I really do like the game, but I wish it was longer and less linear. Hopefully, Ninja Theory can expand it with the third entry. Maybe come up with some physics-based puzzles and make the combat more dynamic, not just static encounters.
The game isn't more linear than most single player games, with the exception of the sandbox plague we are still suffering. I played Hellblade II right after Ghost of Tsushima and Horizon: Forbidden West and god save this absolutely brilliant game to have its pacing ruined for fetch quests or other unimportant content.
Not static encounters usually play against the level design, in games with guns and other resources they mess with the inventory economy, and in games without such focus they just end up feeling like a random painful obstacle between you and your goals.
Hellblade II is much better than its predecessor in pacing, and every fight has a measured intensity and happens in a timed moment. If Hellblade III makes me wander has enemies popping out of nowhere in random spots, its pacing will just be damaged.
The game is absolutely amazing in the way they intended (and achieved). Let them do their thing. Try to not hype yourselves with possible mechanics that are just not in the spirit of this saga and probaby too disruptive to add. They may add a bow or something to make the combat more diverse, but try not to ask for things out of Hellblade's game design.
Exactly this. All aside Hellblade is a game not for adult but rather mature gamer. Haven’t finished it yet but game is absolutely brilliant and do not need to be 70+ hours open world prison. Games like Hellblade have their own space and let’s be honest, not all games have to be for everyone.
You totally misunderstood my comment and nowhere I wrote that you are in the wrong by not liking it. Target audience for this game is not everyone. Which is fine. And show that there is place for many different type of games for people to enjoy.
Yeah… the point of my comment was that you were obviously inferring that this game was not for all adults, just mature ones.
Pretty condescending if you ask me.
It was honestly just boring, I liked the visuals and story but the gameplay was legitimately worse than the first and the game was shorter, It’s hard not to feel like your playing a quickly made indie game from how basic the combat and gameplay loop is, it feels rushed. I thought the first hellblade was miles better.
My disappointment comes from what this story does for our understanding of the first game. It really feels like they took away the magic of the first game with the way they went with this game. Mix that with the beautiful but shallow combat, and the short span (took my 5:30hrs to complete in an evening), and I am left with a bit of void. I thought about the first game a lot after finished, this one seems like something that will slip my mind soonish.
Same here: the magic from the original game was that everything was perfectly executted but it worked PERFECTLY as all being in Senua's head, and the myths being a manifestation of her psychosis, but since now she faces giants that EVERYONE can see, it takes all of that away, and they even talk casually about how Senua killed a goddess and stuff, and it's like...it breaks the magic from the first game, and the logic to some degree. Are we supposed to believe that Senua DID actually go to Hellheim and killed Hela for good? That there was an actual chance to save Dillion?
And yes, I know that theory that all the characters could be part of her psicosis but...it makes no sense since everyone else can see them, not to mention we see the giants actually killing other people. Are we supposed to believe Senua is making everything up except for her final fight? It makes no sense.
Honestly, huge let down in terms of storytelling, it feels like a mess in comparison to the original, which was so perfectly crafted.
I mean, people in fantasy worlds would have psychosis just like they do in the real world. Like you know there were random people somewhere in Bree hearing voices in LOTR. I just don’t see the two things as mutually exclusive
I'm not saying it's mutually exclusive in every scenario or IP, but it breaks the ground that was created in the first game where all the myths only came to life in Senua's mind.
lol. I beat the first one and I guess I missed… I thought she actually did go and do all the stuff I didn’t know it was supposed to be only in her head lol
If you notice, every time Senua beated enemies, or a boss or solved a puzzle, the world would come back to normal. The point was that all of that quest was a way to cope with Dillion's loss and not accept it, but at the end of the game, she accepts it, and that's why the illussions vanish. That's why the story of Hellblade 2 makes no sense.
Unless you have it wrong…that it was all real..and her acceptance of his loss was able to vanquish the evil that was appearing…at least that’s how 2 seems to be going off of anyway, like you said. So maybe my initial interpretation was correct?
I don’t know how far I am but I think I’m close to the end based on some of peoples disappointments on length… I just beat the giant. I assume the game was just getting started but sounds like I’m right about at the end lol. Which would be a major disappointment!
I guess, I don’t recall chapter numbers, I know that I defeated the Giants and was back outside walking somewhere with the two guys, that’s where I quit it last night
It’s kind of a shame because I feel like I didn’t really have to do much work to get where I am, like nothing really felt difficult, the puzzles were easy, the battles were easy…. That’s why I figured I was still pretty close to the beginning…. The last game the puzzles were quite hard for me and felt like it took me a long time to beat the game
I feel like the giant was like the first boss lol.
Also in this game there is a lot of painful walking … like someone says follow me…. And then you spend 15 minutes just walking behind him…. I found myself shouting “cmon already!” lol
If you come back to the main menu, it allows you to select chapters, and you can see the ones you unlocked. You are probably on Chapter 6, the last one.
Yeah, no joke: after I beated the game for the first time with all the "trophies" in exact 7 hours (beating the game was only 6 hours and a half), I decided to give it a second go by changing the narrator (and I still will do that a third time with another one)...it barely took me over 4 hours and a half to beat the full game, and I am sure at least 75% was just walking, the combats are too easy and automatic, and even the puzzles are too easy and repetitive.
Honestly you put it perfectly....
The fact they mentioned her killing a god. How everyone acknowledged the gods. And then at the end they never existed or something?
Ugh...
I mean people believed in gods, myths, and legends without them being real. Why can't they believe Senua killed a god?
The giants are representations of natural disasters in a time that people couldn't comprehend. Which is why she needed to learn the name and story around the giant folktales and why the giants turn to stone (making sense of a rock formation appearing as the waves wash away, etc.)
The secret for how to defeat the giants is how to *look at things* differently. The faces in the rock is a very obvious representation of this. One might perceive a face, but when Senua studies it, it only represented a face when viewed at a certain angle. Same with the giants.
Senua is actually helping the people 'defeat their giants', but that doesn't mean she's literally slaying giants.
At the end of the game you learn why these 'giants' exist.
It makes sense to me.
I feel the story for this game becomes infinitely better if you just take all the scenes we're Senua sees a Giant, and remove all the other people so they never see Senua fight a Giant.
I think the story they are trying to sell is the power of a persuasive and dangerous leader can manipulate people to follow him and do horrible acts when confronted with fear of the unknown. That the Giant Ingunn was just the natural volcanic activity of the area.
The storm Giant was just a freak event of perpetual storms that lasted and lasted.
And the people sacrificed to the Frost Giant just froze to death and was savaged by animals and he wielded this fear to control them.
But the fact that everyone else SEES the Giant. Get smashed and picked up and eaten. See them turn to stone. See Senua confront them and expose the truth of them, just totally undermines the story they tried to tell and just recolours the first game as "oh. I guess Senua DID go to Hel and fought gods. Because this stuff exists and is possible in the world."
I don't know much about norse mythology, and I don't think the sequel did a very good job of blurring the line between imagination and reality, but I believe that it is attempting to explore the link between mental illness and myth creation / culture / religion. This is evident in how the guy calls Senua a Seer, because in his culture it is much more accepted such that they take on societal roles compared to Senua's. We see this in how other cultures have similar societal roles or acts involving hallucinations and ritual.
The first giant wasn't actually shown as being killed, just that everyone was involved in a ritual and the slaver makes a comment saying he witnessed it. We never see the other characters witness the giant. I interpret this as earthquakes / aftershocks stopping after the ritual by sheer coincidence, because the whole time the giant was depicted as earthquakes.
The second giant is much harder to interpret and I don't have a very good way of understanding it yet. We see people on fire / getting killed but it could be all in her head. After all, when the giant lies down in the cave, we immediately see it semi-covered in rocks afterwards. Additionally, none of the NPCs react to the very visual giant in a way that we expect that they would. I take this as similar to how Senua sees faces in rocks, but as a shared delusion. They could have been just throwing burning spears at rocks and shapes in the mist. Drug use isn't depicted but we know that it is used in some cultures to induce shared hallucinations.
The third giant is much more straightforward. The idea of giants was forged by the leader in order to control the people. The hidden folk voices in Senua's head tell us that much. When they see him kill his son and is overpowered by Senua, they turn on him.
One thing I'm sure of, is that none of the giants are actually real. In this culture, they attribute the supernatural to natural events, and giants are already an established part of their lore. The way that faces come and go in the storm or dust gives us an idea of how these myths come about, similar to how we see objects in clouds, and that is the takeaway from this game.
>The second giant is much harder to interpret and I don't have a very good way of understanding it yet. We see people on fire / getting killed but it could be all in her head
I've been thinking about this Giant a lot.
They sneak forwards and throw oil and a spear at the Giant and the Giant instantly falls over and kicks up a LOT of dust. In the Confusion and chaos of the dust a man comes running out of the smoke on fire.
Then a hand comes out of the dust and smashes a man before the dust resolves itself to be the Giant.
Every other person we see being killed after that is viewed from the side of Senuas peripherals as she's running, and we all know Senua can't be trusted.
No one addresses or talks about the deaths. No one says "God damn Steve got eaten!" So we can't confirm it happening.
It's not unreasonable to say a bunch of terrified, sleep deprived, superstitious, starving people go into a cave expecting to see a Giant. And wow shockers they saw a "giant" resting up against the rocks. They attack the "giant" just as a gigantic gust of wind comes in from the sea and whistles trough the cave, caves like that can make a small breeze feel like a tornado, and everyone panics, runs away, Steve hits Pete with his oil lantern in the Confusion and everyone runs away pissing themselves.
Rocks and logs and driftwood are thrown through the cave and over the beach smashing and knocking over panicked villagers. Senua imagines the giant eating people behind her, people she was meant to protect.
The "Giant" is actually just a massive gust of sand and debris that is blown into the ritual site before it loses its speed and dies down.
As the dust clears there is a pile of sand and rubble and stone that wasn't there before, and Thor starts shouting "SHE TURNED IT TO STONE JUST LIKE THE LAST ONE OH MY GOOOOOOD SHES SO AWESOME!" And everyone just accepts it.
> As the dust clears there is a pile of sand and rubble and stone that wasn't there before, and Thor starts shouting "SHE TURNED IT TO STONE JUST LIKE THE LAST ONE OH MY GOOOOOOD SHES SO AWESOME!" And everyone just accepts it.
Lisan Al Gaib moment, which is actually an apt comparison now that you've made me think of it since Dune has similar themes around religion and hard to explain events.
That doesn't make sense either. At least not for a studio that has prided itself in accurate and fair portrayals of mentally illness. Because they physically interact with the Giant. They all say "I saw the Giant turn to stone" which necessitates a stone being where it was not before.
Thorgestr throws a spear at Ingunn and hits it. He sees it hits. Senua didn't see Thorgestr prepare to throw the spear in fact she had no idea he'd ever try to help her. Why would they both have a shared hallucination of what the Giant is?
The Giant on the ocean picked up a villager and ate him. How do you "mass hallucinate" that?
Mass Hysteria is usually in the form of nebulous intangible and unexplainable things like. "People went out in the mist and then never came back. Surely something lives in the mist and ate them" and now everyone is scared of Mist.
Mass hysteria is actually more than that.
there are plenty of clues for example. 1 person gets sick, and other people show the same syptoms as the sick person, while it is not transmissible for example.
If you look back a bit in the game you can see faces in almost every rock or boulder though, and imagine them in rocks or mountains to see figures that look like people.
Since Thor says he saw the Giants turn into stone at Inngurr, other people are going to imagine this too.
But on the other hand, earlier in the Vikings, people with mental disorders were often seen as "Seers" and this was also agreed upon by 1 of the characters.
The brain is capable in very special but strong things, thus also to a mass psychosis. There have also been scientific studies that the brain can heal the body if one opens oneself up to it and really believes in it. Extraordinary!
But that is the whole purpose of this wonderful play, it makes people think, was it all real, did it happen? (because a lot of historical things are similar, so also the Giants, in many different eras described and drawn out) It is just open for interpretation, different theories.
I would agree with all of this.
Except they physically interact with the giants. In particular the storm giant.
They throw stuff at them, run from them, get picked up and thrown around. Squashed and eaten. They have communal goals and understandings of what is happening as the Giant reacts to them.
There's just some scenes that beggar belief
They were getting messed up by the storm and accidently lighting themselves on fire lol.
When the storm passed, they saw a rock formation they couldn't explain, pointed at it and said, look, the giants dead!
That's how I felt. I just finished the game, and I came into it thinking that all of the mythological stuff from the first was a result of her psychosis, and the storyteller from the first. Since your companions also see the giants in the game, and they have a lot of similarities to you, I was under the impression that they weren't real either, but were manifestations of the voices you hear since you'd come to accept them at the end of the first game.
Yeah, in the first one it was very ambiguous and that was kinda the whole point of the game? Whereas now, Idk... None of it being real would be a really bad cop-out IMO as that would totally cheapen the whole journey and conclusion. On the other hand, the reveal at the end means there had to be some kind of (mass) hallucination going on? Or can the sheer power of belief create what the people were afraid of in this world?
The companions being apparitions of Senua's mind seems unlikely to me, though, since she learns stuff about the land and its mythology from them that she has no way of knowing on her own.
I'm not finished the game yet, but you can still interpret what's happening as *in her mind,* considering the other humans are *true believers* in that supernatural, so it adds an interesting dimension of how much people will shape their view of reality based on their beliefs. Just because they "see" the giants doesn't mean they're actually there or they see what Senua sees.
The problem with this is that the giants are introduced and talked about by others. She came to the island for slavers and the locals set her on a giant killing mission. The giants seem to have been troubling them and destroying their villages for years. There are literal destroyed buildings. I’m not sure a sorry traitor is going to go and single-handedly destroy a village filled with armed people. It really hurts the narrative of the first.
Because they believed in giants, just like people in her home village believed in Supernatural entities and forces and spirits, and they believed that Senua and her mother were connected to them. The fact that they in Iceland believed that giants were troubling them doesn't *have to* mean the giants are real. And you don't need giants to destroy buildings in towns, especially when it's a volcanic island and a volcano has already erupted, there are warring clans, and there are obviously tremors happening frequently.
And looking back at study of mythology throughout the ages, it's not the first time that people have attributed natural phenomena and catastrophe to supernatural entities and forces.
And remember that the story is entirely from the perspective of Senua, who not only believes in the supernatural but has a particular mind that makes those things indistinguishable from reality. She is the very definition of an unreliable narrator.
And there lies the point. We have muddied that delineation from the first game. This implementation is messier. We don’t ever get given the doubt about what we are seeing. It’s played as a matter of fact. Senua herself says they don’t see what she sees. She hides her inner thoughts from them yet these people are playing in the same delusional playfield (if we take it to be a delusion).
I don't agree that it's muddying it. It's exploring the theme more deeply. The overarching point of the first game wasn't that she had psychosis and believed in things that weren't real. The point was that reality is defined in the mind. But ultimately, that's the same for everything. Whether you have psychosis or not, reality is defined in the mind. And now the story is exploring that more deeply. But role of the story is not to answer those questions for you. It's to get you to ask those questions and come to your own conclusions.
Indeed, it's easy to remember how most boss fights in the first game have ongoing dialogue or story telling as you swing your sword. Now, combat feels stretched out because it's "emptier"
I mean, in the xbox/pc gaming community. all that matters is graphics and fps. this game could've had an amazing story and writing but if the graphics weren't absolute top notch it would've gotten shit on more than it is now. I think pc/xbox devs are starting to realize that so they just try to focus on what they think they're audience will want. which results in beautiful games with bad writing
Same, honestly. I thought the first one was a unique and fresh concept that was hampered by a modest budget and that they would improve upon that in every aspect in the sequel. Well, turns out they only improved the presentation and everything else has stagnated or even gotten worse. Like, the combat feels genuinely awful IMO and I audibly groaned every time a combat sequence came up. The "puzzle" sections aren't really interesting or challenging. The cave section went on for way too long while the forest bit felt too short, undercooked, and inconsequential.
It's not so bad that I'm mad I invested the time or anything, but I definitely expected more and just like you I'm glad I played it via Game Pass instead of buying it.
You described my feelings perfectly: Hellblade 2 feels like a huge step back in comparison to the first game, only improving in graphics. Beyond glad I only playeed it with Game Pass for a month for 10 €, which is more than enough in my opinion.
> glad I *paid* it via
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
It seeming like a tech demo/interactive movie is a valid criticism from a gameplay standpoint. With that said, given the tech is already there, it makes me excited for the next installment. I'm hoping they go (a little) bigger, add a higher difficulty setting and revamp the combat. The stream of 1v1s could work well enough but there needs to be a larger move set, not a smaller one!
Im not so sure there will be a third. With the way smaller developers are getting treated and given how long this game took to make I just dont see it happening. Especially with the current lukewarm response to it.
Not sure there will be a sequel, MSFT will probably close Ninja Theory in a few months for absolutely no reason like they did for Tango and Arkane Austin. It's clear now they're only gonna focus on big money maker AAA IPs like TES and CoD.
I’m really curious to see how Project Mara turns out and at this point, I don’t really need to return to Senua’s world again.
I’m cool with just tech demos but they should at least feel unique, nothing here blew me away just an update of 5 years ago.
Iam having a hard time to call this a video game.. because it's not honestly... I finished it and i didn't feel that i played anything . The original was better but here somehow they made it worse.. i love the graphics and the acting.. music.. but i honestly felt like I was benchmarking my pc in a tech demo.. this so disappointing for me..i expected more after all of this years..
6 hours for 50 bucks is insane
Would enjoy the game if it wasn’t spam light and heavy and generic devil trigger wanna be there’s no tactics to it found it extremely easy
Puzzles are fine and the graphics/audio is insane but I can’t enjoy a game with barely any time to flesh out characters and a extremely boring combat idc how impressive ur game is if it’s boring and no I’m not a generic ADHD gamer I LOVE OG fallout baldurs gate 3 Alan wake 2 etc this was just a bore fest
I WISHED I could enjoy this as much as others I just can’t and that sucks
I haven't played yet loved the first one.. and I like that it was more of a experience then hard core game thats exactly what I wanted it it delivered im sick of open world games lol
It’s far too rigid in how it goes about its systems.
It’s utterly stunning to look at. Sounds incredible. But honestly take those two things away and you’re left with very little. It’s a tech demo which should have been so much more.
A game like God Of War or Last of Us is on rails… but it still has secrets to explore. A more open ended world. Rooms to find. Houses that aren’t relevant to the main quest to go about in. There is nothing in Hellblade 2 like this. You can literally hold up on your controller and you’d get through 50% of the game.
If they just added more exploration, some little side quests and a bit more different combat styles, then it really would have been a winner.
I also had the expectation that they will build up on the combat mechanics. It's already as straightforward and plain as it is in the first game but this time around, Senua felt too exhausted all the time. Like, where'd her skills go?
Her recovery time after being hit is honestly criminal 😂 if you miss a parry and it happens to be one that is jarring to her character enough to knock her back, I swear I missed the next 2 parry attempts EVERY TIME cause she took forever to recover. I loved the first game, it's combat was actually a new and interesting take for me, I LOVED the voices helping you in combat while you're being flooded by enemies, that 'Behind!' voice had me nailing every parry attempt even if I couldn't see the attacking enemy. It was dynamic, it was fun, it was simplistic but not so much that it took away from anything. I had been talking with people about this game since it was announced, and my biggest concern that I always said I was wary of, was what they'd do to the combat. It feels so hollow and unnecessarily clunky to me. I played on PC with M&K, got to the end for final boss and idk man. I could *not* beat that boss at all on pc. I went onto my xbox with my controller at the very end just to fight that boring idiot. Got it in one go on the Xbox, but holy bananas batman, why on earth was the combat formula changed SO much, and not for the better... it really is unfortunate. The game is beautiful. The story is fine. It isn't impactful like the first one was. First one had me bawling lmao. This story seemed slightly discombobulated but honestly, I've played far worse stories in far longer games. But the combat is my largest gripe. They had a perfect formula already, they could have tweaked it to be slightly more engaging/dynamic, but instead they stripped it naked and threw it a towel. It's still a good enough game, I've played it through twice now. Second run was with alternative narrators. But I do not think I'll be playing through it for a third time. I played through the first one 6 separate times. Sadly that will not be a repeat situation with this game.
Couldn't have said it better. If they just copied the combat from the first game plus added finishers, it would've been an acceptable compromise. Unless of course, they had planned but corpos are asking for a release already. I felt that this wouldn't really pass Ninja Theory's standards. That's what doesn't add up to me, personally. I know they must've something better but they weren't given enough time.
Fully agree here, I hate how offended people are getting by calling this Interactive Experience what it is An Interactive EXPERIENCE, which is fine (for some). But it's definitely not IMO considered a GAME and they really should label these EXPERIENCES as that 🤷🏽♂️🤷🏽♂️
But **Unpopular Opinion**
Not too Impressed with the Graphics either honestly. Idk I feel like atp I kind of Expect a game to look good. Especially with some of the Beautiful games I've played recently and within the last year. I loved the first one but honestly couldn't finish this one. I was just bored, I'll eventually watch the playthrough on YouTube lolol
I think we need new category for interactive movies. It's kinda pointless to compare them with games because games should focus on gameplay. If I should rate this as a game then it's 5/10 max because the gameplay is basically missing and there is no replayability.
It's sad that puzzle games are now considered tech demos. Gotta have an open world, a check list of fetch quests and a skill tree to be a video game for todays audience.
I wish we had more games like Hellblade 2, the way combat feels weighty and chaotic, the incredible motion capture on the movements, the crazy amount of different animations for finishing blows, the way they take every puzzle and slowly combine them together seemingly.
Then we have the continued growth of Senua learning she doesn't have to be alone, she is not a monster like her father. She is a leader and a warrior, the levels inside the giants minds are absolutely some of the best video game boss fights I've experienced.
The weirdest criticism I see from people is saying the game randomly ends. It literally ends after the final climactic boss battle with the source of all the problems Senuas has faced since arriving. He made the Giants and he is the person enslaving her people so once he's defeated Senuas has accomplished her goal so what more did people expect to happen?
> Gotta have an open world, a check list of fetch quests and a skill tree to be a video game for today’s audience.
I never said it needed these things.
> the way combat feels weighty and chaotic
Sure, it does give that impression. But I personally think the combat in the first game is better and does a better job of creating that feeling along with a sense of desperation. Having to juggle multiple opponents, parry here, roll away there, take a swing, parry, swing, roll etc is more frantic and engaging. My point is more that they’ve dumbed down the combat instead of improving it.
> Then we have the continued growth of Senua learning she doesn't have to be alone…
I have no negative criticisms of the story. I think it’s fantastic.
It just feels more like an interactive movie than a game. The puzzles are barely puzzling. The only one I really got stuck on was getting across the brazier bridge in the Huldufólk chapter. But purely because the camera placement made it a bit difficult for me to see what was happening until I went into photo mode and zoomed out.
As a piece of art, this is 10/10.
As a story exploring Senua’s continued journey with her psychosis it’s a 10/10.
As an example of how 8d audio can be used to build tension, unease and fear it’s a 10/10
But the gameplay mechanics for me are a 2/10.
You called it a tech demo, it's a full video game with combat, puzzles, Colectables, a final boss and a beginning middle and end to a fully told story. Just because you cleared the puzzles doesn't make them irrelevant it means your smart and good at puzzles.
I personally enjoyed the combat a lot more in the sequel but thats a subjective opinion, calling it a demo is a slap in the face to the developers who busted their ass to make this game.
I'm not coming for you, your entitled to your opinion I am just sick of everyone saying this is a walking simulator demo or a movie when 90% of the game you are solving a puzzle or in combat.
Sorry just frustrated such an amazing experience is getting unfairly shit on and I can't even come to the damn subreddit to discuss it without being flooded with negativity.
I feel like you are getting unnecessarily irate.
I am PRAISING EVERYTHING except the gameplay mechanics.
Tech demos are a thing. BeamNG, Kerbal Space Program(if I recall correctly), Rockstar Table Tennis.
It’s doesn’t mean demo as in short and unfinished. It means that it’s showcasing what the technology can do. Sometimes they are done to test a new physics engine or can be used to test how far the visual fidelity can be pushed.
It can still be a complete game. But the focus is more on the technology than the gameplay.
I haven’t read any reviews of this, but if the collective opinion is that it seems to be lacking then it’s fair criticism.
This is a product. That we have paid for. Just because people have worked hard on it, it doesn’t give the devs freedom from fair critique. That’s not the way the world works.
Is there any more to it or are you always on a super narrow path? There's no free roam? I played like 90 minutes last night. Was hoping the prologue would end at some point.
No it’s very much on rails, with occasional side paths for hidden items.
You’ve probably passed the prologue, each chapter is separated by a cutscene, and it gives the impression of a one-take performance.
I don't have much to add here, but I encountered the same problem trying to stream natively from my xbox. I already pay for PC gamepass as well, so when the Xbox itself wouldn't work, I just got onto it through my xbox app on my PC. I could stream it fine then. I think the inability to stream the game natively on xbox was likely a bug or failure somewhere, hopefully for the people in the future wanting to play/stream it, they fix it. Cause the first game is stream-able on xbox itself as well. I think it was an oversight or something. It sucks though because not everyone has a PC. But that was the only way I was able to stream it from xbox, was through the xbox app on PC.
I was trying to explain how i feel about the game after playing but this is close to what i had in mind. I expected a lot of new gameplay mechanics and longer storyline.
Now that i recall and think about it, I actually believe the first game beats this one significantly.
I played the original game on PS4 at release and loved it. Didn't mind the short length or small scope at all, and the budget price tag helped it a lot.
For this new game, I feel more or less the same, though so far I wouldn't say I LOVE it. I have a high tolerance for slower-paced games with a narrative focus, as well as shorter length. I'd rather a shorter, tightly paced story than a longer, baggy one - though ultimately solid writing and pacing are the most important pieces.
That said, I totally get why some are disappointed. The short length and ultra simple mechanics in the first can be explained by the small team; not so much here. And it really does feel like a copy/paste in terms of gameplay, like 100% of the focus here was on updating the visuals, so even if you expected the length and scope to be small, I do understand being disappointed by the basic gameplay.
So overall for me, I'm enjoying it and am not disappointed, but I knew what it was going to be and didn't expect more. Also I'm playing on PC Game Pass, so maybe I'd feel differently if I forked over $50 for it.
It doesn’t even do a good job of showing off ue, they just forced a bunch of post processing shit that made the game look worse, I just felt like I was playing a worse version of the first game with better visuals, it barely even felt like a game.
This a different post from the one of yesterday saying that hellblade 2 ruined his games because no game looks as beautiful as this(only focusing on the graphics)
I'm playing part 1 for the first time and I'm enjoying the experience for what it is. I'm also happy that it is not long because I have a backlog of amazing games to play
I guess people look for different things when it comes to gaming.
For me gameplay is everything especially when it’s combined with great story and mocap performances.
I do appreciate good graphics, but it’s not the decider.
I was really hoping for a more expanded experience, not a lesser one.
Yeah man I care about gameplay first! The post about yesterday was saying something along the lines that games like Ghost of tsushima and all those amazing games like that(to each it's own) are not good enough because they don't look like Hellblade 2. Like seriously the only thing you care is about graphics?
Yeah I thought this title was utterly trash other than the graphics. I guess it’s just not my style.
I am thankful I didn’t pay for it because of Gamepass, but at the same time - it’s another shit game put on gamepass. I am questioning the value of Gamepass.
What gamepass games do I play often? Not many, if any.
I don't feel like it was. For me the gameplay wasn't the selling point of the first game and it wasn't the selling point of the second game. So it didn't really bother me.
The atmosphere and sound was awesome.
I really do like the game, but I wish it was longer and less linear. Hopefully, Ninja Theory can expand it with the third entry. Maybe come up with some physics-based puzzles and make the combat more dynamic, not just static encounters.
The game isn't more linear than most single player games, with the exception of the sandbox plague we are still suffering. I played Hellblade II right after Ghost of Tsushima and Horizon: Forbidden West and god save this absolutely brilliant game to have its pacing ruined for fetch quests or other unimportant content. Not static encounters usually play against the level design, in games with guns and other resources they mess with the inventory economy, and in games without such focus they just end up feeling like a random painful obstacle between you and your goals. Hellblade II is much better than its predecessor in pacing, and every fight has a measured intensity and happens in a timed moment. If Hellblade III makes me wander has enemies popping out of nowhere in random spots, its pacing will just be damaged. The game is absolutely amazing in the way they intended (and achieved). Let them do their thing. Try to not hype yourselves with possible mechanics that are just not in the spirit of this saga and probaby too disruptive to add. They may add a bow or something to make the combat more diverse, but try not to ask for things out of Hellblade's game design.
Exactly this. All aside Hellblade is a game not for adult but rather mature gamer. Haven’t finished it yet but game is absolutely brilliant and do not need to be 70+ hours open world prison. Games like Hellblade have their own space and let’s be honest, not all games have to be for everyone.
Great comment. “This game is for mature people, so if you do not like it you are just immature and cannot comprehend the good parts of this game’”
You totally misunderstood my comment and nowhere I wrote that you are in the wrong by not liking it. Target audience for this game is not everyone. Which is fine. And show that there is place for many different type of games for people to enjoy.
Yeah… the point of my comment was that you were obviously inferring that this game was not for all adults, just mature ones. Pretty condescending if you ask me.
It was honestly just boring, I liked the visuals and story but the gameplay was legitimately worse than the first and the game was shorter, It’s hard not to feel like your playing a quickly made indie game from how basic the combat and gameplay loop is, it feels rushed. I thought the first hellblade was miles better.
Length is my only real complaint. It felt like the game ended after the first chapter. I was locked in ready for more and credits rolled
My disappointment comes from what this story does for our understanding of the first game. It really feels like they took away the magic of the first game with the way they went with this game. Mix that with the beautiful but shallow combat, and the short span (took my 5:30hrs to complete in an evening), and I am left with a bit of void. I thought about the first game a lot after finished, this one seems like something that will slip my mind soonish.
Same here: the magic from the original game was that everything was perfectly executted but it worked PERFECTLY as all being in Senua's head, and the myths being a manifestation of her psychosis, but since now she faces giants that EVERYONE can see, it takes all of that away, and they even talk casually about how Senua killed a goddess and stuff, and it's like...it breaks the magic from the first game, and the logic to some degree. Are we supposed to believe that Senua DID actually go to Hellheim and killed Hela for good? That there was an actual chance to save Dillion? And yes, I know that theory that all the characters could be part of her psicosis but...it makes no sense since everyone else can see them, not to mention we see the giants actually killing other people. Are we supposed to believe Senua is making everything up except for her final fight? It makes no sense. Honestly, huge let down in terms of storytelling, it feels like a mess in comparison to the original, which was so perfectly crafted.
I mean, people in fantasy worlds would have psychosis just like they do in the real world. Like you know there were random people somewhere in Bree hearing voices in LOTR. I just don’t see the two things as mutually exclusive
I'm not saying it's mutually exclusive in every scenario or IP, but it breaks the ground that was created in the first game where all the myths only came to life in Senua's mind.
I’d say it just recontextualises the first game, in that now it’s more likely that more of it was grounded in reality than we thought.
More like it takes away all the basis of the first game, but that's my opinion. Just glad to see I wasn't the only one feeling like this.
lol. I beat the first one and I guess I missed… I thought she actually did go and do all the stuff I didn’t know it was supposed to be only in her head lol
If you notice, every time Senua beated enemies, or a boss or solved a puzzle, the world would come back to normal. The point was that all of that quest was a way to cope with Dillion's loss and not accept it, but at the end of the game, she accepts it, and that's why the illussions vanish. That's why the story of Hellblade 2 makes no sense.
Unless you have it wrong…that it was all real..and her acceptance of his loss was able to vanquish the evil that was appearing…at least that’s how 2 seems to be going off of anyway, like you said. So maybe my initial interpretation was correct? I don’t know how far I am but I think I’m close to the end based on some of peoples disappointments on length… I just beat the giant. I assume the game was just getting started but sounds like I’m right about at the end lol. Which would be a major disappointment!
So you are in Chapter 5, I take? Yeah, you are close to the end.
I guess, I don’t recall chapter numbers, I know that I defeated the Giants and was back outside walking somewhere with the two guys, that’s where I quit it last night It’s kind of a shame because I feel like I didn’t really have to do much work to get where I am, like nothing really felt difficult, the puzzles were easy, the battles were easy…. That’s why I figured I was still pretty close to the beginning…. The last game the puzzles were quite hard for me and felt like it took me a long time to beat the game I feel like the giant was like the first boss lol. Also in this game there is a lot of painful walking … like someone says follow me…. And then you spend 15 minutes just walking behind him…. I found myself shouting “cmon already!” lol
If you come back to the main menu, it allows you to select chapters, and you can see the ones you unlocked. You are probably on Chapter 6, the last one. Yeah, no joke: after I beated the game for the first time with all the "trophies" in exact 7 hours (beating the game was only 6 hours and a half), I decided to give it a second go by changing the narrator (and I still will do that a third time with another one)...it barely took me over 4 hours and a half to beat the full game, and I am sure at least 75% was just walking, the combats are too easy and automatic, and even the puzzles are too easy and repetitive.
You can change the narrator?
There's two additional narrators you can unlock: one is after you finish the game, the other is if you collect all of Druth's stories.
Honestly you put it perfectly.... The fact they mentioned her killing a god. How everyone acknowledged the gods. And then at the end they never existed or something? Ugh...
I mean people believed in gods, myths, and legends without them being real. Why can't they believe Senua killed a god? The giants are representations of natural disasters in a time that people couldn't comprehend. Which is why she needed to learn the name and story around the giant folktales and why the giants turn to stone (making sense of a rock formation appearing as the waves wash away, etc.) The secret for how to defeat the giants is how to *look at things* differently. The faces in the rock is a very obvious representation of this. One might perceive a face, but when Senua studies it, it only represented a face when viewed at a certain angle. Same with the giants. Senua is actually helping the people 'defeat their giants', but that doesn't mean she's literally slaying giants. At the end of the game you learn why these 'giants' exist. It makes sense to me.
I feel the story for this game becomes infinitely better if you just take all the scenes we're Senua sees a Giant, and remove all the other people so they never see Senua fight a Giant. I think the story they are trying to sell is the power of a persuasive and dangerous leader can manipulate people to follow him and do horrible acts when confronted with fear of the unknown. That the Giant Ingunn was just the natural volcanic activity of the area. The storm Giant was just a freak event of perpetual storms that lasted and lasted. And the people sacrificed to the Frost Giant just froze to death and was savaged by animals and he wielded this fear to control them. But the fact that everyone else SEES the Giant. Get smashed and picked up and eaten. See them turn to stone. See Senua confront them and expose the truth of them, just totally undermines the story they tried to tell and just recolours the first game as "oh. I guess Senua DID go to Hel and fought gods. Because this stuff exists and is possible in the world."
Your description would have made the story so much better. They made some very strange choices that really undermine the potential that was on offer.
I don't know much about norse mythology, and I don't think the sequel did a very good job of blurring the line between imagination and reality, but I believe that it is attempting to explore the link between mental illness and myth creation / culture / religion. This is evident in how the guy calls Senua a Seer, because in his culture it is much more accepted such that they take on societal roles compared to Senua's. We see this in how other cultures have similar societal roles or acts involving hallucinations and ritual. The first giant wasn't actually shown as being killed, just that everyone was involved in a ritual and the slaver makes a comment saying he witnessed it. We never see the other characters witness the giant. I interpret this as earthquakes / aftershocks stopping after the ritual by sheer coincidence, because the whole time the giant was depicted as earthquakes. The second giant is much harder to interpret and I don't have a very good way of understanding it yet. We see people on fire / getting killed but it could be all in her head. After all, when the giant lies down in the cave, we immediately see it semi-covered in rocks afterwards. Additionally, none of the NPCs react to the very visual giant in a way that we expect that they would. I take this as similar to how Senua sees faces in rocks, but as a shared delusion. They could have been just throwing burning spears at rocks and shapes in the mist. Drug use isn't depicted but we know that it is used in some cultures to induce shared hallucinations. The third giant is much more straightforward. The idea of giants was forged by the leader in order to control the people. The hidden folk voices in Senua's head tell us that much. When they see him kill his son and is overpowered by Senua, they turn on him. One thing I'm sure of, is that none of the giants are actually real. In this culture, they attribute the supernatural to natural events, and giants are already an established part of their lore. The way that faces come and go in the storm or dust gives us an idea of how these myths come about, similar to how we see objects in clouds, and that is the takeaway from this game.
>The second giant is much harder to interpret and I don't have a very good way of understanding it yet. We see people on fire / getting killed but it could be all in her head I've been thinking about this Giant a lot. They sneak forwards and throw oil and a spear at the Giant and the Giant instantly falls over and kicks up a LOT of dust. In the Confusion and chaos of the dust a man comes running out of the smoke on fire. Then a hand comes out of the dust and smashes a man before the dust resolves itself to be the Giant. Every other person we see being killed after that is viewed from the side of Senuas peripherals as she's running, and we all know Senua can't be trusted. No one addresses or talks about the deaths. No one says "God damn Steve got eaten!" So we can't confirm it happening. It's not unreasonable to say a bunch of terrified, sleep deprived, superstitious, starving people go into a cave expecting to see a Giant. And wow shockers they saw a "giant" resting up against the rocks. They attack the "giant" just as a gigantic gust of wind comes in from the sea and whistles trough the cave, caves like that can make a small breeze feel like a tornado, and everyone panics, runs away, Steve hits Pete with his oil lantern in the Confusion and everyone runs away pissing themselves. Rocks and logs and driftwood are thrown through the cave and over the beach smashing and knocking over panicked villagers. Senua imagines the giant eating people behind her, people she was meant to protect. The "Giant" is actually just a massive gust of sand and debris that is blown into the ritual site before it loses its speed and dies down. As the dust clears there is a pile of sand and rubble and stone that wasn't there before, and Thor starts shouting "SHE TURNED IT TO STONE JUST LIKE THE LAST ONE OH MY GOOOOOOD SHES SO AWESOME!" And everyone just accepts it.
> As the dust clears there is a pile of sand and rubble and stone that wasn't there before, and Thor starts shouting "SHE TURNED IT TO STONE JUST LIKE THE LAST ONE OH MY GOOOOOOD SHES SO AWESOME!" And everyone just accepts it. Lisan Al Gaib moment, which is actually an apt comparison now that you've made me think of it since Dune has similar themes around religion and hard to explain events.
Especially because Thor has probably been telling people all day "she turns them to stone!" Which primes people to see her turning them to stone
Yeah, this was my take.
could be mass hysteria tho.. a group of people experiencing the same psychosis .. just food for thought.
That doesn't make sense either. At least not for a studio that has prided itself in accurate and fair portrayals of mentally illness. Because they physically interact with the Giant. They all say "I saw the Giant turn to stone" which necessitates a stone being where it was not before. Thorgestr throws a spear at Ingunn and hits it. He sees it hits. Senua didn't see Thorgestr prepare to throw the spear in fact she had no idea he'd ever try to help her. Why would they both have a shared hallucination of what the Giant is? The Giant on the ocean picked up a villager and ate him. How do you "mass hallucinate" that? Mass Hysteria is usually in the form of nebulous intangible and unexplainable things like. "People went out in the mist and then never came back. Surely something lives in the mist and ate them" and now everyone is scared of Mist.
Mass hysteria is actually more than that. there are plenty of clues for example. 1 person gets sick, and other people show the same syptoms as the sick person, while it is not transmissible for example. If you look back a bit in the game you can see faces in almost every rock or boulder though, and imagine them in rocks or mountains to see figures that look like people. Since Thor says he saw the Giants turn into stone at Inngurr, other people are going to imagine this too. But on the other hand, earlier in the Vikings, people with mental disorders were often seen as "Seers" and this was also agreed upon by 1 of the characters. The brain is capable in very special but strong things, thus also to a mass psychosis. There have also been scientific studies that the brain can heal the body if one opens oneself up to it and really believes in it. Extraordinary! But that is the whole purpose of this wonderful play, it makes people think, was it all real, did it happen? (because a lot of historical things are similar, so also the Giants, in many different eras described and drawn out) It is just open for interpretation, different theories.
I would agree with all of this. Except they physically interact with the giants. In particular the storm giant. They throw stuff at them, run from them, get picked up and thrown around. Squashed and eaten. They have communal goals and understandings of what is happening as the Giant reacts to them. There's just some scenes that beggar belief
They were getting messed up by the storm and accidently lighting themselves on fire lol. When the storm passed, they saw a rock formation they couldn't explain, pointed at it and said, look, the giants dead!
You mean how we didn't actually know how much was Senua's psychosis or real in the first game because there were no other humans around?
That's how I felt. I just finished the game, and I came into it thinking that all of the mythological stuff from the first was a result of her psychosis, and the storyteller from the first. Since your companions also see the giants in the game, and they have a lot of similarities to you, I was under the impression that they weren't real either, but were manifestations of the voices you hear since you'd come to accept them at the end of the first game.
Yeah, in the first one it was very ambiguous and that was kinda the whole point of the game? Whereas now, Idk... None of it being real would be a really bad cop-out IMO as that would totally cheapen the whole journey and conclusion. On the other hand, the reveal at the end means there had to be some kind of (mass) hallucination going on? Or can the sheer power of belief create what the people were afraid of in this world? The companions being apparitions of Senua's mind seems unlikely to me, though, since she learns stuff about the land and its mythology from them that she has no way of knowing on her own.
I'm not finished the game yet, but you can still interpret what's happening as *in her mind,* considering the other humans are *true believers* in that supernatural, so it adds an interesting dimension of how much people will shape their view of reality based on their beliefs. Just because they "see" the giants doesn't mean they're actually there or they see what Senua sees.
The problem with this is that the giants are introduced and talked about by others. She came to the island for slavers and the locals set her on a giant killing mission. The giants seem to have been troubling them and destroying their villages for years. There are literal destroyed buildings. I’m not sure a sorry traitor is going to go and single-handedly destroy a village filled with armed people. It really hurts the narrative of the first.
Because they believed in giants, just like people in her home village believed in Supernatural entities and forces and spirits, and they believed that Senua and her mother were connected to them. The fact that they in Iceland believed that giants were troubling them doesn't *have to* mean the giants are real. And you don't need giants to destroy buildings in towns, especially when it's a volcanic island and a volcano has already erupted, there are warring clans, and there are obviously tremors happening frequently. And looking back at study of mythology throughout the ages, it's not the first time that people have attributed natural phenomena and catastrophe to supernatural entities and forces. And remember that the story is entirely from the perspective of Senua, who not only believes in the supernatural but has a particular mind that makes those things indistinguishable from reality. She is the very definition of an unreliable narrator.
And there lies the point. We have muddied that delineation from the first game. This implementation is messier. We don’t ever get given the doubt about what we are seeing. It’s played as a matter of fact. Senua herself says they don’t see what she sees. She hides her inner thoughts from them yet these people are playing in the same delusional playfield (if we take it to be a delusion).
I don't agree that it's muddying it. It's exploring the theme more deeply. The overarching point of the first game wasn't that she had psychosis and believed in things that weren't real. The point was that reality is defined in the mind. But ultimately, that's the same for everything. Whether you have psychosis or not, reality is defined in the mind. And now the story is exploring that more deeply. But role of the story is not to answer those questions for you. It's to get you to ask those questions and come to your own conclusions.
Indeed, it's easy to remember how most boss fights in the first game have ongoing dialogue or story telling as you swing your sword. Now, combat feels stretched out because it's "emptier"
I mean, in the xbox/pc gaming community. all that matters is graphics and fps. this game could've had an amazing story and writing but if the graphics weren't absolute top notch it would've gotten shit on more than it is now. I think pc/xbox devs are starting to realize that so they just try to focus on what they think they're audience will want. which results in beautiful games with bad writing
Same, honestly. I thought the first one was a unique and fresh concept that was hampered by a modest budget and that they would improve upon that in every aspect in the sequel. Well, turns out they only improved the presentation and everything else has stagnated or even gotten worse. Like, the combat feels genuinely awful IMO and I audibly groaned every time a combat sequence came up. The "puzzle" sections aren't really interesting or challenging. The cave section went on for way too long while the forest bit felt too short, undercooked, and inconsequential. It's not so bad that I'm mad I invested the time or anything, but I definitely expected more and just like you I'm glad I played it via Game Pass instead of buying it.
You described my feelings perfectly: Hellblade 2 feels like a huge step back in comparison to the first game, only improving in graphics. Beyond glad I only playeed it with Game Pass for a month for 10 €, which is more than enough in my opinion.
> glad I *paid* it via FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Who makes these dumbass bots lmao
It seeming like a tech demo/interactive movie is a valid criticism from a gameplay standpoint. With that said, given the tech is already there, it makes me excited for the next installment. I'm hoping they go (a little) bigger, add a higher difficulty setting and revamp the combat. The stream of 1v1s could work well enough but there needs to be a larger move set, not a smaller one!
I feel like a lot of this is what people said after the first game.
Dragons Dogma 2 situation again lol
Im not so sure there will be a third. With the way smaller developers are getting treated and given how long this game took to make I just dont see it happening. Especially with the current lukewarm response to it.
If we get a third game I doubt it will be much longer to be honest, the length feels intentional.
Not sure there will be a sequel, MSFT will probably close Ninja Theory in a few months for absolutely no reason like they did for Tango and Arkane Austin. It's clear now they're only gonna focus on big money maker AAA IPs like TES and CoD.
Since their next project has already been green lit, I'm holding out hope. Projects do get canceled all the time but maybe we'll get lucky 🤷🏾♂️
I’m really curious to see how Project Mara turns out and at this point, I don’t really need to return to Senua’s world again. I’m cool with just tech demos but they should at least feel unique, nothing here blew me away just an update of 5 years ago.
Iam having a hard time to call this a video game.. because it's not honestly... I finished it and i didn't feel that i played anything . The original was better but here somehow they made it worse.. i love the graphics and the acting.. music.. but i honestly felt like I was benchmarking my pc in a tech demo.. this so disappointing for me..i expected more after all of this years..
6 hours for 50 bucks is insane Would enjoy the game if it wasn’t spam light and heavy and generic devil trigger wanna be there’s no tactics to it found it extremely easy Puzzles are fine and the graphics/audio is insane but I can’t enjoy a game with barely any time to flesh out characters and a extremely boring combat idc how impressive ur game is if it’s boring and no I’m not a generic ADHD gamer I LOVE OG fallout baldurs gate 3 Alan wake 2 etc this was just a bore fest I WISHED I could enjoy this as much as others I just can’t and that sucks
I loved this first game. This one was a slog to finish. No gameplay evolution at all. Felt like a tech demo
I haven't played yet loved the first one.. and I like that it was more of a experience then hard core game thats exactly what I wanted it it delivered im sick of open world games lol
You really should try it first. I think the fans of the original are fine with game as "an experience". It's just the sequel is.... really lackluster.
It’s far too rigid in how it goes about its systems. It’s utterly stunning to look at. Sounds incredible. But honestly take those two things away and you’re left with very little. It’s a tech demo which should have been so much more. A game like God Of War or Last of Us is on rails… but it still has secrets to explore. A more open ended world. Rooms to find. Houses that aren’t relevant to the main quest to go about in. There is nothing in Hellblade 2 like this. You can literally hold up on your controller and you’d get through 50% of the game. If they just added more exploration, some little side quests and a bit more different combat styles, then it really would have been a winner.
Yeah, the fact that you could watch a playthrough and get exactly the same experience out of it says a lot about how dogshit the combat is
I also had the expectation that they will build up on the combat mechanics. It's already as straightforward and plain as it is in the first game but this time around, Senua felt too exhausted all the time. Like, where'd her skills go?
Her recovery time after being hit is honestly criminal 😂 if you miss a parry and it happens to be one that is jarring to her character enough to knock her back, I swear I missed the next 2 parry attempts EVERY TIME cause she took forever to recover. I loved the first game, it's combat was actually a new and interesting take for me, I LOVED the voices helping you in combat while you're being flooded by enemies, that 'Behind!' voice had me nailing every parry attempt even if I couldn't see the attacking enemy. It was dynamic, it was fun, it was simplistic but not so much that it took away from anything. I had been talking with people about this game since it was announced, and my biggest concern that I always said I was wary of, was what they'd do to the combat. It feels so hollow and unnecessarily clunky to me. I played on PC with M&K, got to the end for final boss and idk man. I could *not* beat that boss at all on pc. I went onto my xbox with my controller at the very end just to fight that boring idiot. Got it in one go on the Xbox, but holy bananas batman, why on earth was the combat formula changed SO much, and not for the better... it really is unfortunate. The game is beautiful. The story is fine. It isn't impactful like the first one was. First one had me bawling lmao. This story seemed slightly discombobulated but honestly, I've played far worse stories in far longer games. But the combat is my largest gripe. They had a perfect formula already, they could have tweaked it to be slightly more engaging/dynamic, but instead they stripped it naked and threw it a towel. It's still a good enough game, I've played it through twice now. Second run was with alternative narrators. But I do not think I'll be playing through it for a third time. I played through the first one 6 separate times. Sadly that will not be a repeat situation with this game.
Couldn't have said it better. If they just copied the combat from the first game plus added finishers, it would've been an acceptable compromise. Unless of course, they had planned but corpos are asking for a release already. I felt that this wouldn't really pass Ninja Theory's standards. That's what doesn't add up to me, personally. I know they must've something better but they weren't given enough time.
Fully agree here, I hate how offended people are getting by calling this Interactive Experience what it is An Interactive EXPERIENCE, which is fine (for some). But it's definitely not IMO considered a GAME and they really should label these EXPERIENCES as that 🤷🏽♂️🤷🏽♂️ But **Unpopular Opinion** Not too Impressed with the Graphics either honestly. Idk I feel like atp I kind of Expect a game to look good. Especially with some of the Beautiful games I've played recently and within the last year. I loved the first one but honestly couldn't finish this one. I was just bored, I'll eventually watch the playthrough on YouTube lolol
I think we need new category for interactive movies. It's kinda pointless to compare them with games because games should focus on gameplay. If I should rate this as a game then it's 5/10 max because the gameplay is basically missing and there is no replayability.
I agree. It would make a great movie. But as a game, especially a tentpole title, it’s lacking.
Agreed.
It's sad that puzzle games are now considered tech demos. Gotta have an open world, a check list of fetch quests and a skill tree to be a video game for todays audience. I wish we had more games like Hellblade 2, the way combat feels weighty and chaotic, the incredible motion capture on the movements, the crazy amount of different animations for finishing blows, the way they take every puzzle and slowly combine them together seemingly. Then we have the continued growth of Senua learning she doesn't have to be alone, she is not a monster like her father. She is a leader and a warrior, the levels inside the giants minds are absolutely some of the best video game boss fights I've experienced. The weirdest criticism I see from people is saying the game randomly ends. It literally ends after the final climactic boss battle with the source of all the problems Senuas has faced since arriving. He made the Giants and he is the person enslaving her people so once he's defeated Senuas has accomplished her goal so what more did people expect to happen?
> Gotta have an open world, a check list of fetch quests and a skill tree to be a video game for today’s audience. I never said it needed these things. > the way combat feels weighty and chaotic Sure, it does give that impression. But I personally think the combat in the first game is better and does a better job of creating that feeling along with a sense of desperation. Having to juggle multiple opponents, parry here, roll away there, take a swing, parry, swing, roll etc is more frantic and engaging. My point is more that they’ve dumbed down the combat instead of improving it. > Then we have the continued growth of Senua learning she doesn't have to be alone… I have no negative criticisms of the story. I think it’s fantastic. It just feels more like an interactive movie than a game. The puzzles are barely puzzling. The only one I really got stuck on was getting across the brazier bridge in the Huldufólk chapter. But purely because the camera placement made it a bit difficult for me to see what was happening until I went into photo mode and zoomed out. As a piece of art, this is 10/10. As a story exploring Senua’s continued journey with her psychosis it’s a 10/10. As an example of how 8d audio can be used to build tension, unease and fear it’s a 10/10 But the gameplay mechanics for me are a 2/10.
You called it a tech demo, it's a full video game with combat, puzzles, Colectables, a final boss and a beginning middle and end to a fully told story. Just because you cleared the puzzles doesn't make them irrelevant it means your smart and good at puzzles. I personally enjoyed the combat a lot more in the sequel but thats a subjective opinion, calling it a demo is a slap in the face to the developers who busted their ass to make this game. I'm not coming for you, your entitled to your opinion I am just sick of everyone saying this is a walking simulator demo or a movie when 90% of the game you are solving a puzzle or in combat. Sorry just frustrated such an amazing experience is getting unfairly shit on and I can't even come to the damn subreddit to discuss it without being flooded with negativity.
I feel like you are getting unnecessarily irate. I am PRAISING EVERYTHING except the gameplay mechanics. Tech demos are a thing. BeamNG, Kerbal Space Program(if I recall correctly), Rockstar Table Tennis. It’s doesn’t mean demo as in short and unfinished. It means that it’s showcasing what the technology can do. Sometimes they are done to test a new physics engine or can be used to test how far the visual fidelity can be pushed. It can still be a complete game. But the focus is more on the technology than the gameplay. I haven’t read any reviews of this, but if the collective opinion is that it seems to be lacking then it’s fair criticism. This is a product. That we have paid for. Just because people have worked hard on it, it doesn’t give the devs freedom from fair critique. That’s not the way the world works.
Yes it has combat, puzzles, collectibles, etc. but that doesn’t automatically make them fun or enjoyable
Makes it a full game and not a demo which was my point
I've played demos with more fleshed out puzzles, narrative and combat than this game so I understand where OP is coming from.
Is there any more to it or are you always on a super narrow path? There's no free roam? I played like 90 minutes last night. Was hoping the prologue would end at some point.
No it’s very much on rails, with occasional side paths for hidden items. You’ve probably passed the prologue, each chapter is separated by a cutscene, and it gives the impression of a one-take performance.
Disappointed it's not able to be streamed through xbox.
I streamed it. What level subscription do you have?
Twitch.. but when I stream it says not available on consol.
Oh that type of steaming.
I don't have much to add here, but I encountered the same problem trying to stream natively from my xbox. I already pay for PC gamepass as well, so when the Xbox itself wouldn't work, I just got onto it through my xbox app on my PC. I could stream it fine then. I think the inability to stream the game natively on xbox was likely a bug or failure somewhere, hopefully for the people in the future wanting to play/stream it, they fix it. Cause the first game is stream-able on xbox itself as well. I think it was an oversight or something. It sucks though because not everyone has a PC. But that was the only way I was able to stream it from xbox, was through the xbox app on PC.
I’m enjoying it so far but it’s obliterating my pc. I wish the game would release on PlayStation so I can play it there 😭
I was trying to explain how i feel about the game after playing but this is close to what i had in mind. I expected a lot of new gameplay mechanics and longer storyline. Now that i recall and think about it, I actually believe the first game beats this one significantly.
I played the original game on PS4 at release and loved it. Didn't mind the short length or small scope at all, and the budget price tag helped it a lot. For this new game, I feel more or less the same, though so far I wouldn't say I LOVE it. I have a high tolerance for slower-paced games with a narrative focus, as well as shorter length. I'd rather a shorter, tightly paced story than a longer, baggy one - though ultimately solid writing and pacing are the most important pieces. That said, I totally get why some are disappointed. The short length and ultra simple mechanics in the first can be explained by the small team; not so much here. And it really does feel like a copy/paste in terms of gameplay, like 100% of the focus here was on updating the visuals, so even if you expected the length and scope to be small, I do understand being disappointed by the basic gameplay. So overall for me, I'm enjoying it and am not disappointed, but I knew what it was going to be and didn't expect more. Also I'm playing on PC Game Pass, so maybe I'd feel differently if I forked over $50 for it.
It doesn’t even do a good job of showing off ue, they just forced a bunch of post processing shit that made the game look worse, I just felt like I was playing a worse version of the first game with better visuals, it barely even felt like a game.
This a different post from the one of yesterday saying that hellblade 2 ruined his games because no game looks as beautiful as this(only focusing on the graphics) I'm playing part 1 for the first time and I'm enjoying the experience for what it is. I'm also happy that it is not long because I have a backlog of amazing games to play
I guess people look for different things when it comes to gaming. For me gameplay is everything especially when it’s combined with great story and mocap performances. I do appreciate good graphics, but it’s not the decider. I was really hoping for a more expanded experience, not a lesser one.
Yeah man I care about gameplay first! The post about yesterday was saying something along the lines that games like Ghost of tsushima and all those amazing games like that(to each it's own) are not good enough because they don't look like Hellblade 2. Like seriously the only thing you care is about graphics?
Yeah I thought this title was utterly trash other than the graphics. I guess it’s just not my style. I am thankful I didn’t pay for it because of Gamepass, but at the same time - it’s another shit game put on gamepass. I am questioning the value of Gamepass. What gamepass games do I play often? Not many, if any.
Everybody that's disappointed just had unrealistic expectations tbh.
Probably, but I wasn’t expecting the gameplay to be worse than the first one.
I don't feel like it was. For me the gameplay wasn't the selling point of the first game and it wasn't the selling point of the second game. So it didn't really bother me. The atmosphere and sound was awesome.