Of all the titles Ninja Theory have made, if there was one that never needed a sequel, it was the fantastic Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice from 2017. But there’ve been plenty of examples in games and other media, where a sequel that never really needed to exist gets created and becomes as liked as the original or even overshadows it. Well, I doubt this will happen with Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II.
Just like the original title, Hellblade II is an action adventure game with huge emphasis on storytelling, so while there is some exploration and even optional collectible elements, the entire affair is extremely linear. The way it is done is almost seamless with constantly hidden cuts and transitions between time and space and the game throws puzzles and enemy arenas as obstacles that you have to remove to get to the next storytelling point. The performances, the audio design and visual presentation, are as good as they were in the original game but done in a more technologically advanced way due to the title using Unreal Engine 5 and doing it almost flawlessly.
Sadly, here is where I run out of praise. There are several ways a sequel can be made. Ninja Theory decided to go with “do the same game again”, which didn’t really fit with how neatly the story of the original ended, so they had to make a different tale this time. But this new “story” doesn’t have a single interesting character in it while Senua herself just rolls with it. It’s not that she has no motivation – we are told that she does, it’s just that the end result doesn’t feel as much like a proper story and more like a collection of scenes. Most of these scenes do share a connecting theme, but said theme feels extremely hollow, probably mostly because of the lack of characters you care about. And then the plot just ends arbitrarily without having a solid conclusion, nor leaving you pondering some question or a theme, like what Enslaved does.
Interestingly, in “doing the same game again” all of the other aspects of the game were made even less interesting than in the first game too. Combat is now so boring that I am seriously suggesting most people enable the accessibility option to have it play itself and drink tea while it happens on screen. Collectibles now feel even more out of place as they get in the way of pacing. At least the puzzles are still “fine” and at times have some inventive ideas. Mind you – none of the interactive elements of Hellblade were fantastic, but they had a promise that could be expanded on in the sequel, which simply didn’t happen. And the resulting gameplay flow lacks any tension or emotional investment.
Which, really, is my big takeaway from Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II – I didn’t really care about the game. Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice evoked strong emotions in me and I genuinely loved the experience despite how flawed it was. But with Hellblade II I only felt purely professional interest in how Ninja Theory utilized UE5. Perhaps, strong performances (even if they are about nothing in particular) will be a good enough element for you to enjoy the game and I would still recommend checking it out. But I would rather recommend playing the first game instead, unless all you care about is technical prowess and high fidelity visuals.