During a couple of interviews, Ninja Theory confirmed that Hellblade 2 – or Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II – will be a short experience like its predecessor and capped out at 30fps on Xbox consoles.
A lot of information has been revealed on Hellblade 2, including the fact that it is a direct sequel to the original title, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. Today, two new pieces of information about the title have come out. On one hand, a report suggests the title will perform markedly worse on the Xbox Series of consoles. Another report straight from Ninja Theory suggests the sequel could be a shorter experience overall, considering an interview with Ninja Theory’s CEO and considering Senua’s Sacrifice itself had a runtime of around 8 hours. The latest trailer, released back in December 2023, can be seen below.
First up is an interview from IGN with Ninja Theory Studio Head Dom Matthews. Dom Matthews says, “I think what we always set out to do is to tell a story and for the game length to be appropriate for the story that we want to tell.”
He goes on to expand on that by saying, “So I’m really pleased to see that there’s a lot of people that actually enjoy a shorter experience, something that they can sit down on a whatever Friday night, stick their headphones on, turn the lights off and kind of sink into an experience and players who don’t necessarily want something that is 50 hours long, a 100 hours long, so it’s as long as it needs to be. And I’m one of those people, I like shorter games.”
Dom Matthews then concludes his comments by mentioning everyday people are just busier, saying, “I think there’s a lot of pressure on people’s time these days, and I think our fans, from what we hear from them, they enjoy a shorter game where our intention is that every step of that journey is meaningful… There’s an audience of people that want games that are focused,” while Matthews doesn’t directly say Hellblade 2 will be a shorter experience, his comments certainly suggest that.
Next, another report that rolls out from the German site GamePro (loosely translated by Google). During their preview time with Hellblade 2, they mentioned, “Hellblade 2 only runs at 30 fps and dynamic resolution on both Xbox Series S and Series X. There are no graphics modes; the frame rate can only be increased on the PC.” It is then said that Ninja Theory did this to make it more similar to films that run at 24fps, to make it a more cinematic experience.
Whether fans will be pleased with Ninja Theory’s latest offering or not will happen sooner rather than later, considering that Hellblade 2 will launch on May 21. It is a digital-only offering and will retail at $50.
