Now that Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice has a new-gen port to the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, it's been put to the test across both consoles.
In the video below, tech experts Digital Foundry break down the new port of Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice to the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. The outlet reports that there's three modes now featured in Ninja Theory's game across both platforms: performance, resolution, and enriched mode, each of which has an impact on how Hellblade plays.
Digital Foundry reports that it's really in Hellblade's new performance mode where things differ. While both consoles should theoretically target 1080p in this mode, it's actually the Xbox Series X that slips occasionally below that mark. Additionally, the Series X targets 120FPS in this performance mode, while the Series S aims for 60FPS, but both, unfortunately, dip below that benchmark in more action-packed moments.
- Black Myth: Wukong lead blames the missing Xbox port on Series S specs, months after Microsoft claimed the delay wasn't due to "platform limitations"
- Yes, South of Midnight will still run at 60fps despite its stop motion animation: "you're still in this crafted world without making it, you know, too nauseating"
However, Digital Foundry notes that some foliage in Hellblade is actually reduced in the enriched mode on the Xbox Series S. It's revealed that both Series X and Series S receive ray tracing capabilities through this enriched mode, but because of this, sacrifices have to be made on the weaker of the two consoles, which means cutting back on foliage in some areas, to example.
The new-gen upgrade patch came as a bit of a surprise from Ninja Theory this past week, but it was nonetheless good news. This new update is now available to download for anyone who owns Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice on the Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S, and is basically the perfect excuse to replay an exemplary game while we wait for Hellblade 2: Senua's Saga to eventually arrive.
For a full guide to all the other Xbox-exclusive games coming out in the near future, head over to our upcoming Xbox Series X games guide for more.
