Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, announced in 2014, has finally received a release date for later this year.
Hellblade has met with a lot of critique even before launch. For years we’ve known very little beyond its Norse Mythology, and it’s a game about mental illness.
From recent trailers and interviews it seems Hellblade is following main protaganist, Senua, through her own personal Hell. We’re unsure if this is a literal or metaphorical hell yet, with themes of psychosis heavily used. There’s Norse mythology in play, so it leans heavily into Ragnarok themes of hell.
To lay some minds to rest, it seems Ninja Theory has heard and learned from critique. A major criticism early on was they seemed to not have asked anyone with actual psychosis about it. An interview with Game Informer is easing some of these fears, talking about the experiences of actual psychosis sufferers. In the accompanying write up, it’s stated-
“The studio regularly met with people who experience a variety of psychoses, including auditory and visual hallucinations, to ensure that the in-game representation was as accurate as possible. Ninja Theory also consulted with Paul Fletcher, a neuroscience professor in Cambridge’s Clare College to learn more about psychosis from a medical perspective.”
So, with that out of the way, we can comfortably look forward to this game, right? An interesting new take on mental illness, a female protagonist, Norse and Celtic mythology, and a cool, super big sword? Sign me up.
Hellblade will be releasing exclusively on PS4 and PC on August 8th of this year. You can pre-order (if that’s your thing) for PS4 here (EU store) and on Steam here.
Watch the offical Ragnarok trailer here:
About the Author
Sav
Sav is a games developer, programmer, journalist, zine maker and writer. Find him around Melbourne, writing, testing games, running from deadlines and attending pro-queer, pro-trans, and pro feminist rallies. His favourite game is Silent Hill 4- but he knows Silent Hill 2 is the best.
