EvaUnit02 on 15/11/2008 at 05:53
I was shocked during Yahtzee's review when he mentioned that the main character had not only a love interest, but also an eccentric stereotyped negro sidekick, with a big mouth.
WTF is up with the American developer? They didn't have to make it like a formulaic Hollywood film.
van HellSing on 15/11/2008 at 07:50
Quote Posted by dethtoll
Especially since a lot of SH fans don't even know what Jacob's Ladder
is.
Oh please. I used to frequent some SH forums, pretty much everyone knew about Jacob's Ladder there.
EvaUnit02 on 15/11/2008 at 07:54
Quote Posted by van HellSing
Oh please. I used to frequent some SH forums, pretty much everyone knew about Jacob's Ladder there.
This. They also all know about Session Nine.
Dario on 15/11/2008 at 13:21
Quote Posted by Gingerbread Man
Why does everyone have to shit on SH4 all the time? :(
Purist/fanboy syndrome, I would assume...
I've been looking into this game (Silent Hill 5, that is), and am a little intrigued by the videos I've seen so far. Might want to play #4 first though (unless someone can recommend starting with another one, on PC). Fortunately, I'm desensitized enough nowadays that I can usually get into things without significant trauma (as in "I can't play this" trauma)... unlike when I first played Thief 2, and had to skip Gervasius' mansion, so that I wouldn't have to deal with the ghosts in the library.
Then again, I thought I was well-prepared for the Cradle when I played T3 (because the zombie ship didn't scare me for beans), but I was wrong. Ten steps into the basement, and I knew it would be rough.
242 on 15/11/2008 at 13:31
Quote Posted by Dario
Might want to play #4 first though
Nononononono.
Quote:
(unless someone can recommend starting with another one, on PC).
Number 2.
june gloom on 15/11/2008 at 13:44
It's not purism that ruined SH4 for me. It's the fact that it's a bad game. The gameplay is mildly irritating, severely so when dealing with ghosts; however, the game takes a turn for the worse when it makes you do the WHOLE THING OVER AGAIN this time with a useless NPC in tow and a Nemesis-like enemy who chases after you with increasingly ridiculous weapons. It's absolutely the most un-fun game in the series.
SH1 isn't on PC (sort of... someone put together a "PC version" with a highly-tweaked PSX emulator, so if you can find that...) so you might as well start with SH2, which is very different in tone from 1 and 3 but no less spectacular.
I think since you have monster-phobia (as evidenced by your comments on the ghosts in the library) you'd best start with 2 anyway. It's much less oughtright terrifying overall. SH1 is just this pervasive horror that is almost cloying; SH3 has the 3rd floor storeroom.
stay out of the fucking storeroom
denisv on 15/11/2008 at 14:15
I've been playing a bit of Homecoming. It has some things I never thought I'd see in a SH game, like NPCs, dialogue trees and combat that requires superhuman reflexes. Did I mention that it's the first SH game with decent fonts?
The PC port is generally well done but it has a few problems like being limited to 30fps, saving only at save points and only having 5 save games.
Graphics are improved and they're much more dynamic, but it doesn't look much better than SH3 or 4. Physics seems to be limited to knocking vases over. Sound is okay.
Consoles finally have enough power to model more than one room at a time. Unfortunately this mean that when you do transition, it takes a while and there's an ugly "loading..." screen that should be taken out the back and shot in the head.
Gameplay is pretty hard especially since the damn save points feel like they're a hundred miles apart and there's no easy difficulty.
242 on 17/11/2008 at 21:26
Quote Posted by Dario
Then again, I thought I was well-prepared for the Cradle when I played T3 (because the zombie ship didn't scare me for beans), but I was wrong. Ten steps into the basement, and I knew it would be rough.
Well, if you thought the Cradle was very scary for you, any of SHs can be trauma. Not only because they're plainly scarier but also they're much more photo realistic. They can inspire literally the animal fear.
june gloom on 17/11/2008 at 22:21
I don't agree on "photorealistic" (I mean come on) but they're definitely a lot scarier for a first-timer. I still can't handle the SH1 soundtrack, which is part of why DrK's Rocksbourg series is so creepy.
That said, the scariest game I've ever played is, and I say it again because it needs to be said, Afraid of Monsters. Hands down. Now that's animal fear.
froghawk on 29/12/2008 at 16:44
This game is exactly what you would expect from an American developer tackling the Silent Hill franchise: it gets all the superficial stuff right, but is missing the psychological core and depth that truly defines Silent Hill.
I played the PC port, which is a complete mess. The graphics aren't particularly next-gen, but it requires a dual core processor thanks to its terrible optimization. It feels like it's still in beta stage - your OS and directx must be fully updated before it will even run, and once you finally go through all of the effort to get the damn thing running, you'll still encounter lots of slowdowns, crashes, and bugs.
Double Helix were clearly trying very hard to please fans of the first three games and (for some reason) the movie. The plot was a contrived, badly paced, incoherent mishmash of plot elements from previous entries in the series which ultimately comes across as a complete mess. Take the plot from SH2, replace 'wife' with 'brother' and add some half-thought out parental issues, then throw in some heavy cult involvement for no apparent reason, and you've got the plot of this game.
The worst part of it all: not ONCE did I feel scared. The visuals are very nice, and Akira Yamaoka was still onboard for the sound design (which is the only reason I gave it a chance), so the atmosphere in the game is tangible, but it barely even manages to come across as creepy in most areas. There is one scene towards the end which is disturbing and unnecessarily violent, but the game lacks actual scares. In fact, most of the first half of the game is downright boring - it feels sparse and half-finished. So many aspects of earlier games are brought back that it almost triggers nostalgia, but it never conjures the true Silent Hill feel.
Also, they didn't bother to make the joke ending unlockable, so I ended up getting the token UFO ending on my first playthrough. (I proceeded to look up the other four endings on youtube, since the game isn't worth replaying).
Every one of the myriad references to the earlier games feels like fan service (i.e., why is pyramid head in the game, and why did they use the design from the movie?). Ultimately, the game feels like it has no soul. It's not fun, it's not scary, and it comes across as a total mess. In short: avoid this game at all costs.
