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Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 is - point-blank - one of the best-looking and best-sounding video games you can play. In a special interview with Digital Foundry, Ninja Theory answers all of our questions about the development of the game: the move from Unreal Engine 4 to UE5, exploiting high-end features like Lumen, Nanite and Virtual Shadow Maps, the game's phenomenal audio, chosen frame-rate targets and much, much more. Thanks to the team for agreeing to talk with us about this remarkable game!

00:00 Introduction
00:45 Switching to Unreal Engine 5
03:12 Exploiting Nanite
08:43 Lighting and Lumen
14:55 Visual effects: running water and light flashes
17:54 Game audio and binaural audio
24:54 Wave simulation
26:59 Discrepancies between gameplay demo and final game
29:10 Facial animation
31:15 Photogrammetry
34:00 Time jump sequences
36:19 PC version settings menu
37:18 Console frame-rate target and production scheduling
40:14 Epic’s TSR vs other AA solutions
42:19 Conclusion

 

[clarky]

Now you've gone and done it.

You mad man.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Can't wait to watch this! Amazing showcase from this small studio.

 

[RagnarokIV]

Video is longer than the game.

 

[captainpat]

Praise of hellblade 2 on gaf? Uh-oh

 

[winjer]

The best tech demo of 2024.

 

[Punished Miku]

Will definitely watch this tonight.

 

[Topher]

Visually magnificent. No doubt about that.

 

[Bernardougf]

Nice short tech demo ... its time for games to get this kind of image quality at 60 fps

 

[R3TRO]

It had a few wow moments.

 

[Three]

DF working overtime trying to keep this game relevant.

 

[GHG]

If I watch this I think I'll get the 11/10 experience of the 3rd playthrough.

 

[adamsapple]

Praise of hellblade 2 on gaf? Uh-oh

 

[analog_future]

Still my GOTY

 

[TGO]

Cool, I love DFRetro!

 

[ChiefDada]

7:30: "The biggest bottleneck with Nanite is memory, it's the new polycount"

Alex:

 

[TxKnight7]

The best tech demo of 2024.

What you think of DS?
a movie..a walking sim.. both?
is Detroit a tech demo, until dawn?

 

[balls of snow]

I said it before, it would be good enough If most ps6 gen games look this good while having lots of gameplay systemic shit.

 

[peek]

Forget the graphics, glad this game focused on gameplay first before anything else. Its a thrill to walk.

 

[Darsxx82]

It's always interesting to hear from the developers themselves about their experience. And in this case, for the level achieved and for serving as a reference for the use and improvement of UE5 even more.

 

[saintjules]

Video is longer than the game.

Quantity over quality huh.

 

[bender]

Video is longer than the game.

Almost as interactive too.

 

[mayham2199]

What you think of DS?
a movie..a walking sim.. both?
is Detroit a tech demo, until dawn?

Death Stranding is pretty much the definition of walking sim. I loved the game but that's what it is.

 

[Zathalus]

It’s interesting to see the reaction to the game here when both critic and user reviews (on Steam) are basically in line with the first game.

Death Stranding is pretty much the definition of walking sim. I loved the game but that's what it is.

Got to disagree on that, Death Stranding has way too many gameplay mechanics to be a walking sim.

 

[bender]

Death Stranding is pretty much the definition of walking sim. I loved the game but that's what it is.

Not in the common use of "walking sim" that was popularized with Dear Esther and the games of its' ilk that followed. On it's own, a walking simulation might be a good way to describe Death Stranding though I prefer delivery simulator.

 

[mayham2199]

It’s interesting to see the reaction to the game here when both critic and user reviews (on Steam) are basically in line with the first game.


Got to disagree on that, Death Stranding has way too many gameplay mechanics to be a walking sim.

Sure it has a lot of other mechanics but I spent the vast majority of my time walking\running and managing my route that I'm walking.

Not in the common use of "walking sim" that was popularized with Dear Esther and the games of its' ilk that followed. On it's own, a walking simulation might be a good way to describe Death Stranding though I prefer delivery simulator.

Delivery simulator would also be a good way to describe it.

 

[Fafalada]

What you think of DS?
a movie..a walking sim.. both?
is Detroit a tech demo, until dawn?

Until Dawn is a better game than all of them combined. Even if you add the original Senua's game on top.

Not in the common use of "walking sim" that was popularized with Dear Esther and the games of its' ilk that followed.

True - though 'classical' walking sims are more Visual Novels with FPS camera mode. In fact for many of them there's so little walking left the monicker feels pretty undeserved.

 

[Rocco Schiavone]

 

[shamoomoo]

What you think of DS?
a movie..a walking sim.. both?
is Detroit a tech demo, until dawn?

It's a package delivery game or Paperboy in a different context.

 

[Fess]

Interesting video! Almost makes me want to do another playthrough. Almost!

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Damn, a true masterpiece right there. Xbox is winning, guys.

 

[hemo memo]

The game is gorgeous. The gameplay is not as bad as people on here make it out to be. Puzzles are cool. The sword fights require some skill and you can fail so it’s not Press Button for Awesome. Would I have paid full price? No. Would I’ve played it if it wasn’t on Gamepass? No. Is it worth the 1 month subscription to Gamepass to play it? Absolutely.

 

[SlimySnake]

Memory being a bottleneck for nanite is not something i saw coming especially after DF confirmed that it was only a couple of hundred megabytes in the matrix demo. straight from epic. played on pc and i dont remember the vram usage going up above 6gb on my 3080 so its possible they just ported over the xbox version to pc. software lumen and all.

still a gorgeous looking game. i dont care if its one of the worst games ive ever played, it is truly a visual tour de force and incredibly achievement in graphics rendering. it literally looked like a movie at times and those nanite assets just looked otherworldly.

 

[Murder187]

I really enjoyed this game the fighting was nothing short of amazing and very realistic graphics best on consoles by far

 

[diffusionx]

What you think of DS?
a movie..a walking sim.. both?
is Detroit a tech demo, until dawn?

Engadget and Collider are wrong about both of those

 

[adamsapple]

Interesting to note that the game was running on UE4 as late as the 2021 showcase trailer.

 

[Punished Miku]

Super cool interview. Fun to see some of the team excited to talk about their game. Very technical discussion mostly aimed at game devs honestly.

Super cool to see them hone in on specific scenes that clearly made a huge impression on DF. Incredible to hear how specific they got in syncing the flame lighting to the music in that chapter 2 fight. Masterpiece.

Crazy. They did drone photogrammetry of Iceland for the base.

 

[nemiroff]

I love this stuff, great video.

 

[Hollowpoint5557]

My god, the cave level left my jaw on the floor. The atmosphere, the sound, and the horror elements all came together to make something that felt really special. I wish the whole game was that good.

 

[Punished Miku]

My god, the cave level left my jaw on the floor. The atmosphere, the sound, and the horror elements all came together to make something that felt really special. I wish the whole game was that good.

Thats my favorite level as well.

 

[Fess]

My god, the cave level left my jaw on the floor. The atmosphere, the sound, and the horror elements all came together to make something that felt really special. I wish the whole game was that good.

Yeah same here that was the best area in the game, the fights were pure adrenaline rushs, pushed up the score to a 9 for me.

 

[Heisenberg007]

Still my GOTY

My man, you really need to play more games, if this passes as your GOTY.

 

[UltimaKilo]

The game was an incredible feat, at times looking as if you’re playing a movie. Yes, the gameplay was repetitive and the game is not worth the full-price. However, definitely worth a play-through if you’re a fan of games and want to see the best looking game of all time.

I’m excited about the new project they’re working on.

 

[peek]

The game was an incredible feat, at times looking as if you’re playing a movie. Yes, the gameplay was repetitive and the game is not worth the full-price. However, definitely worth a play-through if you’re a fan of games and want to see the best looking game of all time.

I’m excited about the new project they’re working on.

Would you recommend a youtube watch at least? Seems like it might be worth it, dunno tho.

 

[SimTourist]

 

[adamsapple]

My god, the cave level left my jaw on the floor. The atmosphere, the sound, and the horror elements all came together to make something that felt really special. I wish the whole game was that good.

They talk about matching the audio cues with the on-screen action in the video, that made the Ingunn boss segment my favorite part of the game.

 

[kikkis]

I watched most of that. Apart from nanite requiring lot of memory there wasn't much of interesting stuff

 

[DenchDeckard]

I really don't get how people day this game has 0 game play.

The sword fights always get my heart pumping. Couple that with the presentation of graphics and audio and I'm pure adrenalin in those fights and atmosphere.

Different strokes I guess.

 

[Sintoid]

It's time we accept that so much committment to graphics drains resources to game develpment

 

[UltimaKilo]

Would you recommend a youtube watch at least? Seems like it might be worth it, dunno tho.

I’m not sure how it would look, but check it out. I played it on a Series S @ 1440p and was still blown away.