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Up-front trigger warnings make me dubious. They often read like attorney-mandated ass coverage instead of any actual effort at sensitivity. I tend to mentally translate them into the most sarcastic, least considerate reading I can imagine. Thus in my brain, the one preceding Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice goes like this:

This game has crazy people, so FYI if you’re a crazy person or if crazy people make you sad. Also check out our website. Because hellbladehelp.info is totally what you’d visit to learn about mental illness.”

I mean come on. As disclaimers go, it’s not even comprehensive. What if Hell makes you sad? Or blades make you sad?

I’ve been playing Ninja Theory’s Heavenly Sword. I like it a lot.

I like it because I think I get what they were trying to do. They didn’t succeed all the time but you can perceive their intent, pulsing just under the gloss veneer of the game itself. Not only do I get what they were trying to do, I respect it, and because of that I’m going to reward them by buying Enslaved – which we learned today has sold a pitiful 460,000 units worldwide.

Not long ago the staff had a Serious Discussion (which lasted 3 minutes and consisted of “why not?”) about whether our First Impressions section should include demos… that is, whether we can state first impressions based on one. It didn’t occur to us to set up some kind of rule about how long the demo should be. After all, size doesn’t matter. What matters is enthusiasm.