MALIK PRINCE: Games in this podcast range from E to M.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
MALIK PRINCE: We are here to talk all things Senua’s Saga– Hellblade II
And I have two amazing people who worked on the game
here to help me through this because they are the real stars.
I have Lara Durham and Dan Attwell,
who are going to talk about the game, talk about what we
experienced here in Iceland, and actually just be the experts.
How are you all doing today, by the way?
Good.
Yeah, really good.
MALIK PRINCE: We have just endured
two days of extremely long treks across Iceland
and it has been amazing.
And I got to start with you, Lara.
I think that this has been an amazing journey.
And so I’m curious, what is your role here at Ninja Theory?
So I was the scriptwriter for Senua’s Saga–
Hellblade II, and I also did directed the performance
capture.
We have a lot of questions posed to you
because this game is like such a narrative experience
that we’re going to come to you about a lot of that stuff.
Well, yes, but you can come to Dan as well.
MALIK PRINCE: OK.
[LAUGHS]
Because everybody on the team is
involved in telling that story, so we all know.
Yeah, you’re in there.
Well, speaking of you, Dan, what’s
your role here at Ninja Theory?
DAN ATTWELL: So I’m Environment Art Director.
I’m also one of the creative direction team as well.
MALIK PRINCE: Awesome.
And it’s very obvious why you chose Iceland,
and we’ll get into that in just a little bit.
But Lara, can you set it up?
For folks who may be jumping into this game
for the first time and maybe haven’t played the first one,
can you explain a little bit about Senua’s journey
in the first game and where that leads us in the sequel?
ANNOUNCER: Yes, of course.
So Senua is a Pictish warrior from Orkney,
and she sees and hears the world differently from other people.
Her father made that feel like a curse,
so she retreated from the world.
But she met a young man who not only opened
her heart to the world, but also taught her how to be a warrior.
And when he is killed in a rage by Viking slavers,
she sets out to free his soul from hell.
And that’s her experience in the first game.
She’s very traumatized and buffeted by her experiences.
By the time we come to the beginning of the second game,
she’s found a kind of peace with her experiences.
She’s found some agency.
So when the Vikings come back to her village,
she makes a promise to Dillion that nobody else will
suffer like he did and she will stop the slave trade
at its source.
And that promise is what leads her to Iceland.
Oh, that is so badass, if I can say that.
From your perspective, that journey you mentioned,
the words you use were like “by the time we get to the second
game.”
How important is it to have that character arc and that character
development, where you’re building a story?
It’s really important to us that we don’t press
the reset button on Senua.
The events of the first game changed her,
and that has to remain true.
That has to stay true.
For her character to be convincing and authentic
and feel real, she has to change.
She has to grow.
So in the second game–
the first game was very insular.
It was a very personal journey for her.
In this second game, we’re taking her out into the world
and she’ll meet other people and be changed by them
and change them, and it is really a continuation
of that journey for her.
I love that, and we’re excited to see how she tackles it.
Now, Dan, we are in Iceland and a lot of what you’ve mentioned–
and we’ve been here with creators
and we’ve been talking to creators.
And Dan, I think you set up the reason
we’re here in Iceland so well.
The first game wasn’t necessarily in a real location
and now we are.
What are some of the benefits that affords you
and some of the things you have to consider?
DAN ATTWELL: Yeah, so basing on real locations
and capturing those real locations
kind of offers us the opportunity
to increase immersion.
Because we’re using real world reference and things
like that, real world locations, it
means that you kind of don’t question
what you see on other screens.
So there’s a groundedness or a believability
to it, which is fitting perfectly
with how Senua was interacting, and now in this game,
compared to the first one.
Yeah.
We were actually talking the first night
at dinner about how exactly what you said
is true of so many games, even some of the biggest
games in the world.
If you think GTA V, which is not necessarily
Los Angeles, but the reason why I think
it resonated with so many people is because it
is a version of Los Angeles.
And I think it’s interesting, and we’ll
get into it as we go into each location, some of the liberties
that you had to take with each location,
but also just how true to each location and the elements
that you kept from each location as we went through.
So on the first day, we went to Djúpalón,
and that was an experience.
Everyone knows who watches this podcast knows I’m a city boy.
I grew up in New York City.
So that is the furthest thing from New York City.
So when I was there, we got there.
It was kind of overcast.
And I was like, oh, I hope it starts raining.
Because I feel like this game, it shines in the rain.
I mean, we can talk about how beautiful the game is, just
generally speaking, but I think in the rain and everything.
But yeah, that location, can you tell us
a little bit, Lara, about the benefits of going there?
LARA DERHAM: We have shown that location before as part
of a gameplay trailer we released,
which shows Senua’s encounter with the sea giant.
MALIK PRINCE: Yes.
LARA DERHAM: So we wanted to take everyone there,
just to show how we’ve created recreated that location in game.
It’s a hugely important moment for Senua.
She can’t give too much away in spoilers.
MALIK PRINCE: Of course.
Of course.
LARA DERHAM: But she meets a character there
who’s really, really important to her.
That location, I think going there really
inspired the creation of the sea giant and that encounter.
Because when you go there and it’s such a stark landscape.
There’s all these huge rocks crouched there, like giants.
MALIK PRINCE: 100%.
LARA DERHAM: And the sea is such a presence.
It seemed really fitting to create an encounter
like in that location.
Yeah, and a few things there.
One, I just remember the reveal of that.
Everyone remembers where they were when
they saw that gameplay trailer.
And I just think there’s so much going
on from the graphical fidelity of that moment
to the urgency of that moment for Senua trying to run away.
Everything was so great.
But I love what you mentioned about the sea
being sort of a presence there, because that is what I felt.
You almost felt every wave crashing
into rock in your chest, and I feel
like that was awesome to see.
Now, from your perspective, Dan, when
you’re going to build that and you go onto this beach
and you see all of these different elements,
from the black rocks to the impressive rock formations
to the sea, what is the first thing that
comes to your mind of how you’re going
to recreate that in the game?
Crikey.
[LAUGHTER]
Well, yeah, basically that.
How are we going to do this?
Well, yeah, in terms of the process–
because we knew we wanted to have
a representation of the location as faithful as possible,
so we used satellite data to get the topology of the land.
And then we eventually used drone-based photogrammetry
on top of that to get a higher resolution.
And then we went in there and we took
scans of all the different rocks and things like that
and kind of recreated them back in the game engine.
Yeah.
So it was a multi-layered thing.
And that location, in general, was one of the first test bits
that we did as well.
MALIK PRINCE: Oh, nice.
DAN ATTWELL: And I think, as well, parts of that story
came out of being there anyway, that inspired
us to do that chunk of the story as well.
Now the cave, though, where the sea creature was
wasn’t there.
No.
Just for any of the locations, but this one specifically,
what were some of the–
you’re making a game, right?
So you have this place that you’re taking inspiration from
and then you have to take it and make a game.
So I’m assuming that cave came into it,
like, how do we make it so that the player walks into it
and finds something?
I mean, if you look at the area that we placed it,
you can kind of imagine how that headland was
connected to some of the sea stacks that are out there.
What we also did, as well, is we took–
there’s a location further up around the peninsula,
where there’s kind of a sea cave there,
and we used that as an inspiration.
We scanned that, as well, and we kind of
transplanted into that area so it kind of feels integrated.
But yeah.
And in terms of how the narrative plays out,
where the key beats are, and things like that,
there’s things that we have to remove.
There’s things that we have to add.
But then in essence, we want to keep the feeling of the location
to be quite faithful, though.
MALIK PRINCE: 100%, and I think you all did a great job just
from that gameplay trailer.
I can’t wait to actually jump in.
But Lara, from the perspective of someone
who obviously is a scriptwriter, but also,
you oversaw the motion capture, we got the chance
to hike some of those hills, and I quickly
realized how out of shape I am.
So that was great.
Thank you for that.
But then one thing that I kept thinking in my head is like,
not only is Senua battling any foes that she may come across,
but it’s really she’s battling the terrain,
and there’s the physical, I guess,
fortitude needed to get over the terrain.
What was it like capturing those kinds of scenes, I guess?
So we tried to be as 1:1 as possible with our motion
capture.
So that means if we have to do a tricky traversal sequence,
then we recreate it on stage and have Molina,
our amazing actress, actually make her way through that
and record that as a sequence, and then
that’s what we use in the game.
So you really have that fidelity of performance
that adds to the immersion.
We have a really, really talented team
of people who make that happen.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, and it was so evident.
As we’re going, we’ve only talked about one location,
but I think one thing that maybe players
have noticed from the trailers and just from the gameplay,
in general, is just the mastery, the level of mastery
that you all have in building these.
The attention to detail is just impressive.
But I want to move on to the second location,
and help me with this name pronunciation.
I am a city boy, remember.
Reykjanes?
Yeah, pretty close.
Pretty close?
OK, cool.
Cool.
I’ll take that.
How would you say it?
So that specific area, Reykjanestá.
MALIK PRINCE: Reykjanestá.
DAN ATTWELL: There you go.
MALIK PRINCE: So I wasn’t that close,
but I appreciate you giving me credit.
That’s where we went on day two.
There’s so much to talk about in that space,
but I think you did a great job of setting up
that that’s Senua’s landing point as she’s coming
to the southern tip of Iceland.
What is the other significance of that location for Senua?
LARA DERHAM: It’s the first time she
encounters this strange island that she’s come to.
She doesn’t know where she’s going.
She doesn’t know what this is.
So she turns up and, well, you’ve seen it.
We had nice sunshine when we were there,
but if you imagine a night thunderstorm
with driving rain and a furious sea,
you can see how imposing and terrifying that would feel.
So it’s really quite a confronting and–
what’s the word I want– like dynamic scene for her
to stumble upon.
MALIK PRINCE: And I think in this game,
players will find a lot of those situations
where you thought Senua had gone through everything she could
possibly go through and then here’s
this new experience for her.
And that’s so cool.
And then, Dan, from your perspective,
when I went to that location, there
were like pops of green on some of the rocks and then the sea
moss.
But that place also had what seemed like the lava rocks that
were more recently placed there because it’s like more active,
volcanic-wise.
As you’re building each location,
what are some of the things that you’re looking at
to build out that spot to give it its own identity,
obviously, outside of the inspiration that’s there?
DAN ATTWELL: Yeah.
Well, I mean, the locations that we’ve picked
are all quite distinct anyway.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah.
DAN ATTWELL: And then we lean into those,
in terms of the lighting and the weather
and things that we put in the first level.
It’s very much representative of Senua’s mental state
at that point and it pushes the narrative
in a certain direction.
So when you’re going through that,
we wanted it to be oppressive.
We wanted to increase the bleakness of it
to really hammer home what–
it’s kind of dawned on her that she didn’t
know where she was going.
She doesn’t know where she is.
It’s just all pretty overwhelming at that point.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah.
It was just stunning.
I feel like I’m running out of adjectives to describe
the scenes in Iceland.
I’m just like, people are going to think I’m a broken record.
But it is just so overwhelmingly beautiful
that you just can’t help but be awestruck.
Our next stop was Krysuvik.
And Lara, you told a great story.
And I think one of the things that I mentioned
at the very beginning of this entire experience
was the decision to go to Iceland seemed multifaceted.
And it is the beautiful location,
but it’s also it’s lore.
And she told a great lore story about Krysuvik,
if you don’t mind sharing with the audience.
No, I can.
So the name Krysuvik comes from, it means “Kyrsa’s Bay.”
MALIK PRINCE: I see.
LARA DERHAM: Krysa was supposedly
a witch who lived there.
And her sister, in some versions of the story, who was called–
I might pronounce this wrong.
I’ve only seen it written down–
Herdis.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah.
LARA DERHAM: She lived nearby in what is now Herdisarvik.
And they had a little dispute over where
the boundary between their two settlements was,
and each of the settlements had very good fishing spots.
So one day they met.
And they’re still angry with each other because
of this boundary dispute and they started trading insults,
and those insults turned into curses.
So Krysa would say I will curse your fishing grounds so
that all your trouts turn into fir trout
and grow fir and become inedible.
And Herdis would say, I curse your fishing spot so that
all your trouts into anglerfish.
And they got angrier and angrier with each other
until the rage was so overwhelming that they exploded.
And they also took out a shepherd
just haplessly wandering by.
Somewhere around there– I haven’t
been able to find it– but somewhere around there,
there are three piles of stones that represent.
I found them.
No, I didn’t.
[LAUGHTER]
So when you hear those stories, what
do you pull from that to apply to Senua’s Saga?
LARA DERHAM: We’ve tried with every location
to ground what we’re doing with it in some kind of connection
back to the folklore and back to the land.
Maybe in an abstract way.
It may be in a specific way.
But we always wanted it to have that kind of link to the land.
So we took that figure of Krysa and we
took feminine, monstrous energy from that,
and then we used that to create the settlement of Freyslake.
Frey comes from Freya, the goddess, feminine goddess
of Norse mythology.
And then the [NON-ENGLISH] refers to the hot springs that
are in that area.
And so the kind of bubbling fury of the hot springs,
the rage of the witches, and the feminine energy
becomes very slick.
So that was how we kind of came up with the name.
And again, not to give too much away, but there
are other links to the narrative.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, 100%.
And then, Dan, there were multiple things
that I noticed about that place.
The smell was one.
Very sulfuric, which is fine.
It was great, you know, the steam coming from that place.
When you’re building a game, especially from an environment
perspective, do you see places like that
that are so far different than any other place
as moments to be like, OK, I’m going
to take a little bit of creative freedom?
or do you just go straight forward
and say, this place is so vastly different from some
of the other places that we visited that we want to stay
true to the essence of it?
DAN ATTWELL: A bit of both, really.
I mean, yeah, because we had to take some artistic liberties
in the layout of that anyway, because sticking a settlement
right on top of it, it’s a bit of a weird place
to put a settlement.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, a little bit.
Yeah.
DAN ATTWELL: But it feeds off what you were just saying
about the ideas behind it.
And then, yeah, we’ve accentuated
some of that that was there, with the bubbling mud and things
like that.
We’ve got areas within it that are even more kind of volatile
and things.
We dial some stuff up.
We dial some stuff down.
Yeah.
Will players, if they touch the water, will they like get burned
or something.
Because we were warned by the bus driver,
do not test out the water.
It is hot.
No, you can’t.
OK.
That’s confirmed.
Confirmed.
What are some of the encounters that Senua
was going to have in Krysuvik?
LARA DERHAM: So Krysuvik is where we first
encounter the droga.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah.
LARA DERHAM: Which you will have seen in some of the trailers.
They’re based really strongly on the droga
from the Icelandic sagas, specifically– sorry
to get a bit specific, but there’s
a saga called The Tale of Grettir The Strong.
And in that, Grettir fights a droga.
And the Norse idea of the undead was really, really compelling
to us.
For them, the people that came back from the dead
were not spirits.
Not ethereal, ghostly spirits.
They’re very, very real, very physical, and very violent
and very dangerous.
So in this saga, the shepherd who comes back from the dead,
he roams around attacking livestock, attacking people,
and killing them.
And the ones that he kills, they turn into droga, too.
So there’s an element of contagion
to it, as well as this really violent physical presence.
So that’s what informs our depiction of the droga
and crucifix, where you will first,
and Senua will first, encounter them.
MALIK PRINCE: All right, next up on the trip was Rauðhólar.
I don’t know what I thought of that place in the sense of it
was very clear, the striking red on those rocks.
And actually, Dan, I’ll start with you on this one.
As you know, we’re in 2024.
You see this location.
You’re like, I want to put this in the game.
But you realize the game is set in 10th century Iceland.
And again, going back to the fact
that you have to make a game, what are elements there
that you change and you say, let’s go and–
how do you make it a game?
DAN ATTWELL: Yeah.
Well, number one is the vista that you
can see when you’re there, because obviously, if you look
out beyond it, you can see Reykjavik
and there’s a motorway entrance and stuff like that.
MALIK PRINCE: It wouldn’t work.
DAN ATTWELL: Yeah, exactly.
So then and obviously, again, it’s
about dialing everything up.
So we wanted to expand that out.
We’ve accentuated lots of it.
We’ve changed the elevation.
It’s going to give you a really cool opening shot as you come in
and then give you that sense of being lost within it when
you get to the other end.
Yeah, there’s lots of things that you
have to tweak, definitely, to make it feel
compelling as a gameplay space.
I have loved this.
And like I mentioned, this entire experience in Iceland
has been really eye-opening.
I’m glad that we’ve gotten to take the viewers along
for this because I don’t know that people quite understand
what it takes to make a game.
But not only make a game, but make
a game that takes a location and builds upon it,
takes its influence and lots of points of references
and builds it into the game.
And then to what you work on, which is script and everything,
you also have to consider how a character grows
in that space and their encounters, and all of it’s
been great.
And then Lara, I want to pose this question to you.
Because as you build this game, as I mentioned at the top,
with the mastery that you all have gone through in many
different facets– we haven’t even gotten to how great
the game looks or the sound design, the binaural audio,
all of those elements–
what do you hope players take away from this?
LARA DERHAM: What I really want is
for people who love cinema, who played the first game
and maybe saw something of themselves in her,
I want them to feel that we’ve continued
her journey in a way that makes them feel as immersed and as
invested in Senua as they did from the first game.
But I would also like people who haven’t played the first game
to become invested in Senua’s journey, become
immersed in her world.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, and I think they’ll do just that.
Just again, from the trailers, we’ve
seen that level of dedication to her character,
and I know when we get to play the full thing,
it’s going to be even more evident.
And then, Dan, what do you hope that players take away from what
you’ve built off of Iceland?
It is a beautiful land and you all went to extreme lengths
to make sure it was faithful, but also tweaked it in a way
that it makes sense for a game.
What do you hope players can understand
from this entire video or the process of making that?
DAN ATTWELL: Well, I mean, yeah.
So the sense of journey was really important for us to have
that beginning, middle and end, have that real roller coaster
of emotions and locations.
I’d hope that when people come away from it,
they feel like they’ve kind of gone on a journey,
too, like they’ve experienced it.
It’s still pretty intimate.
The first game was super kind of insular, like we talked about,
and very introspective.
And obviously, this one, she’s following other people
and she’s meeting other people and stuff like that.
But it’s still very, very personal,
and I think that the way that we’ve
tried to represent the locations hopefully amplifies that.
MALIK PRINCE: Yeah.
I think players will definitely recognize and appreciate
that cohesion between source of inspiration and the game,
how it plays with Senua, and all those elements together.
Just from this trip alone, I have a new appreciation for what
it takes to make a game.
I have a new appreciation for what
it takes to build a character that has depth.
And I know that the players everywhere, when they experience
it, they’re going to walk away saying that this is something
special and it’s something that, quite frankly,
if we’re being honest, only a team like Ninja Theory
can build.
You all have done amazing work and I
can’t wait for players to play.
So once again, a reminder that Senua’s Saga–
Hellblade II is out on May 21st on Xbox and PC, and of course,
Day One on Xbox Game Pass.
Thank you so much, Lara and Dan.
Thanks for stopping by.
Actually, thank me for stopping by in Iceland,
I guess we would say.
[LAUGHS]
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[XBOX SOUND]
