Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice [VR]

I'm giving this game a thumbs up for the stunning portrayal of Senua and the engaging story. If those are aspects that you care about it, you will enjoy their implementation therein. Unfortunately, everything else is this game is quite mediocre.

Gameplay is especially shallow. There is one hidden-object environmental puzzle routine that is repeated. It is easy but tedious and ultimately unnecessary. What a poor choice for the central mechanic of this kind of game! Cut scenes are also way too long and many. That's good for the story, but a bummer for gaming. Is this a movie or a game?

That said, there are a few interesing environmental challenges. At their best, later in the game, they engage directly with the story and character and feel truly cohesive inspired. Terrific! But there aren't a lot of these, and you'll have to slog through a lot of filler.

As for the VR implementation, it's also hit and miss. I love the 3rd person perspective, and at moments it's utterly incredible to see Senua up close as she battes her horrendous internal demons. Also, combat looks amazing! Combat is actually a very minor aspect of the gameplay (missed opportinuty?) but the visual design of the enemies and the animation really shines in VR.

On the serious downside, the choices for how to handle motion are always compromises in VR. And some choices made here are bad. Despite my diligent tweaking, I could not overcome the feeling of nausea I would get after playing the game for more than 30 minutes. It doesn't help that frame rate is really unstabe (I'm on a 2080 Ti with an HTC Vive) and even at the highest settings youi get sub-par visuals. Hello? Where are my shadows? The lack of shadows sure does break immersion. Engine flaws, like the character moving into the landscape, become especially noticeable in VR. All in all, I acknowledge that this game contributes towards making VR better with its innovative 3rd person perspective, but it might be better to experience it without VR.

This has been a rollercoaster of a review, lows and highs! Ultimately I did very enjoy the experience, despite serious problems. Just do some research and be clear as to what you're getting into.