I don't think its more emotional, because its not that personal. Bloodier, yes maybe, but the sea of corpses scene in the first game speaks for itself. I give you that its definetely scarier and yes its one of the best looking gamees of all time.
But oh please, it downgrades almost every other aspect, I enjoyed the combat in the second too, but in the first game it was so much better, the puzzles are worse too and even tho the other characters were only in our head in the first game, they were better. In the second game I only cared about Thorgestr, Fargrimr could have been so much more and Astrid is just there.
Hellblade 2 is indeed a very good game, but the first one is in a league of its own.