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S1 Ep9: Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
79 Plays7 years ago
Join Dave and Jake as the explore the depths of Senua's mind in this week's episode!
Questions? Thoughts? Ideas for an episode you'd like to hear? Send them in at SoapstonePodcast@gmail.com!
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Transcript
Introduction to Senua's Journey
00:00:00
Speaker
Let me tell you about Senua. Her story has already come to an end, but now, it begins anew. What's happening? It's breathing. The head. It's breathing? It's breathing. Why? He knows. He knows she's getting closer. He can feel her coming closer. They're watching. She's getting closer. They're watching. They're watching. They're watching.
00:00:50
Speaker
How's it going everybody? Welcome to another episode of Soapstone. I am joined by my co-host, as always, Dave. How's it going tonight, Dave?
00:01:00
Speaker
I like this intro we have. It's cute. It's pretty consistent, actually. Yeah. I'm doing alright. I'm feeling oddly good. But in fact, we just stopped it. I'm feeling odd. Let's spend the rest of the podcast describing how you feel.
00:01:21
Speaker
I don't want to diagnose, I just want to... Yeah, probably a good call. But speaking of diagnose, today's episode is Hellblade, Senua's sacrifice. Which I typically just call... Have you played that Senua game? Yeah. Well, I mean, it's an entry in the Hellblade series. Some would argue the best. And the only.
00:01:46
Speaker
Yeah, it's weird that it has the name Hellblade because it makes it sound like it's some Doom-esque game.
Initial Impressions of Hellblade
00:01:52
Speaker
Yeah. Something really metal and badass. So it's not. Oh, it is. It is pretty badass. It makes it sound like what it is. Yeah, it just.
00:02:02
Speaker
An odd name choice. Yeah. I don't want to nitpick it. It is a really good game. Yep. So pretty good. Let's get into some of the stats quick. Yeah. Yeah. So hell blade came out, uh, probably about half a year from the recording of this podcast, 2017 developed by Ninja theory, uh, who you may know for other games.
00:02:23
Speaker
Such as. They made several games. A lot of them people probably wouldn't have heard of, but one of the ones that you may have is DMC Devil May Cry, which is different from the rest of the series. From the rest of the series, also Senua kind of hit different points. For sure. So what is Senua though? Senua is a exploratory
00:02:53
Speaker
I don't want to say walking simulator, but it is linear in that regard. But it has a combination of some puzzle solving and some combat. But it's all done over this really interesting storyline where the rough plot is you are the character Senua.
00:03:10
Speaker
you have your boyfriend's head so i guess ex-boyfriend he has died that didn't work out and you are taking the head back essentially into the depths of hell to try and reclaim his soul right it's just standard things weekday, weekday blues i'm going out for errands don't forget to bring the head with you aww it's your turn to watch the head
00:03:40
Speaker
But yes, as you said, it is at its core. This puzzle combat hybrid and the combat is kind of distinct. It's not.
00:03:54
Speaker
When you're in combat mode, it's separate from everything else, right? You're never going to be really solving a puzzle. Well, at the same time that you're dealing with enemies, it's kind of like you've entered this combat arena.
Mental Health Themes and Story Spoilers
00:04:07
Speaker
And it's impossible to go too far into the game without talking about what this is all based around, right? Like the very first credit in the game was the mental health advisor.
00:04:19
Speaker
Yeah. The entirety of the game is kind of around, it was mental health, which you discover as the game progresses. Cause you don't really know what's up with her, but you start hearing a narrator and you start to hear other voices, which you find out is coming from her own mind. Right. Left and right channels. If you got headphones. Yeah.
00:04:39
Speaker
They do a lot of crazy things with the binaural. Mm-hmm. I think it's my turn. Okay. Two aurals. Binaural. Two aurals. Yes. It has two aurals. Two aurals. Yeah, at least. But they do a lot of cool things with the sound in this game, as you are hearing voices throughout. And she at least has some form of schizophrenia
00:05:06
Speaker
Serious depression. Yeah. Possibly a handful of other conditions as well. Just a cocktail of different things to overcome really. Yeah. But some form of psychosis for sure. Yeah. She's not your typical Superman hero. Where it's just a medley of great qualities. There's a lot of, a lot more underdog qualities about Senua. A lot of things that she's trying to overcome and beat like the journey into hell itself.
00:05:37
Speaker
That's true. Yeah, and everything she faces throughout the game is a construct of this struggle that she's going through. Before we get too far into the plot here, I just want to notify everybody that this is a full spoiler episode.
00:05:54
Speaker
We haven't touched on any of the bosses or anything like that yet. So if The premise kind of piques your interest then definitely go play it first as of this recording. It's on sale It won't be when you look because that would be hilarious But it's usually about 30 bucks on Steam about eight hours of gameplay probably first playthrough maybe a little bit longer if you try to collect everything and it's
00:06:29
Speaker
I feel like good is an understatement, but yeah. Dave and I have fallen different parts of the spectrum here as far as the review for the game, but I think that I also recommend it. But that's done now. This is the end of the disclaimer. We're going to go right in there.
00:06:39
Speaker
Before, if you want to stop here, it's
Gameplay Mechanics and Combat
00:06:51
Speaker
You had your chance. But that aside, we're going to jump basically right in here.
00:06:51
Speaker
good. I recommend it.
00:06:58
Speaker
Immediately from the get go, the game basically puts you on a boat. And I think she's kind of like a canoe. She's paddling upstream. It's a log with.
00:07:09
Speaker
a bit of a engraving, which I guess counts as a seat. Yeah. Canoe's already a pretty rudimentary seafaring vessel. Yeah. And hers is more, more so. I feel like we talked about this before in the past. I'm like, why are you taking a canoe in the fucking ocean? It's happened, right? There's got to be like. But they're not ideal circumstances. No, no, I mean, for sure. I think that's how they got between the Hawaiian Islands, though. Anyways, that doesn't matter. Hawaii, that's podcast. Yeah.
00:07:39
Speaker
But yeah, it opens on her rowing this canoe through a small river, and you're not really sure of your environment. You see she's kind of wearing Norse-esque clothing. She has some tribal paint on her, a lot of leatherworking. You see the head kind of dangling from her belt, and she's kind of slow going into this area, which you're not sure about yet. You're introduced to the voices, and that raises some questions.
00:08:08
Speaker
But as you keep going and hearing a little bit more about Senua, you see the environment change a little bit. You see a lot of bodies on spikes or hanging. It's very uncomfortable. Yeah. And the camera also zooms in a little bit that you're always from a third person perspective from behind Senua.
00:08:28
Speaker
Um, which really helps with some of the shots that will come up later in the game. Yeah. They use camera work a ton, not to derail onto it now, but I'm going to come back to blatantly filleting their, um, choice in video design and shots a lot.
00:08:45
Speaker
But the way they pan the camera and the way you are introduced to an environment, you feel very small because in the distance you see what looks like a huge mountain that you're going to, which you perceive to be your destination. Right. And you feel very alone except for the voices and the dead bodies, which are not the best of company. Right. Especially those voices. Dead bodies. Okay. The voice is terrible. I have a couple of dead bodies at home. Yeah. Everybody's dealt with dead bodies. Right. Listening.
00:09:17
Speaker
Now, but the trek kind of up the river gives you a time to take in the world a little bit, come to grips with the fact that she's hearing these voices in her head, and the game intentionally at this point, and it does at several points, cuts your control out of it.
00:09:35
Speaker
like you can have a more introductory sequence than this start for the game because there's about probably six or seven minutes of the boat ride where you have no control other than looking around you. You actually don't have any other control other than that. It's just taking in the world listening to the voices, internalizing Senua's place in this.
00:09:58
Speaker
And like when I was playing through the first time, it didn't bother me at all. Because I played through this game twice. Playing through the second time, I was like, I kind of want to get to get to the game. But that's on me because there's a reason that that tracks there. It's all about establishing this pacing for the game that will be continued later.
00:10:21
Speaker
Yeah, it's good that it sets a precedent in that way because it is very much a storytelling game that has some interactive mechanics versus I hate to always go to like Call of Duty, but it is very action based game. It's more emphasized on multiplayer.
00:10:38
Speaker
and the combat itself versus an overarching story throughout the series. Right. And just to continue this, because this is kind of like comparison a little bit, in a game like Call of Duty, even if you're looking at the single player portion, which a lot of people play Call of Duty for the single player portion, that's fine. I've played through a lot of it.
00:10:57
Speaker
We're not trashing that at all. The pace that the plot develops is to advance the plot, not to internalize the conflict of the character. It's very rarely rare that in a fast-paced game, you're learning a whole bunch about the main character.
00:11:15
Speaker
Senua goes completely the opposite direction and this game is pretty slow. Like there's parts where there's action, there's parts where you need to move through an area quickly. Those are rare compared to on average where you can go through the game at your own pace, take in the sights and sounds, unwilling or not, and just experience what the game has to offer.
Symbolism and Key Characters
00:11:38
Speaker
Yeah, but like I said before, I think it is good that they do it because you want to essentially be in Senua's shoes. You want to be able to moccasins. You want to be able to relate to the character and feel what she feels. So when you're at certain other points in the game, like when you're going through the combat and you're fighting these Northmen, these apparitions in a sense.
00:12:03
Speaker
you want to actively take them out of your way and cut them down. If you're solving puzzles, a lot of which are based around perspective, you want to explore the environment and take your time and say, oh, I didn't look at it this way. There's a puzzle at a midway point in the game where essentially you have to go to a door, the door will have some runes, and you have to look for those runic shapes in the environment.
00:12:30
Speaker
And at that one point, there's a suspended shape that if you look at it from three different angles, actually provides the three runes you need for the door. Right. So it's a lot of looking around and looking at things in a different way. Yes. Which I like.
00:12:46
Speaker
And the game is, you could basically break up every section of the game fundamentally into three parts, either moving from location to location, solving a puzzle or combat, which usually jumps in in the
00:13:05
Speaker
the transitional parts where you're breaking between puzzles. They'll throw some combat at you. And the combat is pretty fast. Usually when enemies jump at you, they kind of like, they'll gather around you a little bit slowly. Whoever's closest to you will have the most initiative kind of to attack you. But if there's two really close, then they'll both just try to attack you. It doesn't do the whole one person at a time thing. If there's a whole bunch around you, they'll all attack you.
00:13:32
Speaker
and that kind of breaks up some of the slow-paced puzzles when you're like moving from area to area and you get some heads up that you're about to get jumped basically because you'll pull out your sword yeah when combat actually starts the sword comes out but even before that
00:13:50
Speaker
Like this the rot starts to cover the environment this like darkness basically and you're just like it's kind of similar to Almost like a Silent Hill rust like everything's transitioning to the dark world basically And so you're like I think combat is about to happen But when it actually triggers an enemy may materialize really quickly Like kind of randomly around you and then move to attack you so sometimes if you're not prepared for it You can get hit immediately
00:14:19
Speaker
This happened to me a shit ton my first playthrough because for whatever reason I didn't look at what the controls were mapped to.
00:14:26
Speaker
So then we would appear, I'd be like, Oh, and then I can take a hit in the face and you can take a couple of hits before you go down. You don't exactly have a health bar, but you'll kind of notice the screen will start looking a little more red or dark towards the edges and send you a struggles a little bit. She'll like breathe more heavily, kind of cluster side, things like that. The, uh, the health, like.
00:14:51
Speaker
Taking damage in combat actually will occasionally put you, if you take enough damage, it'll put you in like a down state. You can kind of like button mash to stand back up. Or if you're down and you get hit again, that's when it counts as a death. Yeah. Let's, let's jump into that a little bit. Uh, so you've now landed your boat on the shore. You're exploring a little bit and essentially you go to Hella's Gate.
00:15:19
Speaker
Now, Hela in Norse mythology is in charge of, I'm going to forget the name of the plane, but Midgard is the plane of like human existence and they're different ones and there's one for the dead. And the Hela is in charge of that basically. So you want to- It's like Helheim or something. That sounds right. Yeah. I just played the game. That's all right. It doesn't pop up with like text whenever you enter an area like Helheim. Welcome to the new area. Yeah.
00:15:50
Speaker
But essentially you want to go through to Hella's Gate to retrieve the soul of Dillion. Who's your boyfriend? Right. The head that you're carrying along with you. Yeah. Head boy. So once you're first at the door, you are introduced to your first combat and you beat a couple of guys. Then there's some guys that you can't beat and it's essentially a scripted down. It's like an ethereal opponent. One of these Northmen. Yeah. They're very shadowy, ethereal, like you said. You can't interact with this guy.
00:16:20
Speaker
Yeah, but you can take the hits. Even if you dodge for a bit, there's enough of them, they surround you, you go down. And so you have this. Cutscene where you have this rot kind of creep onto your arm. And that is the darkness, which is spreading or just talked a lot about throughout the game.
00:16:40
Speaker
and the game will say essentially as you keep failing or dying in the game the rot will spread and if it gets all the way up to your head Seniwa's journey is over when all progress will be lost.
00:16:55
Speaker
And it actually explicitly says this. It uses, this is one time that the game is very explicit. At other points, the game is actually, they try not to give you meta information about how to play the game. And you mentioned the controls. In order to find the controls, you have to look them up. Like the first time I played the game, I didn't use like the focus ability in combat until significantly through, even though I unlocked it relatively early, I think after this fight.
Challenges and Trials
00:17:17
Speaker
But this, what Dave's describing here, this text pops up, like, not as a pop-up, but it's displayed glowing, essentially, where the door is, telling you this message. So it's pretty explicit. If you die too much in this game, your save game will be deleted, essentially.
00:17:37
Speaker
Yeah. So that kind of made me a lot more try hard. Right. So I paid a lot more attention in combat and didn't try and show off as much. I tried to learn the controls, learn when to dodge, learn when to parry. And now I'm fucking.
00:17:52
Speaker
great at it. Like somebody appears in front of me starts going with like a right swipe and I just parry and it's just a beautiful effect. Time slows a little bit and you start whaling on them. And we mentioned the game was graphically impressive. It is very, very pretty, very beautiful. Whether it's darkness or like light beams, anything like that, it's well designed. The animations also continue with that and especially in combat.
00:18:19
Speaker
every animation that you're executing, be it parrying, attacking, you can run it, enemies jump up, like stab at them and stuff. Even when you take hits, it's all animated really well. But as soon as that combat resolves, you've encountered this opponent you can't fight, you've died, you're now basically, the camera pans back and Senua's looking at her own rotted body, as you said.
00:18:48
Speaker
voice that's basically been guiding you up to this point whose name is Druth is one of the voices in your head and He starts to tell you about two of these opponents that you can you must go forth and face to open the door Beyond this the first being Val Ravin and the other one being cert, right? Mm-hmm
00:19:10
Speaker
And you have the choices to which one you want to face first, but you need to fight both of them. And essentially they are bosses. So who of the two of those would you think would be your favorite?
00:19:27
Speaker
Uh, just to describe a little bit for the listeners, uh, cert is, I believe the God of like fiery destruction. He has some place in Ragnarok as, as, as the most, but it's very burnt out themed. You'll find like a lot of just charred bodies, charred buildings in his area, as you're going through some of the puzzles as you go up to him. But when you actually get to face him, he has this.
00:19:56
Speaker
Not exactly a face, but more of like a wicker visage. Yeah. And he is like a really, probably twice as tall as you, burly dude. Has like a giant butcher's sword. Yeah.
00:20:07
Speaker
So the whole thing is very intense compared to what you've been fighting up to this point, which are granted these Northmen are still taller than you, much more muscular. They look intimidating for sure. Yeah. But this guy is like big and he means business. Like Cine was not huge. She's actually pretty small, pretty light, but muscular. Yeah. And everybody fighting the game is essentially larger than you. I didn't even answer your question, but I was trying to give the background.
00:20:35
Speaker
I prefer Val Ravin thematically for sure. Yeah. So well, search area has puzzles related to like, uh, igniting a fire that will burn through a barrier. And then you have to like run through to get closer and closer to the boss, kind of like through the fire at the place. Yeah. Uh, your sound editor, could you please splice that in? Thank you. No copyright strikes.
00:21:00
Speaker
The Val Ravin, who I agree is more interesting to me, his areas are all puzzles and they're really interesting perspective-based puzzles, right? Yeah, you have to essentially go through these doors, which will actually change your perspective of what you see. So let's say you're looking at a corner and there's a door through that area, but it's blocked off.
00:21:26
Speaker
but if you look through the gate at the same corner, it's now open and accessible to you. Right. And the gate's just kind of sitting there in the open, right? So just looking through it changes what the world looks like and then walking through it actually forces that change in the world. Yeah, it materializes it basically.
00:21:44
Speaker
So there's a bunch of things like that going up to his area of illusions and trying to align symbols together on the door itself. The crows, right? These crow symbols, which is his thing. Well, Robin's motif.
00:22:00
Speaker
Yeah, he's a very tall, creepy crow guy, I guess. And you actually see him before, like he kind of taunts you, kind of watches your progress at various points. But anytime you get close to him, he's replaced by like a bone alter.
00:22:17
Speaker
yeah like a little bone altar kind of like pointing off like oh no that wasn't him i just thought it was him but it's really just like this arrangement of sticks yeah i think getting through all of his puzzles it's it's satisfying once you finally accomplish it you've solved all these perspective puzzles
00:22:34
Speaker
And then his actual fight is in this dark, sort of like a colosseum, like a fighting ring with a large tree branch going over the top of it, which is where you initiate the fight basically. And he appears behind you in this creepy cut scene and basically attacks you, knocks you to the ground, right?
00:23:00
Speaker
I talked about that a little bit. I think it's one of the more unsettling points of the game for me. Yeah. It might be the most unsettling point of the game for me. Yeah. It's for sure a violent game and it will certainly depict a lot of things. But in this cut scene, it's again, like everything else that you encounter as Senua, it's a mental projection and it's not actually happening. Just like when you died earlier in the game. Right. She saw herself. You seeing a vision. Yeah.
00:23:30
Speaker
but you're there lying on the ground and your body's kind of jiggling a little bit as you have this thousand yard stare. Yeah, there's dead, dead eyes basically. Yeah. And then you see this figure kind of above you and you realize it's Val Ravin just kind of picking out your innards. Yeah. From behind you and it was, uh, it's very uncomfortable. It's really uncomfortable to watch.
00:23:55
Speaker
but you manage to fight back, use this mirror that Sinua kind of channels to focus throughout the game, which slows time essentially and makes certain enemies that are invulnerable to your standard attacks vulnerable. So you can kind of just carve through people and do tons of damage. She kind of grabs the mirror, stands up quickly, like repels Valravn and is seemingly like unhurt, right? Like she's literally being devoured a moment ago, but now she's ready to fight.
00:24:24
Speaker
But yeah, part of Val Ravin is he is a trickster. He uses a lot of illusions. Yeah, for the fight he actually periodically will like summon guys and other Northmen kind of to fight you. And he's more agility based as a boss where Surt is perfectly willing to just like decimate you with his huge cleaver or he has this like fire-like ability that will channel over time and if you don't hit him
00:24:50
Speaker
You die as I found out second playthrough. I didn't it apparently didn't encounter the first playthrough I forgot about it, but I died to it in the second playthrough. I was like, oh, so that's why the controller was rumbling Yeah, but he's much more beefy and slow-moving whereas Val Ravin has two little like sighs blades
00:25:09
Speaker
And he'll throw him at you. He'll dive at you. He'll do like jump kicks and other shit. He's crazy. Yeah, super evasive. But if you manage to counter his abilities, he becomes a lot more manageable. And taking him down at the end kind of it removes this illusion that's present through his realm. Same with Cirque. Every time that you beat one of these bosses, their area becomes
00:25:38
Speaker
normal normal. Yeah, it's no longer tainted by fire or darkness or crows. It's just a perfectly fine sunny day. And this is probably a fair point to bring up. Druth. I know I mentioned him a little bit earlier, but he's this voice of someone you encountered in the wilderness. And he's the one telling you about these bosses. He gives you warnings about what you're likely to encounter in their areas, how you're gonna have to
00:26:06
Speaker
how you're going to have to face them and in general just provide some advice for characters you otherwise know nothing about going to the fight with it's also at this point i want to mention so we've talked about the north mill we've talked about valravn and cert
00:26:24
Speaker
And we also talk about the voices in Senua's head. I think it's the going theory, in my belief as well, that everything she encounters, whether they be puzzles or combat, are just mental manifestations of struggles that she's trying to overcome. That's one of the core things.
00:26:45
Speaker
that you can sort of get from the game if you look back on it once it's all complete, is everything that's being described to her, all of these situations, she's either created in her mind or someone else has told her about this foe, about this area, and she's constructed this as her reality to fight through.
00:27:09
Speaker
And, I mean, some of the areas are just ridiculously pretty. I'd probably move through some of the other ones a little bit quicker, but after you've beaten both of those bosses, you can finally move through the... Hell's Gate? Through Hell's Gate to the bridge, right? Which it says, like, only the dead may cross, but you're already dead. That's what the game tells you. You're kind of this cryptic... cryptic metaphor. Do you think Cinny was actually dead throughout the game? I don't believe so.
00:27:37
Speaker
And maybe, maybe there's more of a justification for that. But I mean, when the game opens up, it says this is her story. And if I remember correctly, it says something to the effect of she's already in hell. Yeah, she's already. I think that is.
00:27:54
Speaker
a state of mind though yeah i agree i don't think she's actually she's grieving and she's gone through a lot of a lot a lot a lot of shit um with her past including her well almost especially her father right um a lot of abuse and there's a lot of talk of darkness as we mentioned throughout the game and from Senua's perspective it is this
00:28:19
Speaker
outside evil presence Which I would just shock up to She hears voices. It's the embodiment of all of her anxiety and struggles and schizophrenia and psychosis and for the times
00:28:36
Speaker
Everyone else believes that she's a witch and hearing voices and trying to contact the underworld. She's cursed. She has this darkness inside her. Similar to her mother who gets burned at the stake due to her father for the same reasons, basically.
00:28:52
Speaker
because they thought it was some evil presence they can't really explain, but she was probably just a troubled person like most other people are. It just wasn't known at the time. There's only two friendly characters who were kind of mentioned throughout the game. There's Dillion, who provided some structure to her life and actual happiness and hope, and was the antithesis of what her father provided, which was abuse and all of this.
00:29:20
Speaker
And Senua actually repressed the memory that her mother was born at the Siddiq. Based off of the lines in the game, she believes that her mother killed herself until probably 75% through it. And then the memory resurges.
00:29:38
Speaker
and she realizes that her father burned her mother because the father is this druid who truly believes in this darkness and his wife at the time and later in Senua.
00:29:54
Speaker
And yeah, her father completely abused her, left her isolated, put her in a hole in the ground where she was forced to deal with the darkness on her own and then the literal darkness in this case. And all of that comes back to manifest itself through the foes that you face in the game. Even just darkness itself becomes an enemy at a point.
00:30:20
Speaker
where you can't stay in the darkness because it will kill you. Yeah. So that's the area right after. So after you've beaten Valravn and Sirt, you cross the bridge to Helheim and you come before the door that Senua believes is going to lead her to Hela and Dillion's soul. And as you fight some opponents on the bridge, the Northmen,
00:30:48
Speaker
And once you get close enough, it goes into this cutscene
Confrontations and Symbolism
00:30:53
Speaker
of her approaching. The sky darkens. And the door bursts open. All this darkness just pours out, just this cloud of billowing mass of darkness. And Hela emerges, right? And Hela is probably my favorite designed character in the game. Really? Yes.
00:31:18
Speaker
Hela is, in this case... Hela Awesome? Yeah, basically. I had to make that joke once. But she's a pale-skinned,
00:31:30
Speaker
I would almost say porcelain. Yeah, porcelain or stone. She has runes engraved on her body, all of these Norse runes. Her eyes are black. Her mouth is constantly got this dark ichor inside of it and her eyes do as well. Part of her skull is basically burned away.
00:31:55
Speaker
and she looks like deformed. She's this really awesome concept. Yeah, and she's also a giantess. Yes. So she's like 30 feet tall at this point. And as soon as Senua sees Hela coming out of the gate, she drops her sword and starts cowering. And it's actually like, it's really fast. She kind of succumbs to Hela as soon as she sees her. And this other voice that's in her head, the shadow,
00:32:23
Speaker
begins to mock her, saying like, you're no warrior, pick up your sword. And she finally does, but Hela doesn't care. Hela just kind of pimp smacks her off the bridge, if I remember. Yeah. Just one hit. But Senua was willing to at least try to fight back a little bit.
00:32:43
Speaker
And that transitions into this despair portion of her psyche, basically, where she wakes up below the bridge and her sword is broken. And the shadow berates her for the loss of her sword. And the fact that she, you know, he considers her a coward. The shadow is this kind of deep, like really modulated voice that is just constantly berating Senua through this.
00:33:14
Speaker
similar to Dr. Samuel Hayden, in a way. Yeah, actually, it might be. It is a very overpowering voice, like I said, very mocking. Dr. Samuel Hayden. And you hear the voice, and she's sitting by a fire looking into the mirror, I guess reflecting on what had just happened and what she's going to do next. But as the camera pans around, you keep hearing the voice of the shadow.
00:33:40
Speaker
but then when you get to see her face, her mouth is saying all the words and she's talking into the mirror at herself. In this voice, it's very uncomfortable. So yet again, it's another projection of her own mind, of her judgment saying, I'm not good enough to do X, Y, and Z, I should turn back, et cetera.
00:34:08
Speaker
And this is on top of you having the different voices in your head saying like, don't fuck up, dream back. Now occasionally the voices, they are whimsical to a degree. So they will sometimes encourage you or say if you're in combat, say, hey, focus, which is your cue to use the mirror and slow down time that you're being attacked from behind.
00:34:32
Speaker
Even when I would say even when the voices are positive, though, like even when they're trying to encourage you, this is all part of the. I'm going to say the desolation of Senua, basically, in her mind is the positive things are just there to provide enough hope that the failure hurts more. Like that's the way the voices really seem to be, because there's times there are no hopeful voices. It's all despair.
00:35:00
Speaker
And the fact that sometimes the voices are on your side makes those moments worse. And they're usually mocking to a degree. So I think there's a time where you're cut off from something and you have to...
00:35:13
Speaker
merely push down a plank to act as a bridge. And the voice are like, oh, she did it. She got it. And it's like a trite thing. It's not an accomplishment, but it's just another thing of that mocking background voice throughout the entire game. Right. You're undergoing this pressure as Senya was undergoing this pressure.
00:35:35
Speaker
And that's so good. So now you're at the point where you don't have a sword to continue on because you need your sword to fight anything. And you have no hope at this point, but you find yourself on a shore and you see a glimmer of light in the distance who you perceive to be Dillion. So you start following the image around some corners and into the distance.
00:36:04
Speaker
And then you've got, I believe, some backstory about when you first meet Dillion. Right. So Senua met Dillion when she was one of the rare instances she's like outside of her home, not being abused. And she sees him fighting or practicing swordplay underneath the tree.
00:36:24
Speaker
and she is curious she really she's like what's what's this boy doing and to her it proceeds she perceives him as dancing and really appreciates this and eventually like she actually encounters him and they either like do a little sparring thing or something like that and he remarks like oh you know how you know swordplay where did you learn this like who taught you she says no one taught me
00:36:50
Speaker
I just learned it from watching you. Yeah, I just saw you and he's like, oh you could learn all of that from watching and this kind of They start out as friends, but they just grow together and begin to love each other
00:37:05
Speaker
And so, like, Dillion is one of the person who saves her. A key moment when a curse, a curse, quote unquote, but plague afflicts the village, right? And she, Dillion's father dies to this plague. And in her psychosis, she believes that Dillion blames her for this. Because everyone else blames her for this. Exactly.
00:37:34
Speaker
including her father, everyone's saying that because of her communicating with the underworld, which is her dealing with her voices, etc, that she somehow brought upon this sickness to the village. And it's led to many people's deaths. So she's internalized that yet again. Yeah, but dillian is the only true character
00:37:55
Speaker
I would say he's lawful good. He's truly out there for her benefit, always looking out for her, being very reassuring. There's a point in the game coming up very shortly after this where you're walking through almost entire darkness and you have very little white outlines of falling where to go and you're feeling around, but you have Dillion's voice talking to you, guiding you, saying,
00:38:25
Speaker
Hey, like, take it easy, be calm, find your surroundings. Because you're within your own head, in a sense, trying to fight your way out. And this is essentially right after you've followed this kind of illuminated specter of Dillion as he leads you to a tree. And in the tree is a sword, and Druth is also one of the voices here in your head, and he tells you it was
00:38:53
Speaker
a sword capable of killing gods and these are the trials of Odin. And when you try to claim the sword, this darkness just pours over you and essentially consumes you. And you are forced to complete these trials to claim the sword. And each of them, going into gameplay for a second, each of them is a mechanically different challenge.
00:39:15
Speaker
be that using Senua's hearing to traverse. This is one of the creepiest parts, probably the creepiest part in the game for me. There's these humanoid-esque shapes that are just like, they're monstrosities. Basically like Eldritch in nature.
00:39:36
Speaker
and you are completely surrounded by darkness, and you have to rely on Senua's hearing to get past them. If you get too close to them, and my case is using a controller, it starts to shake a little bit, and you get too close and they'll kill you basically. They're mostly stationary, but eventually you'll reach areas where they start to move around. Now the trick is,
00:40:01
Speaker
your sense of hearing is not like, it's not like Batman, we're going to illuminate everything detective vision. It's really focused on specifically where you're kind of pointing the cursor and it barely works if you're moving. So you need to stand still for a moment to get a feel for your surroundings and then kind of move forward. And it's a very, very uncomfortable experience.
00:40:25
Speaker
yeah it's i do like it though when they limit your senses because it also provides a really cool way to show the game use different dynamic lighting and other things to put you in this dark space right you want to feel or they want you to feel alone uh trapped like you're kind of stuck there and you're kind of just
00:40:50
Speaker
thought. And the voices start to like dim a bit. Eventually, I think they come back and they're present for some of the trials. Usually they kind of call like cry out whenever you lose sight of Dillion, because they're the manifestations in your mind. But this is a much more isolated kind of personal
00:41:16
Speaker
trial you go through with dillian like his voice is way more present at this part in the game than i think any other and he's trying to help you through this keep you calm keep you like capable so you can move through these trials and just going back to the audio thing for a second another mechanic i something i didn't really notice the first time through that i remember but i noticed the second time through is you come across a river that's like flowing down a hill and you need to follow the river up dillian says you need to follow the stream up
00:41:44
Speaker
And because the stream is making noise, you actually see it. And you see it like further up than you would anything else when you're just listening to like soft subtle sounds. And that's like a really cool touch when you're just like, oh yeah, it makes some sounds. So we'll actually allow the player to see it. Yeah, I enjoyed all of the trials for sure. Or some of the other trials that you remember.
00:42:11
Speaker
I know there is one where you're trying to find the runes, but there is a giant screaming flame chasing after you, and you're kind of going through this labyrinth, and you're following this glint of light, which again you perceive to be Dillion, kind of guiding you where the next rune is.
00:42:31
Speaker
But you're doing this with the giant screaming flame chasing you. Right. Now, I'm already like a bit of a coward when it comes to scary games. I wouldn't consider this a scary part, but I did feel very tense. Yeah, it's anxious, right? Yeah.
00:42:49
Speaker
Like you start to feel like a little bit hot in your clothes, but you're just minding your own business type of anxious. Yeah. It's like, it's like you're Egyptian and that's the pillar of fire, right? You're like, yeah, I'm not really sure what's going on here. I'll stay away from the tabernacle. But they do a really good job of instilling that sense of anxiety and fear in you throughout many points in the game. But this being another example.
00:43:13
Speaker
I think those two are the standout trials for me. Those are the ones I really remember. And the one with the flame isn't even that long. It's like by necessity it's pretty quick because if the flame catches you, you die.
00:43:32
Speaker
Yeah, they don't take that long. And once you've completed all the trials, you can finally claim the sword and it glows blue. And, you know, when it works in your buy. Did we talk about the sword at all? I mentioned, do you try to pull it out? And that's when the darkness converges on. Did we talk about the name of the sword? We did not. Ah. So I don't think it's named once you actually pull it out completely. Okay. It is called Graham. Yeah.
00:43:56
Speaker
But essentially its purpose is to slay gods. Right. And to make it a felony if you get caught with it. I wish I had a cracker joke here. This again is another mental manifestation of this is your hope. This is your way to go back to put you on equal footing with Hela. And Dillion's brought you here, right? Yeah.
00:44:24
Speaker
And yeah, I mean, Hela is this goddess of death, and you finally have a tool, something you can use to fight her, something you can kind of struggle on with. And after you claim the sword, you can leave the tree, and the voices rejoin you. And for a time, after they rejoin you, they're like, oh, we're back, essentially.
00:44:51
Speaker
they're actually really encouraging. They'll be like, oh, there's, there's a path up the mountain. You can go up the mountain. There's a ladder. She sees the ladder. She's so, she's so smart. And, uh, it's kind of yours like, eh, why are they all positive right now? Right? Like usually there's a lot of detractors on one person, maybe being a little happier. All of them seem to be for you right now. And it's suspicious.
00:45:18
Speaker
There's a reason it's suspicious. It's because the voices in your head want to be in control.
00:45:27
Speaker
later on when things start to get more difficult again they revert back to their you know taunting she's she can't she can't make it she has to make it she can't make it like what you're gonna do she can't go and yeah like the the happiness and those good feelings and things like that they don't last they're always like at war with the voices in your head to make this make you feel terrible about the situation do you remember the next area though because this is
00:45:57
Speaker
This is probably thematically, I think my favorite. I know I've said like three favorites so far. Favorite cutscene was Val Ravin. Scariest area was the monstrosities and I think this is my favorite area.
00:46:15
Speaker
This would be the cave with the beast. Yes. Yep. P.S. The beast is yet another manifestation. And it is something that is hiding in the darkness. And so this is why you can't stay in the darkness at this point. But again, you have to go through.
00:46:36
Speaker
more rooted puzzles and combat as you work your way down. And it's, I think it's worth saying how it's presented, right? Like you come across this giant archway leading through a dark hallway and you're like, all right, fine. I mean, Senua has a problem with abstract darkness, but literal darkness isn't the problem, right? And as soon as you step into it, there's these like these flashing, essentially red lights and like claws and faces at the sides of the screen that are flashing at you.
00:47:06
Speaker
and this is the sign that the beast is coming for you. Yeah and in your haste you run through the darkness and you come to a ledge and you jump off the ledge and onto a bridge that starts falling apart and you fall down a little bit
00:47:22
Speaker
And through all this mishap, Dylan's head falls from your belt and falls down into these depths, which is what is encouraging you to go after it at this point. And you have to go reclaim the head and fight the beast to take it back.
00:47:39
Speaker
And this happens right before this, before the head falls, the area before that. This is the one exception in the game where I think the puzzles and the mechanics kind of come together and they're not distinct separate things. There's one area where you have to carry a torch as you're exploring it prior to the jump and the bridge. You're exploring an area and you need to get a rune. And in order to get the rune, you need to illuminate several lights in a room. When you enter the room, you have this torch.
00:48:08
Speaker
and you're attacked. So you drop the torch so she can draw her sword and it's now imperative that you stay within the confines of the light when you're fighting or else the beast will kill you. So before you have like all these dodges and things like that, you could be really mobile, you can avoid enemies all of this. Now it's like, oh crap, I got too far away from the light and like the claws and things start coming at the side of the screen.
00:48:33
Speaker
And the beast isn't like a physical entity in the world, it's worth noting. It's an instant death that happens if you spend too much time in the darkness after, like, Senua succumbs to it.
00:48:47
Speaker
and there's a point right before the bridge where you're making the final jump where I think the wind blows out the torch and Senua looks back and she sees the beast for the first time and this is the first time you see the beast and it's this huge like hulking skeletal muscular boar type creature that's like twice her height and it's just looking at her and I'm like oh my gosh
00:49:12
Speaker
That build's an anxiety for me. That build's an anxiety for me because it's just looking at her and then she just books, hits the bridge and drops the head. Sorry, I can't skip it. No, it's fine. Like part of what we do here is to hype up things. For me, I'm a low energy person, so I can't really get as hype. But you seem pretty high energy. I just seem to have some attachment to the game. Oh, yeah, I really do enjoy the game. I love it in a way. Yeah.
00:49:42
Speaker
But the head falls down, all of the voices are mocking her. The beast starts to come for her because she's out of the light, and she crawls back to a torch that's nearby and despairs, that she's lost Dillion's head.
00:49:57
Speaker
So at this point, you go down a little bit further, solve another puzzle or two, and you get to this big open bottom of the cave type chasm. The only light you have is coming down from where you initially came from, like maybe a mile up.
00:50:14
Speaker
It's just this beam of light and you're in the circle of light with dillian's head, but in the outskirts, you see the beast start to approach into the light. Yeah. It's like, Hey, I stalk in the darkness, but I ain't no bitch. Yeah. I'm here now. Yeah. And you have the voices of the standard ones in your head. You have the shadow mocking you saying, like, I told you not to come here. Yeah. Like this is what you're going to get for.
00:50:42
Speaker
all of your effort is not and just death it's actually right before the beast fight i believe the shadow mocks like says it actually starts to like manipulate you more because it says
00:50:58
Speaker
I wanted you to succeed. Like the reason I put you through all of this is because I didn't want you to die like your mother died. All of this. And it's like, this was all a challenge to push you so that you could survive in the end. And you're just like, I don't believe you though. Yeah. The shadow has not been a friend up until this point.
00:51:20
Speaker
In some ways you could maybe say, eh, it's pushing me on with some tough love. Yeah. But arguably this love is extremely tough and abusive and has no redeeming qualities. Yeah. But beast fight, beast fight, beast mode.
00:51:40
Speaker
It comes in hulking and it starts sliping at you with pause and you go to attack it and you don't seem to deal any damage or it hits land, but they don't really go through. They kind of deflect off. Right. It's like a sturdy creature, whatever it is. So you have to essentially wait for your focus meter on the mirror to build up.
00:52:06
Speaker
Get into your slow motion mode and start wailing the shit out of it. Yeah, it's the only way to deal damage. And you'll kind of go back and forth parlaying with it for a little bit. And then once you've crossed that threshold, it's like, you know what's going to be good? No more light. Yeah. And the light just goes out entirely. It's like breathe this fog out that just covers everything. And so now you're waiting in the darkness.
00:52:32
Speaker
kind of like turning around like where he's going to go. And then it just dashes out at you. Yeah. And you essentially have to keep dodging. You can only see him like when he starts to go in and swipe for an attack. Yeah. The game basically makes you do this part of the boss fight blind, essentially, which is just crazy, which sounds way more frustrating than it is. It's
00:52:57
Speaker
after the first playthrough of this i had to talk to dave about this and i was like that is the definitive fight of the game and i still hold that to be true beast fight is legit yeah and it's very intense because you have limited vision and you're at this point where you've
00:53:15
Speaker
You have something more to lose because your initial thing was coming in with Dillion's head, trying to go to the underworld to save his soul. But now you don't even have that. Yeah. She claims that his head at the start of this fight and she's like, no, she's like this. I have this. Like I have my goal. I have my quest. And you need to be the beast and get out to continue it.
00:53:38
Speaker
so she you you ultimately do after this ridiculously high intensity fight where it does all of this damage to you only your uh your strong attacks and your focused attacks can even damage him and the only way uh because he has i think he has like two mechanical abilities one of them is the like
00:54:00
Speaker
darkness everywhere. And the other one causes just you, I believe, to like be a sufferer to this element so you can't like see anything. You have to break through it with focus, which allows you to actually see him again and fight.
00:54:14
Speaker
And if you burn all your focus off and he uses this ability, like, good luck, you're going to have to like, dodge and... Yeah, you have to try and time those parries really well. That's a good way to build your focus back up. But you are at its mercy, essentially. And it is a scary fight. Like, there's some things in this game that are actually...
00:54:35
Speaker
frightening to me to play through and the beast is just one of those it's like a silent skeletal monster and i just uh it's uncomfortable i don't like it i've already used the word uncomfortable like three times i think for different things but we've used a lot of phrases multiple times that's part of who we are i'm not worried about that being consistent yeah
00:54:58
Speaker
So after Senua has defeated the beast here at the end, you can progress finally into this hallway where there's a mirror before you. And it's very linear, it's a long hallway and there's a circular kind of like portal at the end. And as you approach the mirror, it enters another cutscene where the depiction, like Senua sees herself in the mirror and she has a conversation back and forth. And this version in the mirror doesn't have all of the wounds
00:55:24
Speaker
It doesn't have the body paint even. Yeah. It's a much younger earlier version of herself. Yeah, I didn't actually realize it was younger, but that's actually interesting. But converses with Senua and says like, hey, you know, like we can we can stick together, you know, like we can we can make it through this. And Senua walks through the mirror, ending up on the other side, looking back at this reflection of her, which remains on the other side.
00:55:54
Speaker
It says, like, no, I need to move forward. Like, I've got to let you go. Like, I've got to get Dillion. And the reflection crumbles to dust, basically, on the other side of the mirror, signifying, send you a moving past this reliance kind of on the voices in her head for
Resolution and Acceptance
00:56:15
Speaker
this.
00:56:15
Speaker
And she walks through, continues into this portal that's illuminated with all of the runes you've encountered from the stories from Druth. And then enters the final arena of the game. And the conclusion. So this brings us to the final combat with Hela.
00:56:38
Speaker
We walk into this huge open area. There's a couple of platforms connected by bridges. It's outside. There's heavy thunderstorms. There's shards of glass floating everywhere. And there's Hela in the distance towering over. And as you scream at her and charge forward,
00:57:00
Speaker
She kind of leans forward and screams at you, shattering the bridge that you're about to cross, knocking you back and keeping you on this platform. You get covered in the corruption too. The darkness is spreading even further and you start having to fight these Northmen again that she keeps summoning.
00:57:21
Speaker
And you fight a good, now typically when you have these comats, you fight maybe earlier in the game, it starts with like three, and then it keeps scaling up. And at this point, you have to fight through, it seems like 30 enemies. Yeah, it's non-stop combat. But you also have this upgraded sword, a Graham, and using your focus and your charge attacks, you go through them much quicker.
00:57:48
Speaker
Cause typically if you're fighting an enemy early on in the game, you're hacking at them with light and heavy attacks, maybe like seven to 10 times. Yeah. Maybe you have to get through the guard. Maybe you have to parry, but you are just wailing. Yeah. You're wailing hard. You're at, nothing will stop you at this point. Yeah. Right. You're pushing forward through these guys.
00:58:07
Speaker
So you defeat 30 enemies or so, and you're like, bitch, I'm coming for you. Yep, you're next. You again charge forward and you have the shadow and the voices again, trying to deter you, trying to tell you where you failed and went wrong. And there's still a chance to go back and your efforts are fruitless. But once again, as you get closer to Hela,
00:58:33
Speaker
She screams and knocks you back, destroys the next bridge. Right. And now you're refighting shadow versions of Sert from the beginning of the game, Val Ravn, more Northman shadow warriors, and even a copy of the beast himself. Yeah. Once again, you triumph and you charge forward. You're now on the same platform with Hela. You've like rebuilt the bridge just through sheer force of will, right? Running through it.
00:59:02
Speaker
Yeah. As you conquer and progress forward, you get to, like you said, refund the bridge. Yeah. And at this point you're on the platform with Hela and a couple of moments ago, she was this grandiose 30 feet tall thing. And now she's just the size of you. Right. So as you're progressing forward.
00:59:26
Speaker
It's, I mean, the whole fucking game is symbolic, but to me, um, the reason they do this is because you are facing your fear of hella, who you avoided before and was towering over you and domineering. But after you look, you're like, this isn't such a big thing. Right. I'm facing my ears. You're humanizing it to a degree. You're on the same level. Yeah.
00:59:53
Speaker
But as you're here, you cannot damage Hela. She keeps summoning all of these shadow Northmen warriors, and you fight through 30, 40, 50... When I first played through this, it took me... It was about 30 minutes. I think it actually was 30 minutes of me just hacking through, guys. I'm like, when is this...
01:00:18
Speaker
gonna end, this feels futile. Right. There's voices right talking while you're going through this. And they're saying you need to give up, you need to let Dillian go. It's like you've fought long enough, you've been through too much, you need to give up. I'm like, yeah, right voices.
01:00:37
Speaker
And as we've said, the voices have always been very jeering throughout most of the game, but they've also provided some insight. So if they scream behind you or focus, that's usually your cue to dodge or use the mirror. Right. And at this point, you still think that they are jeering. So you ignore them, right? And you continue to ignore them. You're going to keep pushing on. You're not going to give up. You've made it this far doesn't give up. What are you talking about? But at a point.
01:01:04
Speaker
you realize, oh, I actually do need to lose here. You need to give up. You cannot actually defeat everyone, because it keeps spawning in. It is literally impossible. And this is the point where it bothered me, because I am not a huge fan of giving up in a situation where I am essentially in a fighting game. And then at this point, for this moment in time, it is a fighting game.
01:01:29
Speaker
And I'm like, why would I give up? I'm destroying these guys. My KDA is amazing. Like, I don't need to give up. If there's an achievement for not giving up, I'm going to get that. Do the fight for one hour. I'm there, man. Let's go. Yeah. No, it's like, nah, I'm committed at this point. We're in there. We're emotionally invested. We're going to keep fighting. I know the mechanics. I can fight. I know how to dodge. My health will slowly come back for the damage I have taken. We got this. No worries.
01:01:59
Speaker
But, but, but you eventually let go. Um, and then you have the cut scene of, it's just Senua talking to Hela and saying, basically like I made this far, like, let me do anything. I will give you my soul. I will give you my life. Just please bring him back.
01:02:26
Speaker
Yeah. And Hela is, as she always has been, completely quiet, just watches Senua. I thought you stole that character. Yeah. Very constant. And Senua starts to, you know, break down. She's like,
01:02:43
Speaker
hey if this if you can't deliver him back to me if the darkness isn't real if what i've fought all of this way to get here is not real that means i can't save dillian and like the reality of this just kind of washes over and she says finally if i can't save him and you can't help me then you need to kill me
01:03:08
Speaker
Because I've done it like I've done it all there's nothing more for me to face I'm at the end of this I've gone through it all and so Hela does pick up the sword and stabs you with it. Yeah, like lifts you up by your neck just stabs you right through the through the chest and Yeah, then you die And then there's some dialogue and the hella picks up the head and
01:03:38
Speaker
and walks away. Yeah, it's interesting the dialogue here, because without getting too much into it, the game uses recorded, mocapped, real actors, obviously, as all games do. But then they have these more realistic kind of video almost renders of these actors, and they'll superimpose them in different places here. So this final one is heard dead on the ground.
01:04:05
Speaker
And the screen is half her and then on the opposite side of the ground half dillion almost like a Reflection of blood right as dealing like you said and they kind of just like laying on their arm against each other through the reflection as dillion talks to her and You know comforts her and everything But yeah, like you said hello moving forward
01:04:31
Speaker
So Hela then takes Dillion's head and approaches the ledge at the end of Helheim and drops it off the ledge into the water and the camera pans back up and you see that it's Senua who's delivered the head to the end and she apologizes to Dillion and lets him go.
01:04:54
Speaker
And she's finally come to terms with what her darkness is and that she's actually dealing with Dillion's death. And that it's not her fault, but it's also not something that she can undo. Right. And that's that's the culmination of the game. That's her letting them go.
01:05:16
Speaker
Now, I do like this game, and I think we opened with this, right? And there's a lot of things I really enjoy. There's a couple things still at the end that I'm less a fan of. And I think that I understand why they're there. I'm just still not as much a fan of them. In the final fight, I prefer to have an out or an obvious indicator that you're supposed to give up.
01:05:41
Speaker
the voices didn't do it for me and maybe I was just dense so I was just like it took too long for me to realize hey this game wants me to stop fighting and it's not that hard so I can keep fighting for as long as I need to yeah I definitely got that feeling as well to a degree because like I said I sunk like a half hour into just whaling on dudes but
01:06:07
Speaker
Like we said at the beginning of the episode, you want to be in Senua's shoes. You want to play as the character. You want to feel her pain and you want to live her struggles. So I think it's good that they do this and that you feel this point of when will this end, right?
01:06:27
Speaker
That's probably a good way to think about it. If you come at it with that mindset and you're not thinking about it in gamey terms, then it makes a lot more sense. And there's some things like that in the game where they're entirely justifiable by the fact that this is about sinuous psychosis, but I'm not as much a fan of how they play out from just a gameplay perspective.
01:06:54
Speaker
So there is that there is the voices who are essential like they are one of the core parts of this game and it would be like remiss to remove them right but there are points where
01:07:10
Speaker
you're trying to figure something out or you see the solution to a puzzle and you could have that aha moment and at the same time as you're kind of like executing the solution the voices are like she needs to climb the ladder oh she climbed the ladder we're good you know or something like that and you don't necessarily always need that affirmation from a gameplay perspective even if it makes sense in universe
01:07:32
Speaker
I think that was the dichotomy for me is like as a gamer sitting here with headphones when is it gonna be obnoxious for somebody to tell me the solution right before I see it or It's the the Navi. Yeah, basically. Yeah. Hey listen People don't like to be reminded of something that is painfully obvious like oh the door says push right? I know I get it I
01:07:56
Speaker
On the other hand, the, uh, still on the voices, the times where they degrade you kind of also started to get to me. I'm just like, I get, I get it guys. Like I'm, I'm doing fine. Like we're getting through this. It's going to be fine. And that part I can't actually hold against the game as much because that is, and that's across the boundary for me. I understand that this is against Senua. Um, but it still bothered me, but I don't hold it against the game.
01:08:25
Speaker
I would say that both of your gripes, for me, fall under the... If you watch a B-rated movie and you're like, this movie is really bad, that's the point. I feel like all the design decisions they made were for the sake of the game and the story that they're telling.
01:08:43
Speaker
So while they might be a little frustrated mechanically, for somebody who plays a lot of games like we do, there is a point to it. Whether that is enjoyable as a player or not, it depends. But I stand by their design decision personally.
01:09:00
Speaker
yeah i think that's i think that's entirely justified and fair and i i concede that that is way better than super obnoxious mechanic with no justification right like at least here there's an in-universe justification for what's going on
01:09:15
Speaker
It's just still moment to moment going through the game. Sometimes of like, ah, you know, I wish the pace was like a little bit faster. I wish the voices were a little bit less obnoxious. But all of that is the vision they were trying to convey. And I respect Team Ninja for
01:09:32
Speaker
Following that even if you had to make a couple concessions I almost definitely bet some like I almost definitely guarantee that someone came up to them and was like hey, we have a seven-minute introduction and One guy's like isn't that a little long? Yeah, I know it's like should we like should we put ducks ducks in your a bow? She can shoot ducks while we wait for the exposition to end and then they fired the guy and it was bright It was the right call. Sorry guy
01:10:02
Speaker
Do you have any other critiques of the game before I go on my rant of good things? So one more was the final ending. So we said that the camera pans back up and it's Senua and it's true.
01:10:18
Speaker
And if it was only that, I would have been entirely satisfied with it. This is a gripe I had first playthrough as well, but they mentioned like, Oh, we'll see you in the next story or something like that. They basically set up a sequel essentially, or leave the door open for it, or at least say that her story will continue. And then you see Hella's body.
01:10:39
Speaker
on the ground where Senua had died. And it's clearly hella, it's woman sized, but it has all of the supernatural design of hella. Now here's the issue.
01:10:52
Speaker
This whole game is set up to be the psychosis in Senua's head. There's very few things in the game that actually happen that are real, other than like her burning herself with the sword like midway through to like cauterize a wound. Yeah, by the way, that happened. That happened.
01:11:13
Speaker
the problem I had with the end and I understand that this could just be them leaving open that her psychosis is ongoing and she's just come to terms with it but the fact that they left the body there is like
01:11:27
Speaker
Oh, was any part of this real? And it leaves the question open, is the universe our physical universe? Where, you know, magic don't exist, doesn't exist, hella doesn't exist as far as I know. And this is just a woman, you know, fighting her demons in her mind. Or was there a little bit more? And that's kind of like the cliffhanger for the end.
01:11:53
Speaker
I think it's one of those left open to interpretation, but I, again, will take the side of the developers as far as your one theory was saying basically that she came to term with her demons. Um, I think that is the case. And I think Hella's body just being there was like, I realize I have some issues, but I conquered them.
01:12:20
Speaker
Yeah, and so like there's still remnants of that that exist But that's why a hell is bodies there. I would say yeah, I mean I would also say I think they didn't really leave it up to a sequel as much as Senua is gonna move on through this right like a big thing for Depression and other things is you you always feel like there's no hope and
01:12:49
Speaker
that it's pointless, it's just nothing, it's meaningless. You're experiencing this now, you don't have the concept of happiness tomorrow, right? This is your life. So I think at the end they are preaching hope for Senua and other people with similar conditions.
01:13:09
Speaker
Again, it's up to interpretation, but that's my take.
Reflection on Mental Health and Game Impact
01:13:13
Speaker
And I agree. And when I came into this for the second playthrough, I had all of these reservations from the first playthrough, these gameplay reservations. I know there's these things about the gameplay I don't like. I dislike that you have to stand near the story stones to hear the whole story without moving forward. I understand for gameplay reasons why it's necessary.
01:13:35
Speaker
but I had all of these reservations and I after completing the game went back and I looked at the trailers on Steam because I was like I wanted to address how I thought the game was portrayed and I had a feeling that it was portrayed as a
01:13:52
Speaker
like a hybrid combat game, which it definitely isn't. The combat is the, while a lot of effort was put into it, probably not the most important takeaway from Senua at all. If you're playing it for the combat, there's other combat games to play that are going to give you a lot more combat and a lot less walking around. Undertale. Yeah, combat is traditionally the realm of Undertale.
01:14:16
Speaker
But here's the thing, I got to the end, I was looking at these trailers and I realized they all were mostly the cutscenes from the game. It's Senua going through something and interacting with something, falling into despair, all of this. It was portrayed accurately to what the game actually was, even if the term Hellblade makes it seem way more action-oriented than it is.
01:14:37
Speaker
There was a trailer that wasn't around when I first played it and it's like four minutes long. And the only thing it is, is the developers posting stories and snippets, snippets of people who have mental illness and then played the game. And.
01:15:00
Speaker
They're just messages of like, no one else, like, like understands what this is like, like the isolation that you feel. And one of them was like, uh, I believe a boyfriend of someone who had, um, some form of psychosis and was like, I had to immediately run in and apologize for all the stuff that's going on, like for not understanding, right? For not being there when you need to. And that's.
01:15:26
Speaker
I was just like dang it game. How do I criticize this I want I want to like edge in here like yeah you don't get a pass just because you're about mental illness, and then they show that they actually care. And everything they did, like I said, is for the sake of the story in the game, but they did have.
01:15:46
Speaker
Advisors on this this wasn't a haphazard. What was that Netflix thing 13 reasons? Yeah, it's like a whole shit storm in and of itself Yeah, but they really did look into this and they did take It became a passion for sure and it shows Do you have any other critiques can I start the
01:16:07
Speaker
Yeah, we're on the tasty bits the the final the the final thing I had was I came into this for the second playthrough and I was more of a critic and I think that by the end of it they they they convinced me of their intent and It's a good game Three out of ten. All right. Thanks Jake. Um, any who
01:16:32
Speaker
I want to just sing the game's praises in general. I really love the story. Obviously we can't go into the full detail as we don't have enough time to go through the entirety of the game. I'd say check it out for yourself. We're over one eighth though. Over one eighth of... Oh yeah, the duration of the game. Yeah, this has been one of our longer episodes for sure. But the design, the visuals,
01:16:58
Speaker
Fucking amazing. What they do with lighting and specific shots. It's great. Also, Jake made a brief mention earlier to some of the facial mapping that they'll do for the characters. Senua's face mapping and the expressions you see throughout the game and her design is truly incredible because it conveys so much emotion.
01:17:24
Speaker
that you wouldn't see in like any other character in any other game. Because usually a way you can convey something from a character is their dialogue and their body movement, right? Obviously facial expression, but they really honed in on facial expression for this.
01:17:42
Speaker
Best part about that, the actual actor for Senua, the model after, that was the video producer for Team Ninja. They were testing the technology and they were like, she's really good at this. Yeah. It's good they found somebody in the house, probably a little bit cheaper. You're going to pay me more, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. But I do think the entire project turned out
01:18:08
Speaker
What's an adjective I haven't used yet? Well, the tits. It turned out the tits. But there's none of that. Highly recommend 10 out of 10. This game actually even encouraged me to cosplay as Senua. Right. At a convention. Yeah.
01:18:27
Speaker
Thank you for sticking around for one of our longer podcasts. If you have questions, comments, suggestions for any games that you'd like us to discuss in the future, feel free to drop those at our Gmail at soapstonepodcast at gmail.com, and we will be happy to hear them.
01:18:45
Speaker
I also want to extend my thanks to our three or four confirmed listeners. Thank you for reaching out and giving us some surprisingly generous feedback and your interest in upcoming episodes and the episodes that have already aired. And we look forward to making more. Have a good night. Have a good night. They say dreams are visions of our memories, thoughts, and fears as seen by our inner eyes.
01:19:14
Speaker
What if each one of us is always dreaming, even when awake, and we only see what our inner eye creates for us? Is this what hell is? A world shaped by Senua's nightmares? Maybe that's why people feared seeing the world through our eyes. Because if you believe that Senua's reality is twisted,
01:19:42
Speaker
You must accept that yours might be too.