Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice Receives Next-Gen Upgrade on Xbox Series X/S

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, the 2017 action-adventure game from developer Ninja Theory, has today been upgraded for Xbox Series X and S consoles in a number of new ways. As expected, the game will now have faster load times, boast better visuals, and also contains ray tracing on the next-gen Xbox. The only downside it seems is that those who may have previously played Hellblade on PlayStation won’t be receiving this same upgrade on PS5.

As a whole, this marks the second upgrade that Hellblade has received over the years. Developer Ninja Theory previously optimized the title for Xbox One X and has now been able to upgrade it even further on Xbox Series X and S. “The Xbox One X Enhanced version of Hellblade was great but moving to Xbox Series X|S lets us really push the boundaries of what we can do with the game,” explained Ninja Theory’s Will Potter in an interview with Xbox. “Our starting point was to put everything on max settings, then make tweaks and additions from there. We were pleasantly surprised how great we could make this game look and run on Xbox Series X|S; the end result is even better than what we had hoped when we set out to make this update.”

When it comes to the specifics of this update, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice most notably adds ray tracing, which makes the environments pop more than ever before. Load times are also now virtually nonexistent, much like many other games that appear on the new Xbox consoles. And best of all, if you already own the game (or at least are subscribed to Game Pass), you’ll be able to download this update for no additional cost.

Overall, this upgrade for the original Hellblade seems to be used as a way to tide fans over who are looking forward to the forthcoming sequel. At this point in time, Ninja Theory hasn’t revealed when Hellblade 2: Senua’s Saga will be arriving, but this new iteration of the original title should give fans a better idea of what the follow-up entry might look like when it does release.

Are you going to look to revisit Hellblade (or perhaps play it for the first time) thanks to this new upgrade? Let me know either down in the comments or over on Twitter at @MooreMan12.