This game might be one of those that was announced too early. (Don’t worry, Bethesda has Starfield, or especially The Elder Scrolls VI!)

During Microsoft‘s E3 program, Ninja Theory‘s game was not mentioned, even though the team is also part of Xbox Game Studios. In a developer diary, Tameem Antoniades, Ninja Theory’s creative director, revealed that they had a good reason why they skipped E3. The reasoning is… surprising.

„I want to give you an update on the work so far for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II. What we’re doing right now is building a good chunky slice of the game, before we move into full production to build out the rest. Hellblade was very special for us, and we didn’t want to do a straight sequel, we wanted to do something extra special, and so we’re making our lives as difficult as possible in that pursuit.

The game is set in 9th century Iceland, so we’ve been sending our art and audio teams out there, doing photography, photogrammetry, and combining it with satellite data to recreate large swaths of the landscape. On the character front, we’re making real costumes, scanning them in.

We’re collaborating with Epic Games to bring you next-generation digital characters. On the combat front we want it to be extra real and brutal, and so Melina, our main actress, has been training for two years, and all of our animators have undergone combat training,” Antoniades said. What has Epic Games to do with Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II? Well, the game happens to use Unreal Engine 5! And that would be something Epic has created…

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II has no launch window yet, and a 2021 release feels unlikely. It’s in development for Xbox Series and PC.

Source: WCCFTech