Hellblade II is equal parts stunning and disappointing

I have a lot of mixed feelings about Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II.

On the one hand, I admire how developer Ninja Theory leverages some of the most impressive visual and auditory work in all of gaming to enhance its storytelling. But on the other, the Xbox action-adventure game’s combat and narrative beats often feel tedious. As a result, Senua’s Saga proves to be an uneven experience that doesn’t remotely live up to the remarkable highs of its predecessor, 2017’s Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice.

Those shortcomings start with Senua’s Saga‘s narrative, which lacks the nuance of Senua’s Sacrifice. The first game was rightly praised for its thoughtful, mental health expert-backed exploration of psychosis, as represented through the struggles of a young Pict warrior named Senua. While the larger Norse mythology-inspired plot saw her venturing to Helheim to rescue the soul of her dead lover, the real focus was emotionally grounded in this woman coming to terms with her mental illness. By the end of the experience, she views the voices in her head not as a curse, but as a part of her, and it makes for a powerful character arc.

Senua’s Saga, however, loses that compelling intimacy for the sake of grandiosity. This time around, Senua travels to Iceland to stop a group of slavers, only to get caught up in a larger conflict with the fearsome giants. On the one hand, it’s a solid premise, picking up on the original game’s hopeful ending to show how Senua, feeling a sense of freedom in accepting her psychosis, is now seeking to liberate others.

The problem, however, is that the broader scope of the story often pulls the focus away from Senua. While you’re still always in control of her, the narrative introduces several new characters, such as the slave master Thorgestr, who all hog some of the screen time from her. All the while, Senua herself remains a largely silent character, making her feel like she’s often taking a backseat in what’s supposed to be her story.

Senua’s quietness wouldn’t be an issue if the internal voices that represent her psychosis were more introspective, but unfortunately, they become grating before too long this time around. In the first game, the voices would connivingly give her conflicting messages about everything, which, when coupled with her fledgling hold on reality, led to a surprisingly unique form of multi-sensory gaslighting. But now that they’re not a source of direct conflict for Senua, they generally don’t have anything meaningful to contribute.

Throughout the roughly six-hour experience, the voices bafflingly provide almost unending play-by-play commentary on what Senua is doing. Have to crawl through a tight space? They’ll frighteningly whisper, “She has to go through!” and “She shouldn’t go through!” See a mysterious shadow appear and then dissipate in front of you? The voices will utter, “Why is there a shadow?” “The shadow vanished!” “Follow the shadow!” And so on and so forth.

Any chance for subtlety is gone when the voices incessantly narrate everything Senua does as she’s doing it. Moreover, it does a disservice to the breathtaking photorealistic visuals and expert sound design, which are more than enough to create a potently haunting atmosphere on their own. (If I had a nickel for every time the voices say “turn back” or “you mustn’t go further,” I’d have enough to fund Xbox’s next multi-billion-dollar acquisition myself.)

To be clear, it was crucial that the voices play some role in this game, given that psychosis, like any other form of mental illness, doesn’t just magically go away. I just wish that Ninja Theory found something more impactful for them to do beyond providing some unsettling ASMR-like sounds (as with the first game, you’ll want to wear headphones to hear the trippy binaural audio) and excellent vocal performances. All of this leads to a conclusion that feels rushed and unearned for Senua’s arc. It’s a genuine shame because I was so invested in Senua’s story in the first game, in no small part because it was focused on Melina Jüergens’ masterful performance. Jüergens is even more transformative in Senua’s Saga, too, making me long all the more for a deeper connection to her journey here.

But the voices and other characters aren’t the only distractions from Senua’s story — the gameplay actively gets in the way as well. While Senua’s Sacrifice never had the deepest combat, people forgave it given the ambition of the storytelling from a pretty small 20-person team in 2017. If nothing else, that left room for improvements in the sequel, which was made by 80 people with more resources. Unfortunately, the combat has actually worsened this time around, seemingly due to a misguided effort to streamline everything for the sake of being “cinematic.”

On paper, having light and heavy melee attacks, as well as a parry and dodge, should result in at least a serviceable combat system, but that never comes. In practice, the heavy attack feels too slow, making it far more effective to simply spam the lighter alternative. Meanwhile, the small handful of enemy types, which includes standard soldiers, axe throwers and fire breathers, are all defeated in exactly the same way. Attack a couple of times, dodge and repeat. Sure, you’re encouraged to use the parry system for instant kills, but it feels inconsistent in how often it registers your timed inputs. Landing your attacks will also fill up a tool that lets you temporarily slow down enemies, but I found welcome solely for its aid in mercifully helping me clear fights quicker, rather than it being genuinely rewarding in its own right.

Adding to the mechanical simplicity is the rigidity of the battles themselves. Simply put, you only ever fight one enemy at a time versus having to fend off multiple in Senua’s Sacrifice. In losing that kineticism, Senua’s Saga‘s combat feels painfully on rails. After defeating one enemy, Senua will turn around (or, occasionally, get tackled or pushed into another foe) to start the next skirmish. Every combat encounter plays out like this.

During its promotion of Senua’s Saga, Ninja Theory has touted that it spent 69 days on motion capture for combat alone versus a mere two for the original game. And sure enough, that results in an impressive variety of animations for slashes, stabs, dodges and parries, but that commendable work is nonetheless squandered on a combat system that is itself so stagnant. This led me to actively dread what trite battle I’d come across next.

Thankfully, the puzzles fare a bit better, revisiting the psychosis-inspired “finding matching symbols in the environment” gimmick from Senua’s Sacrifice. They’re likewise often painfully simple, but they at least allow Senua’s Saga to play around with space and time in some aesthetically stunning ways, particularly when they warp the layout of the world around you. And outside of them, there’s an unmitigated beauty to walking through the world and soaking in the vistas, adding texture to Senua’s perilous quest.

All in all, though, I often just found myself checked out of Senua’s Saga, and that hurts to say. I loved my time with Senua’s Sacrifice so much that it remains one of my biggest highlights of 2017, a year that had the likes of Breath of the Wild and Persona 5. Senua’s Saga, however, lacks that impact, losing the strong sense of narrative focus and atmosphere while also actively making combat far less engaging.

I still love Senua, especially for Jürgens’ achingly raw performance and the character’s noble and inspiring crusade in the sequel, and I’m in awe of Ninja Theory’s vast technical prowess. But overall, Senua’s Saga is a thoroughly disappointing sequel to one of last generation’s most unique and gripping experiences.

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II is now available exclusively on Xbox Series X/S and PC. It’s also on Xbox Game Pass.

Image credit: Xbox