i_ni: On par with your reference is this end-of-2014 article http://www.pcgamer.com/researchers-find-that-female-pc-gamers-outnumber-males/ based on a servey in US. To my surprise females dominate the US RPG market with ~ 54% share! So roughly every second reader or poster of this thread could be a female. (Why is it only you who speak up?)

i_ni: You're the first fellow female gamer I well met :-) Nice to meet you!
So we're in the same train of difficutlies then... Did you give the game a try?

On par with your reference is this end-of-2014 article http://www.pcgamer.com/researchers-find-that-female-pc-gamers-outnumber-males/ based on a servey in US. To my surprise females dominate the US RPG market with ~ 54% share! So roughly every second reader or poster of this thread could be a female. (Why is it only you who speak up?)

AgentBirdnest: Wait... "fellow female gamer" ?
Didn't you just say you find it difficult to roleplay as a female character, because you have difficulties playing as the opposite sex?

A bit of clarification, please? O_o

groze: From my personal experience, women don't generally just throw the word "female" around as liberally as that person did. In fact, a lot of my friends (admittedly those more "active" in feminist matters) downright shun the liberal overuse of the "female" term, something which sounds particularly annoying in gaming/nerd culture ("female gamer", "the next Doctor will be a female", etc).

Of course, this is just speculation on my part. Plus, the person is apparently from Bulgaria, so some cultural and social differences may apply -- not even taking into account their level of "mastery" and understanding of English, for all intents and purposes the language we're using to communicate, in here. For instance, just for illustration purposes, in Portuguese, calling someone a "fêmea" (lit. female) is, very simply put, derogatory, offensive and rude, unless you're using the term in a strictly scientific or biological context (and, even in those cases, it must be used with care). I don't know how Bulgarian works, maybe female is more akin to the French "femme" in usage.

richlind33: Anyone finding this game enjoyable with mouse and keyboard?

CharlesGrey: Strange, that seems like a beefy system. Would be nice to hear back from more people, with a wider range of PC specs. The only reviewer which mentioned the system specs so far ( as far as I've seen ) has a 1080 ti, so it's no miracle that the game ran smoothly for them.

WildHobgoblin: So, since the thread's still trickling along nicely and somebody here might be in the know...
I set combat difficulty to "auto". Does anyone know what exactly that does?
Also, blocking doesn't seem to actually block (it's more like, hurling yourself at the opponent) and seems a fairly risky move since you open yourself up to a counterattack (the thing I'd actually try to avoid by the act of "blocking").
Combat's been a bit sparse so far (which I'm fine with), but it feels like there's not enough time to just fiddle around with the controls to get used to them.

Other than that, what little I've played has been great. I like left-clear'n-close voice. She seems nice and supportive :)

RoseLegion: Haven't really had trouble with performence myself, specs are;

Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4690K CPU @ 3.50GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.5GHz
Memory: 16384MB RAM
GPU: GeForce GTX 970 DDR5

groze: From my personal experience, women don't generally just throw the word "female" around as liberally as that person did. In fact, a lot of my friends (admittedly those more "active" in feminist matters) downright shun the liberal overuse of the "female" term, something which sounds particularly annoying in gaming/nerd culture ("female gamer", "the next Doctor will be a female", etc).

Of course, this is just speculation on my part. Plus, the person is apparently from Bulgaria, so some cultural and social differences may apply -- not even taking into account their level of "mastery" and understanding of English, for all intents and purposes the language we're using to communicate, in here. For instance, just for illustration purposes, in Portuguese, calling someone a "fêmea" (lit. female) is, very simply put, derogatory, offensive and rude, unless you're using the term in a strictly scientific or biological context (and, even in those cases, it must be used with care). I don't know how Bulgarian works, maybe female is more akin to the French "femme" in usage.

i_ni: I used "fellow female gamer" in the most positive way. What is the right way to refer to "a gamer you have a high respect for, belonging to the feminine gender"?

You made me check the definitions of the words (en.wiktionary.org):
a) fellow, https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fellow:
1. (obsolete) A colleague or partner. // this is what I meant
2. (archaic) A companion; a comrade. // similarly
3. A man without good breeding or worth; an ignoble or mean man. // this completely oposite to what I meant. Rather opposite to the rest of the definitions too?
...
4. An equal in power, rank, character, etc. // similarly
b) female, https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/female:
1. Belonging to the sex which typically produces eggs and/or, in mammals, has XX chromosomes. // too scientific
2. Belonging to the feminine gender (social category). // this is what I meant.
...

What is the most correct way to call a human being of feminine gender? (I'm surprised by your comments that female doesn't fit)

No question about the game here - my last activity in the discussion, unless somebody asks me sth.

Edit: typos
Edit: Also, let me state I have no bias towards women. For example, I find Ann Leckie's "Ancillary Justice" the best Sci-fi of the century.

groze: ...

WeaselWords: Opinion: Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice - Disrespects Scotland and all Celts

Don't get me wrong, I was originally intrigued by the premise of this game and was eager to try it but after viewing some of the videos I was dismayed by the portrayal of the protagonist.

I won't be able to play this game due to the protagonists accent. It completely breaks immersion for me, it's not credible.

Senua is a member of a Celtic tribe from northern Scotland known as the Picts. This game is set around the time of the Viking raids on the island of Orkney. So why would this Celtic warrior from the north of Scotland sound like a school teacher from the South East of England? Why would she sound like the very English, very posh and very privileged Lara Croft? They took a Pictish warrior and made her sound like bloody Lara Croft.

I have to question the intentions, ethics and motives of this game and developer. They are perfectly happy to exploit Celtic culture and imagery right down to the blue face paint but are unwilling to use an actual Celt to portray the character. They are using a Celtic face but giving it an Anglo-Saxon voice.

For centuries Celtic culture was suppressed, persecuted, dismissed and marginalised in the UK and Ireland. The people of the indigenous Celtic nations of the UK and Ireland have frequently faced discrimination, bigotry and harrassment throughout this period. So for the Pictish protagonist to actually use the accent of the aggressor culture that repressed Celtic culture and nations for the best part of a millenium is particularly offensive. Worse still it uses the dialect/accent of the British establishment, the architects of this repression.

Now this wouldn't have been a problem if they had made the character Anglo-Saxon. At this time in history this is a perfectly viable alternative. They could easily have made the character an Anglo-Saxon from the Kingdom of Northumbria (modern day Northern England) at the time of the Viking attack on Lindisfarne (Holy Island) in 793.

No, they chose to make the character a Celt. If they really wanted the character to speak as an English-person they
should have made them an Northumbrian Anglo-Saxon not a Pict. They think it's appropriate that an 8-10th century Pictish warrior should have a generic, anonymous, middle class, English accent that uses received pronunciation.

This raises a number of questions. Why would an English developer not tell an English story? Why would they appropriate somebody else's culture when their own cultural history would allow them to tell the same story, in the same timeline in the same general vicinity?

Could it possibly be that the term "Anglo-Saxon" has become tainted and conjures up images of racists and white supremacists and reminds people of the term WASP? Are they so ashamed of their own identity and history that they feel the need to steal somebody else's?

Is Celtic culture seen as a more benign, inclusive, sympathetic, socially acceptable culture and therefore more commercially exploitable and lucrative?

I find the game design choices made by the developers highly questionable, distasteful and unethical. Their expedient cultural compromises make me suspect their motives for using Celtic culture. This is no noble enterprise, this is the tawdry exploitation, abuse and misrepresentation of other peoples cultural heritage.

This anglification is not only an insult to Scots but to all people of Celtic heritage/identity everywhere. Not only is it not credible, it's pretty damned offensive. I shouldn't be surprised by any of this given that the developers are from Cambridge, England.

WeaselWords: Opinion: Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice - Disrespects Scotland and all Celts

Don't get me wrong, I was originally intrigued by the premise of this game and was eager to try it but after viewing some of the videos I was dismayed by the portrayal of the protagonist.

I won't be able to play this game due to the protagonists accent. It completely breaks immersion for me, it's not credible.

Senua is a member of a Celtic tribe from northern Scotland known as the Picts. This game is set around the time of the Viking raids on the island of Orkney. So why would this Celtic warrior from the north of Scotland sound like a school teacher from the South East of England? Why would she sound like the very English, very posh and very privileged Lara Croft? They took a Pictish warrior and made her sound like bloody Lara Croft.

Jacob_1994: uuuuhhhh...Its a game about someone who sees demons and talks to a head that she keeps in a sack, and your complaning about historical accuracy? The accents of the picts will be hard to replicate as any accent from that time period would be (language changes over time). As for me the "posh english" is easier for me to understand due to my hearing loss,

WildHobgoblin: (it's already difficult enough as is, and I can only use German subs to the English audio, which is very annoying to me, who prefers an Eng/Eng setup).