If you’re playing Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice in preparation for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2, you will be aware of the game’s ‘rot’ system that erases your progress after an unspecified number of deaths. So just how many times can you die in Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice? Here’s the answer.Â
How Many Deaths Can You Suffer in Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice?
Contrary to what the game indicates, you can die as many times as you need in Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. There is no penalty at all for dying. Yes, the ‘rot’ will make its way up to Senua’s head, but that’s tied more to the story than the number of times you fail. And no matter how frequently you die, the game never erases your save or forces you back to the beginning.
But hang on… didn’t Ninja Theory make a big deal about this? Absolutely. An in-game message warns you that “The Dark Rot will grow each time you fail. If the Rot reaches Senua’s Head your quest is over and all progress will be lost”.
It caused a big stir at the time of the game’s release. There are plenty of other games that use permadeath, but those tend to be geared towards short runs. Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice was a story-driven adventure threatening to delete your progress. And then, various people put it to the test and it didn’t happen. There was no permadeath mechanic at all. It was all an elaborate bluff. Speaking to GamesBeat, the game’s Creative Director Tameem Antoniades explained:
“We did it because it was in service of the story and the experience. We wouldn’t have done it just to make the game hard, needlessly hard. We felt justified that it added to the experience while knowing that some people wouldn’t like it… I think the consensus is pretty good now. People get it.”
It absolutely works. I replayed the game recently and, even knowing it was a bluff, watching the rot creep up put me on edge. So, there’s actually no limit to the number of times can you die in Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, and the in-game message about permadeath is a fake-out.
