As soon as it begins, a message warns the player: Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II “contains representations of psychosis, such as visions and auditory hallucinations, which may be disturbing to some people.” It is a pertinent warning because, as happened with its previous installment, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice (2017), the new work by the British studio Ninja Theory dares to go one step further in the representation of themes such as trauma, phobias and pain within an action game. The title does not tighten the rope because it contains images of graphic violence – which it does – but because of the rawness when it comes to portraying the inner suffering of its protagonist, a Celtic warrior who suffers psychosis in the middle of the wild Iceland of Viking myths and who embarks on a journey with the aim of saving his people from a slave-owning tyrant.
Precisely, another message at the beginning of the game recommends using headphones to enjoy one of its key features, binaural audio. Thanks to special microphones, this recording technology allows the player to feel the contradictory voices and thoughts of his protagonist as if they were sounding inside his head. In fact, the sound section, directed by the Spanish composer David García-Díaz, is one of the milestones of this production, since it manages to transmit the voices of judgment, guilt and terror with which Senua has to fight.
The work with the sound is as outstanding as its images are overwhelming, and the artistic direction and technical muscle are other virtues of one of the most spectacular and cinematic games ever created. The landscapes are evocative and the combats thrill with their choreography.
It is for all this that it is surprising how stagnant the title appears from a playable point of view, and that beyond its superb packaging, its structure is linear and its design extremely basic in its mechanics. It is the other side of the coin of a daring work, which avoids clichés and manages to expand the expressive capacities of the interactive medium. Plus, it’s a short game: it lasts about six hours, which is always appreciated.
