Senua's Saga: Hellblade II Reviews
Senua's Saga: Hellblade II is well worth the wait and is a serious game of the year contender. Senua's follow-up journey is the best exploration of mental health that we've seen in games to date, using incredibly striking visual imagery, metaphors and immersive soundscapes to have you feel right there next to her. In what has to be the most photo-realistic game of all time, you're guaranteed to be constantly taken by the hero's adventure as you take in the beautiful and often haunting Viking Iceland. Through mud and dirt, blood and bones, Senua and Ninja Theory in turn bare all to you, the player. A masterpiece, benchmark and magnum opus, Hellblade II is crucial storytelling you won't soon forget.
Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II sets a new bar for performances and presentation. Combined with smart improvements to gameplay, it is arguably the most cinematic, immersive, story-driven experience we’ve ever seen.
Senua’s Saga Hellblade 2 is a video game only on its surface. Scratch that away and you’ll see that it’s a deep, thought-provoking, interactive experience proving games are an art form that demands skill and talent. Ninja Theory should be very proud.
A brilliant sequel that's bound to be doing the rounds come awards season.
Senua's Saga: Hellblade II remains a maverick in the gaming world. While its gameplay has not evolved from the first game, it has expanded on the aspects that set it apart from mainstream games: more realistic graphics, more moving performances, and an even more immersive depiction of psychosis that resonates deeply with players. This interactive film style game is very niche and I don't think everyone will appreciate it. However, there must be creators who make such games, and these games must exist. They allow those who live in a different reality every day to be seen and understood by more people.
Review in Chinese | Read full review
Senua's Saga is as strong as its predecessor, if not more, and delivers both in its storytelling and on the technical side. The gameplay, however, has still a lot of room for improvements and boils down to almost-QTE combat and boring puzzles. An experience more than an actual and so-called video game, but an experience worth living nonetheless.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Senua's Saga: Hellblade II is an achievement in visual fidelity but fails to define itself amid clumsy retreads and unengaging new ideas.
Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 improves on its predecessor in numerous ways, making it a must-play for fans of dark, cinematic adventure games. Visually it's unparalleled, offering photo-realistic characters and environments, and its audio design is spectacular, too. It's just a shame that its combat gets repetitive all too quickly – but in the grand scheme of things, it's a small price to pay.
But then, games can be a lot of things. The are fewer boundaries in gaming than any other form of artistic media, and titles that challenge established understanding of the medium push the margins further out. Hellblade 2 doesn't offer meaningful exploration, it doesn't come loaded with side quests and activities, and it doesn't let you play your own way. It has a strict vision for what it does offer: an uncompromising and harrowing story, immersive environments, photorealistic visuals, and excellent sound and performances. And with its sensitive and important representation of mental health disorders, Senua's Saga stands distinct among formulaic big-budget games.
Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II marks a triumphant return of Senua’s adventure with a balanced gameplay, powerful representation of psychosis and incredible visuals.
For a game that is about six hours, it is barren and wastes a lot of time by having players tediously walk through vast and empty environments or trudge through forced walking sequences. It is an unsatisfying experience that fails to live up to the original and you still can’t skip cutscenes.
It’s for games like this in which I bought an Xbox Series X; the reason I love playing games. This is Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II.
Even though the gameplay loop felt a little repetitive by the end of the experience and the game doesn’t reinvent the wheel compared to some recent gaming experiences (aside from its audio-visual presentation), Hellblade II still stands as a shining example of a small team of creative minds from all different disciplines coming together to craft a meaningful experience that gets to the heart of the human condition.
Senua's Saga: Hellblade II is a perfect example of flexibility in a video game. This game allows developers to be ambitious and implement their innovative ideas to a great extent. if you crave cinematic games, you will have a blast playing Senua's Saga: Hellblade II.
Review in Persian | Read full review
A disappointing follow up where everything is the same as it was in Hellblade I or worse. Except for visuals, they look truly marvelous. If only everything else received the same treatment.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 is the best-looking video game we've ever played. It sounds incredible, Melina Juergens acts herself inside out, and on a purely technical level this is just next-level stuff all round. However, we still don't feel as though extending Senua's plight into a Saga is a good idea. We remain unconvinced, and it's because this sequel feels like diminishing returns, as we had worried it might. It's not as vital or as unique in 2024, and it goes for bombast as a means of smoothing things over, resulting in a good game, an interesting eight hour romp, but nothing that screams must-play. Weak combat and dull puzzles are just more salt in these wounds, unfortunately.
Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II is a classic example of the old mantra: get past the start, and you’ll love it. If you have Xbox Game Pass, you have no reason not to try this game.
In the end, Senua's Saga: Hellblade II is a steady and safe step. Ninja Theory didn't complicate their existence and honored their own idea of creating a sequel for fans of the first game, not someone else. Hence, it is familiar territory for those who lived through the first part. As a work with indie essence and AAA production values, it fulfills its mission, and although its flaws and limitations are evident, they do not diminish its concept and the strong potential it has to generate emotions, demonstrating that the medium can take other paths beyond the traditional. Yes, Hellblade II is more than just a video game: it's a great audio-visual experience that doesn't betray itself; A work that deserves your time and your feelings.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Although the original Hellblade was a unique addition to the action adventure genre at its time, it doesn't even come close to be comparable to Hellblade 2, as Ninja Theory's latest release is also their best yet. Hellblade 2 improved drastically over its predecessor while offering deep and engaging gameplay from start to finish and arguably the best visuals and sound design we've ever seen in a video game to date, making it the best Microsoft exclusive of the last decade.
Review in Persian | Read full review
Senua's Saga: Hellblade II is a technical achievement for the gaming industry, the visuals are impressive and realistic in a way we haven't seen before and the audio design is very impressive. The game itself though, we think it could've offered more as puzzles are repetitive and combat is quite limited. However, the storytelling is strong in this chapter of Senua's journey, though it feels heavy and depressing.
Review in Arabic | Read full review