Hellblade is scheduled for release next month, it’s by Ninja Theory. I’ve not played a Ninja Theory game, but aware they’re well know for the Devil May Cry beat-em up games. Senua appears to be the widow of a Nordic warrior, and she’s journeying in to Hell to rescue her husband.
It seems like, while this is a 1 on 1 combat title, the fighting actually takes a back seat to the story.
It wants to use its hero’s journey as a way to explore real life mental illness. The particular focus will be on psychosis, with Senua suffering hallucinations that splinter her perception of reality.('Hellblade' game explores real-life mental health issues | WIRED UK)
The work on audio cues, hearing voices, seems really well done, well at least in the trailer. There are also a lot of puzzles based on Senua attempting to overcome her visual hallucinations.
I don’t know how it’s gonna play, but I appreciate the scope of the premise. It’s also a discounted title, about $30, so perhaps a shorter experience?
Yeah I’m curious if this will be any good. Ninja Theory seems to enjoy the story side of their games more than the gameplay. They did the DmC: Devil May Cry reboot that was fun but had some issues.
They said it’s a shorter game, 4-6 hours, hence the price. They’re trying to work in that mid-tier space. I think they called it “indie AAA” one time. Oh yeah, here you go:
Sounds like this is part walking sim, part combat, and part puzzles. It looks good and the audio is creepy. Might be cool if you have surround sound or headphones.
I wouldn’t go into this expecting much to the combat, but it could be a pretty neat experience type of game. Hard to tell for sure.
I do think it is lame to publish review that goes up on metacritic with score like that, caused by a bug that will probably be fixed very quickly. I mean yes, developers should ideally release bugfree games, but with millions of lines of code, it is not always possible to find everything, even when you are big studio with megapublisher backing, let alone a small team. He should definitely warn people about the bug of course.
But I cannot be too angry at him because I can imagine how pissed I would be if I got a bug like that :)
Have you read the Lottery of Babylon by Borges? It speaks to this psychological issue. Namely, the thrill of having a possible punishment hanging over your head (and avoiding it) can be greater than the thrill of a reward, as long as you know the punishment is there. You can play poker with fake money, yet very few people do (because the game is designed such that the stakes are about the possibility of winning and losing money). Compare that to Mus (a better bluffing game where no money changes hands yet it provides the same thrill as poker playing, imho).
I like strong design choices (money in poker is just too bland). In this case I’d rather be punished with a permadeath (and maybe not finishing the game, since my time is limited) if that’s going to make the time I play more tense.
Of course, it needs to be a punishment you are OK with, which is to say, no to punches!
I’m aware of a phenomenon like that. I just think it’s stupid.
If you promise yourself you won’t replay it if you die then that’s fine. I just feel for the people that go through the effort of replaying a linear experience game. The waste of time makes me cringe.
I probably need a break from forums because I can see the same stodgy arguments coming a mile a way.
Games aren’t stupid. They are entertainment. My metric for their worth is joy per hour. How anyone could find joy replaying the same linear, engineered experience because of an arbitrarily programmed fail state is beyond me.
You are missing the point. It’s not the replaying, but the playing it once knowing there’s a punishment. The thrill, that first playthrough, gives me more enjoyment per hour.
Again, I didn’t think the permanent is going to be easy to trigger, but if I do it I might not replay. I’m no longer a completionist
