Developer Ninja Theory has always had a history pushing the boundries of video game visuals. Its' titles from the PS3/360 era of gaming -- Heavenly Sword and to a lesser exstent Evovled, are still amazing visual showpieces. I can remember playing that Heavenly Sword demo at a Gamestop kisok all those years ago and being blown away by the motion capture sequences. While the combat was good -- it was the presentation that was the star of the show.
Micorsoft aquired Ninja Theory alongside a handful of other stuidos in 2018, fresh off the success of its Indie darling, Hellblade: Sensua Sacrifice. It was a big moment for XBOX and given the studios' reputation for pushing graphical fedielty to its bleeding edge, many on the team green side of gaming likely thought that myabe this could be XBOX's answer to Playstation's Naughty Dog.
Shortly thereafter, we got the announcemnt of the XBOX Series X, which was being touted as the "world's most powerful console." In addtion, an annoucement trailer for Hellblade 2 also dropped. It was a mouth-watering trailer, which not only served as an excellent tonal piece for the sequel, but also showed off some motion capture that was on another level. It was a bombastic heavy-metal infused powerhouse, and over the next four years we waited.
However, alot has happening behind the scenes at XBOX. And what was once a cool art house sequel now had a lot more riding on it. Ninja Theory, who creates "life changing-art with game changing tech" was now behind one of the platfroms few exclusives. The last few years had been spent in a larger merger aquired Activision-Blizzard. 2024 has also been plauged by constant game delays and layoffs -- the most recent of which was Tango Gameworks, XBOX's only Japan-based studio. Not to mention XBOX's promised to release a slew of games in "the next 12 months" all of which but two were delayed. These including the underwhelming flop Redall, and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3, one of the lowest rated entries in the long running sales powerhouse in over a decade.
Hellblade 2 was met with mixed results. Some outlets and content creators called it a masterpiece, while others called it barely a game -- highlighting the title's short single player length and lack of gameplay elements. While Ninja Theory did attempt to temper exspectations by assuring gamers of the sequels length, virituallyno updates were given on combat or story, with much the press focusing on visual fedelity or sound design. It is now saddled with the pressure of being something that XBOX needs -- in year pracrically devoid of exclusive content. By contrast, Playsation in the same year has released Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Stellar Blade, and Rise of the Ronin.
The takeway for all this could blamed on the ultimate scapegoat -- the hype train. While some of the dissppointment is understandable --its the optics of how it was revealed that has led to this disappointment. Since Hellblade 2 was presented alongside the series X, alot of the community assumed it was going to be a AAA single player experience. And visually, it was. Hellblade 2 in keeping with Ninja Theory's track record, is a another tech push-smashing powerhouse, pushing the limits of the Series X (and comparable gaming PCs) to the edge.
And while the sequel shares alot of the same elements as its predessor, alot of those core elements have been stripped down to lesser forms -- despite having a much larger team and a three times the budget. Combat was never the primary focus in Hellblade, its sequel seemed to dumb down its strategic elements -- in favor of making it look more cinematic. Hellblade was never designed to be a counter part to Last of Us or God of War -- but is also a stark reminder of the lack of exslusives on XBOX-- something that isnt likely to change anytime soon. While some may give Hellblade 2 a pass on its lacking elements -- the XBOX community seems largely disappointed by the final product, only taking note that its good that Hellblade 2 exsists, not praising its arrival.
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