Towards the end of the 8th century, the first Vikings arrived in the lands of the Picts, more specifically the islands of Orkney, and replaced them as the main population of the land. Doing research to find the right angle for the character, the team realized that despite the Roman Empire being able to conquer nearly all of Europe, they were unable to conquer a group of Celts, known as the Picts, in the northern reaches of Great Britain. Based on what is believed of the way Celtic warriors looked, Senua was given war paints, and braided hair clumped with lime.

Ninja Theory’s sequel to 2017’s Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice does not have a release date.The main inspiration of Senua's character was the Iceni queen Boudica, while her name came from Senuna, a Celtic goddess long lost to historians but re-discovered in 2002, whose name was at first read incorrectly as Senua. Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 is coming to Windows PC and Xbox Series X. That’s what you can see in the video above - which also serves as a fresh, albeit brief, look at Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2, a title we haven’t heard from in a while. Unreal Engine’s MetaHuman technology processes that simple footage to apply detailed facial animations to a 3D model, expressing fear, anger, and more subtle looks without a human needing to finesse it.īut using a more sophisticated performance capture rig, it can also apply highly detailed facial animations in real time to Epic’s MetaHuman models. Melina Juergens, performance capture artist for Ninja Theory, and the actor behind Senua, showed how Unreal 5 can take footage of a performance using little more than an iPhone camera and turn it into usable facial animation.

While the talk was primarily game developer-focused, the takeaway for most people will be “Damn, this looks pretty good!” Epic Games showed off new animation technology during its State of Unreal presentation at this week’s Game Developers Conference, illustrating how developer Ninja Theory is using Unreal Engine 5 to bring Senua to life for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2.

Download hellblade senua's saga