Recent reviews by Jlad

haven't played yet but already died twice while preloading

10/10 praise the sun

I absolutely love this game. Though I found the puzzles to be somewhat tedious at times, I thought its method of storytelling was amazing. By hearing Senua's voices you more deeply understand both her fear and her determination. It gave her a relatability that I can't readily identify in characters of other games I've played. When she felt overwhelmed, I found myself cheering her on telling her to get up. When she felt determined, I was overcome with joy as she defeated her enemies and advanced in her quest to save Dillion. It's stunning a game can be so impactful with only about 10 hours of playtime, but Hellblade does a damn good job with the small amount of time it has.

The environments, sound, and fx are also very well done. I thoroughly enjoyed exploring the world. The gameplay was also decently varied, and though not always inuitive made sense once I understood what they wanted me to do.

Though I highly recommend this game, there are definitely some things I'd like to see improved upon if we see more from Ninja Theory in the future. Combat is fun, but feels rather simplistic in that there usually isn't much incentive to using one attack versus another. The most notable exception to this is kicking which is very useful versus larger characters. It'd also be nice to see a larger variety of enemies earlier on, as repeatedly fighting the same ones felt a bit monotonous. I would personally like to spend less time searching for runes to open doors, but this last point is entirely subjective.