shit.

 

[markec]

 

[Zlaja]

Game "journalists" are hypocrites!? Please, tell me it ain't so, bros!

 

[911 Jumper]

His phoniness is palpable

 

[cruel]

First impressions: they managed to create a worse game than the first after 7 years of development. 'Immersive' slow walking, 'immersive' slow climbing, 'immersive' slow drowning - everything is very immersive now. Shitty puzzles are still there. They went overboard with voices with Senua's head, instead of a whisper here and there, now you have a band of women screaming into your ears constantly. Combat is simple, but somehow satisfying. The game looks very good, but I feel it lost this dark oppressive atmosphere from the first one - they tried to re-create that, but it feels very fake and artificial now.

 

[Ezekiel]

First impressions: they managed to create a worse game than the first after 7 years of development. 'Immersive' slow walking, 'immersive' slow climbing, 'immersive' slow drowning - everything is very immersive now. Shitty puzzles are still there. They went overboard with voices with Senua's head, instead of a whisper here and there, now you have a band of women screaming into your ears constantly. Combat is simple, but somehow satisfying. The game looks very good, but I feel it lost this dark oppressive atmosphere from the first one - they tried to re-create that, but it feels very fake and artificial now.

Combat sucks and any sense of oppression is lost to her incredible power.

What did I write in my review about the combat? Oh yeah.

Playing on Hard combat difficulty (the highest available), I only died once against regular enemies, very early on when I was still figuring out the system, and maybe three times against one later boss. It's a really basic and forgiving system. Her hit points regenerate in combat. She is an averaged-sized woman, maybe five feet four inches, fighting men four times as big as her. I'm supposed to believe that she could stun lock these hulking giants (almost nine feet tall) by throwing straight forward kicks? That she could break through their solid parries or parry the attacks they deliver with arms thick as logs head on? For a game this grim and visually realistic, the fighting is absurd. It doesn't matter if they are phantoms and figments of her mind. The problem with that excuse is that before she came to this place she was taught to fight like men, against enemies who would be bigger and stronger than her. Viking warriors with much more mass, powered by testosterone. She learned to fight, at least initially, by watching her love. If he cared for her, he would have helped her to realize how limited she physically was and taught her to make up for her smaller size and weaker power by using her wits and building her other attributes up more, perhaps making her more of a sneaky, resourceful runner. Or at least put her in a place where she might figure those things out for herself. If these demonic warriors are her fears corporealized, then think about how comically delusional she must be to imagine herself beating them down like little boys, wiping the floor with them, even when it's three or four giants against her. That is what I did through almost the entire game: I wiped the floor with almost everything this hell threw at me, dodging most attacks (dodging physically THROUGH their attacks), my enemies constantly staggered by her unlimited stamina before they could deliver a blow. The voices always told me when the enemies who were not in the overly cramped field of view fixed on her back were about to strike. Once you get the mirror ability that slows them in time, forget about it! THIS is supposed to be her hell? Owning all? It's difficult to think of how she would take them on with any credibility. If we make her taller and significantly more muscular than the vast majority of women, then that just concedes the real problem: men and women aren't the same; a man will almost always win in physical combat. But that makes you wonder why every cinematic story-driven game has to be about defeating hordes, waves, armies of enemies anyway, and it brings me back to the alternative I proposed before. Why can't she instead hide, flee, defend, and only take on the enemy directly when an opportunity that disadvantages one presents itself? The player could have activated events and interacted with objects in the environment that gradually disadvantaged him. For the sake of the intended story, she would still have been a warrior, with agility, stamina and strength, but one who understood and heeded her physical limitations and used the tools available to her. When the enemy did take her on directly while at his best, she would have suffered and might have only gotten away by stabbing/jabbing repeatedly or biting or kicking while in his grasp. I would have increased the field of view and not fixed the camera behind her back for this mix of mechanics. Again, the overwhelming focus on shooting and hitting in nearly all of these types of action-adventure games is tiresome anyway.

 

[cvv]

I'm supposed to believe that she could stun lock these hulking giants (almost nine feet tall) by throwing straight forward kicks?

Yes, you ARE supposed to believe that and as a side dish you're also supposed to believe Jasuke was a military officer who led soldiers to battles. It's still the currentyear, try to keep up.

 

[911 Jumper]

PC GAMER review is well written – it's worth reading in full. I agree with the score too.

Some bits that stood out

And despite that visual approach to the storytelling, there's an awful lot of breaking the rule of 'show, don't tell'. The voices in Senua's head, though atmospheric (and particularly creepy if you wear headphones), constantly over-explain what's happening in a story that would hugely benefit from some moments of quiet.

You're never allowed to wonder about what a line might mean, or the significance of a particular facial expression or gesture, because the voices are there to talk all over it like YouTubers making a Let's Play. At their worst, they make a game trying to be intelligent and artful feel like it has no respect for the audience's intelligence, explaining the most basic of plot points multiple times in a row and offering a jumble of advice for overcoming simple obstacles.

It's a problem the first game had, but it's exacerbated here by how disconnected Senua and her psychosis are from the narrative. With no new personal backstory to exposit on or anxieties to work through, they don't really have anything of substance to talk about. Even Senua just ignores them most of the time, which has the unfortunate effect of creating lengthy sequences without a peep from her at all. I'd much rather watch more of Juergens at work than "She must go back! She'll die!" "No, she can't! She must go on!" ad nauseam.

But the problem extends beyond the voices. Through the Icelandic characters, we're told about the effect the giants are having far more than we see it, and Senua's more mystical allies are able to simply relate to her the backstory and weaknesses of all of her greatest foes whenever she's en route to challenge them. There's never a sense that either she or the player need to figure something out or speculate on a clue—it's always presented plain as day, which feels bizarre for a series so interested in the surreal and ambiguous.

Regarding combat and puzzles

You're constantly being told that you, as Senua, are accomplishing incredible feats and doing things no one else could have done—the reality is that most of the time you're just holding forward on the stick, or doing puzzles a child could solve, so it all feels deeply unearned. In one sequence where the characters were lost in a strange forest, I was heaped with praise for using my insight to find a way through—when literally all I was doing was following the one clear path in front of me.

The occasional battles are a little tougher, but still stripped down and simplified even from the first game. You only ever fight enemies one-on-one, and all are beaten with just a simple toolset of a fast attack, strong attack, parry, dodge, and slow mo power. There's no nuance to be found beyond learning each of the handful of enemy types' limited attack patterns, and if you do falter, the game seems reluctant to actually kill you—it is possible to die, but you're given second chance after second chance, and on the default "Dynamic" difficulty, the game gets easier and easier the more you falter.

Source: PC GAMER

Five to six years in development and this is the best they could do? It sounds as if they've released a demo as a full game. Much of the effort seems to have gone into making the visuals and animations as close to real life as possible. It's been frequently stated that the game is around eight hours long. But reading around tells me it's actually closer to four or five hours.

The favourable reviews remind me of the reviews praising Alan Wake 2. Lots of positive comments about atmosphere, graphical fidelity, voice acting, mood, etc. Very little commentary on actual gameplay.

 

[cvv]

You're constantly being told that you, as Senua, are accomplishing incredible feats and doing things no one else could have done—the reality is that most of the time you're just holding forward on the stick, or doing puzzles a child could solve, so it all feels deeply unearned.

Are they trying to say a strong female character does crazy shit that's deeply unearned?

I'm p. sure that's already illegal. Or will be soon.

 

[911 Jumper]

Came across this. Shows you what Ninja Theory looks like

 

[Ezekiel]

I'm supposed to believe that she could stun lock these hulking giants (almost nine feet tall) by throwing straight forward kicks?

Yes, you ARE supposed to believe that and as a side dish you're also supposed to believe Jasuke was a military officer who led soldiers to battles. It's still the currentyear, try to keep up.

I remember thinking when I wrote that that I had to speak as if the Steam user isn't aware of clown world or doesn't care.

 

[Ezekiel]

I tried playing the first game with a mod that opened the letterboxed picture up, but it created a fisheye effect because of where she stands and how the camera is anchored.

Oh, I remembered it wrong. The first game didn't have letterboxes, just a pretty cramped field of view. Remembered as I read to the end of my review again.

"Tried increasing the field of view as well with those files, but it looked weird. It created a fish eye effect because of where the camera was fixed. Did not find a way to turn off the dumb permanent screen dirt/moisture."

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

I played the Swedish inventory edition out of sheer curiosity, since I found the first game quite unique, but quit about half way through and uninstalled.

Hellblade 2 is in every way worse than the first game. There's even less gameplay, the story is stupid (Giants lol?), the whole core gimmick of psychosis feels slapped on and like an afterthought, sound design is worse, scariness factor is down to zero, and the few puzzles that are in are an insult. Did I mention the stupid story? I don't think the original writer(s) worked on that game, just everything feels shoe-horned and dispassionately cobbled together.. Senua went from a journey of personal growth in HB1 to crazed warrior wamman saving village idiots from slavery and giants in HB2. What a total joke of a "game". Nice graphics tho.

And now apparently, Microsoft has already greenlit Hellblade 3.

 

[cruel]

The game is a complete joke. Boring, linear walking simulator filled with occasional combat and shitty puzzles, with the dark and oppressing atmosphere from the first one completely gone. I play this for free and probably reached halfway point, but not sure if I will be able to finish. The only good thing about this game is that it looks good, everything else is shit. Puzzles are cancer in all games, but there is only one thing worse than them - shitty puzzles, and this is what this game offers. 3/10.

If Microsoft had any logic behind their actions (they don't), they would just layoff whole studio behind this. It's mind blowing that 50+ people were working for the last 7 years and delivered this - a boring linear 6h tech demo with no soul. If this is the future of gaming, I'm not going to be a part of it. What a shame.

Plague Tale games look like a masterpiece compared to this.

 

[The Decline]

Not sure why you would expect anything more from this studio, their games have been shit from the beginning.

 

[d1r]

His phoniness is palpable

I am amazed to see that he didn't start whining during the interview.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

Tameem got better things to do now: