Silent Hill Origins

Developer: Climax Studios
Publisher: Konami
Released (UK): Dec '07
Released (US): Nov '07

May Contain Spoilers:After the brilliance that was Silent Hill 4, I waited for ages for a new Silent Hill game and 2007 brought that moment. However, I was quite disappointed that it was to be for the PSP and not the PS2 or the PS3.
Although the game was released in 2007, the first trailer to be released was in 2006 and that promised the game was coming "This Winter". "This Winter" however turned out to be winter 2007 instead because of deadline problems (always the case).
It was a long wait but the trailers that were released looked really good and Origins was looking like a competitor.

Silent Hill Origins is a prequel to the first Silent Hill game and is based around Travis Grady. Travis is a lorry driver who is driving through Brahms on a delivery which is halted after a girl walks onto the road causing Travis to stop.
Travis stops and despite the fact that the girl runs away, he doesn't carry on with his journey and instead takes a detour to Silent Hill.

He follows the girl to a house that is seen caught on fire, a lady is seen walking away from the place. After hearing a girls scream coming from the house, Travis being the hero he is goes in and saves her. The girl is burnt badly but he gets her out, fainting shortly afterwards.
When he wakes up, he finds himself in the town but the girl isn't there with him. The game is then based on Travis trying to find out what happened to this girl and why the residents of the town (the ones he sees anyway) are so secretive.

Travis (above) is the only new character in this game, the supporting characters being from the original Silent Hill. The characters brought over are:

Alessa Gillespie - Alessa Gillespie is the girl Travis saved from the house but we don't know if she is dead or not. It's what Travis is trying to find out throughout but, as he goes on through the game he comes across her in a live state without any burns at all. She doesn't speak throughout the whole game but tries to lead Travis in helping her.
Dahlia Gillespie - In this game she doesn't give the whole witch like vibe she does in the original. She wears what I would call normal clothing rather than the Wicca-like clothing she wore in the first game. We speak to her three or four times only.
Dr. Kauffman - We see him only three times and he's very arrogant even now. He is very secretive and tells Travis he has no idea which girl he is talking about but expresses his uneasiness of Travis' presence.
Lisa Garland - She's a trainee nurse in this game and is nothing like the nurse in Silent Hill 1. She's flirtatious and is definitely not the innocent girl you meet in the original game. She’s the friendliest character Travis comes accross.

The Monsters of this game are numerous, though some are not very imaginative at all. This game also includes many bosses - all of which are relatively easy to defeat. The monsters include some old favourites as well as some new ones:
The Nurse makes a come back although they have gone under a great deal of revamp. They now look like the nurses from the Silent Hill movie but they seem more stupid because you'll find you can sneak past them with the light off.
The Patient Demon (AKA Straight Jackets) from Silent Hill 2 also makes a comeback but they're faster and chase after you. They have the same spitting attack as before but they give greater damage than before - ignoring them is your best bet. If they get too close, they straddle you and head butt you in the face.
The Carrion monsters (below) are supposed represent the road kill that Travis, as a lorry driver has run over throughout the years. I think they look like plucked Chickens with no heads but that's just me.


The Ariel is a puppet that comes to life but they are very easy to defeat when you use a fire arm. You only come across them when you're in a specific area – the Theatre.
The Caliban is first seen as a boss to one of the levels but becomes a regular enemy after that. They come in various sizes and you'll come across some that block the roads of the town. They're very slow and easy to get past if you don't want to waste your time.
The Two-Back (below) looks like a guy riding another guy like a horse. You only come across this monster in the last area of the game but they're very powerful. What’s more is that they always appear off screen so you can't see them until you've put several bullets in them.
The Remnant is probably the only monster in this game that has any creepiness. They're basically a shadow with some kind of harness. Like the nurses you can get past them without the light on but they can whack you quite hard. They remind me a little of the Mannequins in Silent Hill 2 because they give out a masculine scream when hit.


Then we have the bosses of the game. You come across one of the bosses at the end of each area and then you have the sub-boss and main boss at the very end so there's 6 in total:

The Hospital - Our first area is the Alchemilla Hospital where Travis believes the girl is resting. The hospital is commonplace in Silent Hill games – every game in the series has had a level in a hospital. The boss isn't much of a boss because it's just a Straight-Jacket with no part in the story.
Cedar Grove Sanitarium - We find out that Travis' mother was once committed here and the boss is a monster that represents her. Apparently, people in the mirror would talk to her and asked her to kill little baby Travis. This was to make sure that he wouldn't return and stop the ritual revolving around Alessa. She was stopped though and taken into care where she eventually died.
The Artaud Theatre - This is where we find the Caliban as our boss. Apparently, it's the monster of a Shakespearean play that was once played at the theatre. A note says that the costume was so scary, a little girl ran out screaming. Tony, the actor playing Caliban died from a haemorrhage shortly afterwards - The little girl turned out to be Alessa.
The Lakeside Motel - Two boss fights take place here, the first being the Butcher (below) [There's a huge spoiler here so look away now if you don't want to know]. The Butcher represents a serial killer who would bring women to the motel in order to rape then kill them. This killer was to be known as The Butcher but he didn't look the same in reality. The second ending of the game proves that the Butcher is indeed Travis Grady.


The second boss fight in the Motel is the monster representing Travis' father. After arguing with his wife at the sanitarium, Travis' father killed himself whilst little Travis played in the motels game room.
Then we have the ultimate boss, Samael, the Cult's God. The word God isn't necessarily true as all Silent Hill fans know that the Cult actually worships a Devil and the ‘Paradise’ they seek is actually Hell.

There are several issues with this game that I’m not happy with. One of which is the breakability of the weapons Travis uses. Where you would expect things like TV sets and toasters to break when thrown, even strong weapons like pipes and sledge hammers break. What's the point? It doesn't make the game any better; to me it makes it worse. Is it just me?

The Characters weren’t exactly memorable for me. I didn't feel anything for Travis Grady at all. In Silent Hill 2 and 3, you feel for the main characters - James for losing his wife and Heather for losing her father. I didn't feel any pity for Travis and he's lost both his parents - am I just that insensitive? Maybe, but as I've already said, I felt for James and Heather and I even felt for Walter Sullivan in Silent Hill 4 so I can’t be that bad.
Lisa was a big disappointment. She had no part in the plot at all and it wasn’t necessary at all for her to be in this game. I would say that she’s been put in the game to satisfy all the fan boys out there, but they messed with her character. She was very sweet in the original Silent Hill and you really did feel sorry for her situation and the scene of her death is classed as one of Silent Hill’s greatest.
The Butcher wasn't impressive either - can anybody say "Pyramid Head knock-off"?

The levels aren't up to much either although the Motel can be quite interesting, especially since this is where the Butcher hangs out. There are a lot of peepholes in this area which did spook me out at times. As well as the main levels of the game, Travis will come across other buildings to gain access to other areas. One of these is the Butcher Shop which is the best area of the game - freaky stuff happens in this place. Watch for the Nurse.

The main drawback of this game is the medium it has been developed for. The PSP doesn't have the best sound quality or the best graphics. The shiny screen makes it hard to play on the bus or in the car (as a passenger you understand) which means you have to wait until the sun goes down to play it. The game even makes you aware of this when you turn it on, advising you that the game is best played in the dark and with headphones on.
The game has been released on the PS2 since but the graphics have basically stayed the same.
The cut scenes are appalling for this day in age, PSP or not. However, you have some occasional scenes that are fantastic - why they didn't use the same technique for all the cut scenes, I don't quite understand. The game would be so much better for it if they had. I’ve found two examples of cut scenes from YouTube to demonstrate my point:

Good Cutscene:



Bad Cutscene: (This also shows the terrible acting and lack of chemistry between Travis and Lisa)

The UFO ending returns after being left out of Silent Hill 4. The ending is pretty uneventful but you get a useful weapon out of it. The game has several Accolades to achieve where you will unlock a new item once you’ve achieve it. Accolades include such things as completing the game within a certain time scale, limiting the use of your flashlight, using your fists to attack rather than using weapons etc.
Examples of the items you unlock include new outfits, a novelty light (where the flashlight projects a smiley face, football or Peace image) and armour for your hands.
This is one of the good things about the game because these items can make the game easier for you, making the accolades easier to accomplish.

It’s not the best Silent Hill game, for me, it’s actually the worst of the series but there has been a difference of opinion.
Fans of the series that I’ve come across on forums such as http://boardsus.playstation.com/playstation/board?board.id=horror and www.play-mag.co.uk/forum seem to like this game more than Silent Hill 3 and 4. Not me though – I give it...

6/10

One's I've Never Finished...Part 3

Resident Evil 4

Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom
Released (UK): Nov '05
Released (US): Oct '05

May Contain Spoilers: The critics gave a positive outburst when they reviewed this game. Everyone was giving scores of 10/10 or 100% and even though I hadn't played a Resident Evil game before I thought I'd give it ago because of all this praise of being the best Survival Horror game ever. Silent Hill, another big contender got 84.0% on gamerankings.com where this game was given 95.7%.
I had to see for myself so I bought it, although it had been out for quite a while before I got my copy of it.


What's it about?

Again, I don't know much about the story of this game. I'll explain why later but the story as I know is that the games Protagonist, Leon S. Kennedy has gone to a village is Europe (Probably Spain - the Police jackets say Policia on them and Leon finds Pesetas, Spanish currency before the Euro). This is where the President's daughter, Lesley Graham was last seen after being kidnapped.

It's all I can remember so I went back to Wikipedia and got the plot from there:

"In 2004, the Umbrella Corporation's secretive activities within Raccoon City have become a public affair. Following an investigation conducted by the US government, several Umbrella officials are implicated and prosecuted. The government indefinitely suspends Umbrella's business, causing the company to become bankrupt.

Leon S. Kennedy (right) was recruited by the US government after they learned of his actions in Raccoon City. Leon is sent on a mission to rescue Ashley Graham (the blonde, below), the President's daughter, who has been kidnapped by a mysterious cult. Leon travels to a rural village in Europe, where he encounters a horde of unruly villagers who pledge their lives to Los Iluminados (The Illuminated Ones), the cult that kidnapped Ashley.
During the course of the mission, Leon is reunited with Ada Wong, a woman he met in Resident Evil 2, and Jack Krauser, one of Leon's former comrades from his years of government training, thought to be dead. He also meets Luis Sera, a former Los Illuminados researcher, who aids Leon on his mission, before he is murdered by Osmund Saddler, the leader of the Los Illuminados cult. By examining Sera's notes, Leon discovers that Los Illuminados gained control of their subjects by implanting a mind-controlling parasite known as Las Plagas into their bodies.

After Saddler discovers that Leon has rescued Ashley, he commands his subjects to use any means to recover her. Meanwhile, after defeating the village chief, Bitores Mendez, Leon, and Ashley take refuge inside the castle of the local castellan, Ramon Salazar. Ashley begins to cough blood, realizing that she is probably infected and runs into one of the castles many traps. Leon then battles his way through mazes and minions to find Salazar only to learn that Ashley has been taken to a nearby island research facility. After numerous altercations with Saddler's forces, including a freakishly empowered Krauser, Leon is able to rescue Ashley and defeat Saddler with Ada's assistance. Leon recovers a vial containing a Plagas sample from Saddler's corpse, but Ada forces him to give it to her at gunpoint. She then escapes from the complex in a helicopter, leaving Leon and Ashley to escape via jet-ski."

Taken from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resident_evil_4

The bad guys in this are basically the villagers that follow the Los Illuminados cult. Each carry some weapon of some kind from a shovel/stick to flare's that blow up in your face. You also have the notorious Chainsaw man who occasionally pops up now and again to behead you resulting in an instant "Game Over".
Leon will find himself ganged up on in some cases because the villagers attack in groups of two all the way up to six or even more people. This was one of the most frustrating parts of the game because you can spend ten minutes at a time just shooting these people down.
As the game progresses these people are harder to push down - when shot in the head, tentacle looking things appear from the neck that whip you causing considerable damage

This game also has a limited inventory. Leon carries a case which can only fit so many items in it. This case can be upgraded to larger ones as the game goes on because you will occasionally come across the Seller. A suspicious looking guy I thought was a bad guy to begin with. He has all kinds of items for Leon if the price is right - Leon can exchange Pesetas for these items which include new weaponry and ammo as well as healing items etc.
You will also come across red and blue medallions that hang from high points such as trees and buildings. If you can collect all of these then the Seller will exchange something big for them.



Why I never completed it:

I tried, I really did try and get into this but I just couldn't. It wasn't compelling nor scary in the slightest.
It took a long time for the storyline to even get going, it was just Leon blowing a few people's head off in a Spanish village.
Being a PS2/Gamecube game it doesn't exactly have graphics that blow all previous horror games out of the park. There were no scary bits in it at all the good parts of the game were purely its mechanics E.g. Controls and Accuracy. The game is over the shoulder view so you see Leon at the bottom left side of the screen. When you aim your pistol/shotgun a laser helps you aim your shot although it does shake slightly as if Leon’s hands are shaking. What is annoying though is that your target goes off line when a shot has been made - it adds to the realism but when you have a mob to fight off, it makes things difficult.

The first time I played this, I got through the first chapter (up until you meet the Seller for the first time). At the beginning of the second chapter I arrived at a village where I was mobbed by a gang of people. I shot them down and even more people came so I shot them down too but even more came. This happened on repeat for about 15 minutes - I got fed up and put it away.
However, I later tried again, from the start. I got further this time and actually got to rescue Ashley from so place or another, I wasn't paying much attention. Low and behold, I stopped soon after that...I was bored.

People say Silent Hill is in trouble because of this game which brought new attention to Resident Evil as a series. In my opinion, Silent Hill should have nothing to worry about as far as Survival Horror games are concerned. It looked good and worked well but it WAS NOT A HORROR GAME.
I don't even think Resident Evil is a contender in this genre of games. Forbidden Siren on the other hand...Might just happen.

Why do people get excited by this game?
Am I the only person NOT to like this game?
Silent Hill Vs Resident Evil...Debate

One's I've Never Finished...Part 2

Forbidden Siren

Developer: SCE Japan
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Released (UK): Mar '04
Released (US): Apr '04

I saw this game get a good 9/10 score from the Official Playstation Magazine. I decided to buy it, although it took me some time to find it. It's not well known in the UK unless you are a Survival Horror fan and has only now found itself known after the recent release of Blood Curse on the PS3.
(Note: Because of this reason, I haven't been able to find any good pictures, just various screenshots.)

What's it about?

Forbidden Siren is set in Hanuda Village, Japan where various different characters find themselves. The story is actually very confusing so I've put this excerpt from Wikipedia's article on the game:

"Siren is set in a remote, rural Japanese mountain village named Hanuda, which is characterized as being very traditional and particularly xenophobic. Following a ritual ceremony near midnight, the village teeters wildly between time and space, with an infinite sea of blood-red water in place of the usual surrounding mountains. The crux of the story focuses on the efforts of Hisako Yao, the leader of a strange local religion, to resurrect or re-awaken a being known as Datatsushi through an occult ceremony. The siren of the title is the call of Datatsushi, summoning the residents of Hanuda to immerse them selves in the red water, thus creating an army of subordinates called Shibito. The shibito then go about building a nest to house the corporal form of Datatsushi once it is summoned, as well as killing and converting any living humans left in Hanuda. The story is told through the perspectives of ten survivors, some of whom are natives of Hanuda, and is presented out of chronological order over the three days in which the mystery takes place."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Siren

There are four types of Shibito in this and they aren't defeatable meaning they will eventually wake up after being knocked out. They are attracted to noise and light so always walk (never run) when close to them and turn your torch off when around them.
The four types are:

Human Shibito - (Left) These look like Humans as normal, except for the blood coming from their eyes and the black stuff around their mouth.

Spider Shibito - They are called Spider Shibito because of how they walk. Like the Crab Yoga position they walk on all fours, their back towards the floor. At some point you see them creating webs with rope and string.

Moth Shibito - These Shibito have wings like a moth or butterfly. They also carry gun's making it harder to avoid them.

Brain Shibito - (Right with Risa) There are few of these about and they have worm like things hanging from their faces. They control the Spider Shibito so when the Brain is down, the Spiders will fall down also.

Sight Jacking is a concept within the game where the characters can see what the Shibito and other characters can see. This is vital plainly because this game involves more stealth than action. One character in particular wields no weapons whatsoever throughout their part in the game so stealth is absolutely necessary or you'll fail. Some Shibito hold rifles which can get you from far distances so sight Jacking informs you of what the shibito is focused on.
Shibito are very predictable and always use the same route either A to B or in circles. Sight Jacking various Shibitos in the area will make to wise to where they patrol as well as using their sight to find items.

There is a huge cast in this game, some characters being more important than others. Some characters you'll only play as once or twice, some characters you don't play as at all. Here's a list and the reasons they are at Hanuda Village.

Kyoya Suda (left) is our main character in the game and is the hero at the end (apparently). He's come to Hanuda to find out more about the massacre that happened there years ago.

Kei Makino is a Priest of the local religion. I haven't come across him much whilst I've been playing but he's the brother of Shiro Miyata is a doctor at the local hospital.

Risa Onda is is back at her hometown from Tokyo to see her twin sister Mina Onda who is a nurse at the hospital where Shiro works.

Tamon Takeuchi (right with Yoriko)is a teacher who grew up in Hanuda Village and has returned to find out what had happened to his parents who had died when Tamon was a child.

Yoriko Anno is Tamon's student who has come along uninvited. We find that she has a crush on her teacher which is the unofficial reason for coming along. She's quite annoying is this character - I don't like her much.

Hisako Yao is one of our bad guys although she is nice at the beginning of the game. She is a nun of the local religion and she's the reason the events of the game occur, reincarnating the god of their religion.

Miyako Kajiro (left) is the latest girl within the Kajiro family to be sacrificed for the religion. She is goes along with Kyoya for most of the game but she is completely blind which can be a pain for whoever is playing the game.

Reiko Takato is a teacher at the local elementary school whose student is Harumi Yomoda. Reiko spends half of the game protecting Harumi from the Shibito before sacrificing her life in order to save her once again.

Akira Shimura is also a resident of Hanuda and is the oldest character of the game. His Shotgun makes him the easiest character to play as although he is pretty slow. He kills himself to avoid becoming one of the un-dead, failing. He eventually becomes a Shibito.

Naoko Mihama is a model/TV Presenter who is in Hanuda to film the Television series, Occult Japan. Going a little bit crazy she drowns herself in the red water in a bid to keep her youthful looks. She is my personal favourite in this game.

Tomoko Maeda is a middle school student who becomes a Shibito. She dies off screen so we don't know how she died but she was probably killed by another Shibito

Mina, Yoriko and Miyako are the only characters we never play as through the game but all have quite important parts in the plot.

A lot of the time the playable character will have a sidekick with them. These don't attack the Shibito themselves but rely on you to do it. They'll do pretty much what you tell them to such as "Wait","Hide" and "Come Here". Female sidekicks may also need your help in pulling them up high places such as sheds, rocks etc. In some cases, hiding a sidekick in a certain place may encourage them to find items such as keys.

The graphics used in this game are very unique in the fact that the characters are played by actors (I don't just mean the voice). The actor’s faces are imposed onto the character models making them look more realistic. Going to the Menu Page allows you to see the real life actor playing the character.

The areas in the game include The Elementary School, The Maeda House, Lower Arato, Janokubi Valley and the Shibito Nest amongst others and there are some really good props hanging around such as the payphones, drawings (by the children at the school). The clothes the female characters wear are nice too - Risa Onda and Naoko Mihama for example.

In order to find out more about the plot, there are 100 Archive Items to find throughout the game. I love this part of the game because the guys at Sony have been really innovative regarding the kind of items you can get. Videos and Tapes are some of the best you can get but there are also newspaper and magazine articles which can be quite funny. I think these can be really interesting to look at.
The weapons are quite unique too. You have the staples such as the rifle and the pistol but you also have the Poker, Umbrella, Hammer and the crowbar.

Why I never completed it:

This game is extremely hard and that is the only reason I haven't been able to complete it. The game is much harder than most for the following reasons:

1) Where Silent Hill, Resident Evil and Project Zero have healing items to collect; Forbidden Siren has nothing like that. If you get trapped by several Shibito’s you will die, your energy however will go back to normal when you haven't been hit for a while.

2) If your Sidekick dies you will have to start from the top and because they don't attack Shibito they usually do unless you tell them to stay put.

3) Checkpoint is a word Sony Japan doesn't know about in this game. Checkpoints are exceptionally rare meaning that you have to do the whole mission from the start which is obviously a pain when you're near the end of a mission. Checkpoints do occur occasionally but not very often.

4) The game is quite time consuming if you're a magpie gamer like me I.E. You have to collect everything available to you. If you find an archive item then die during the mission, you will have to go and get the archive item again. It takes forever on the harder missions at the end of the game.

5) It is a very confusing storyline on religion which is a subject I personally find boring. To make the game even more confusing, the events of the game are not in chronological order so you're going back and forth but the link navigator will help you out a little. The link navigator is a graph with the character names at the top and the times on the left so you can look back at what mission came first. Unfortunately you won’t get control of it until halfway through the game.

The first time I played this I didn't get as far as the third or fourth mission without getting killed over and over again. I put it aside and just never went back to it...In fact, I sold it without giving it much of a chance - I found it just too hard.
Then Forbidden Siren 2 was due for release and despite the fact I was unsure about getting the second after failing the first, it was Christmas so I got my Mum to buy it for my present. I’m going to talk about Forbidden Siren 2 later but for now I’ll just say this. It impressed me so much I decided to get the original again and give it another go.
The second time I got a little further but I still found it rather hard and for a second time I put it aside. As I’m writing this now, I am attempting it again after the recent Blood Curse has been released although I’m using a walkthrough in order to do it.

Anybody else find the game extremely hard?
Archive Items? A pain or useful?
Who's your favourite character?

Project Zero III: The Tormented

Developer: Tecmo
Publisher: Tecmo
Released (UK): Feb '06
Released (US): Nov '05

May contain spoilers. I was so unbelievably pleased when I heard Tecmo were doing a third Project Zero game. There were hardly any games out at that time for Survival Horror nuts such as myself so it was quite exciting. Being British I had to wait longer than most (as usual) - the game was out in November '05 in the States but we didn't get it until February '06.

Tecmo went in a new direction with Project Zero III: The Tormented in the fact that you play as three characters rather than the one.
You have Rei Kurasawa, our main protagonist, Miku Hinasaki from the original game and another new character Kei Amakura, Uncle of the twins from Crimson Butterfly.

It's a long opening but the game starts off with Rei approaching a car crash in the rain, inside the car is a young man who is unconscious and when Rei starts crying it becomes obvious she knows who the man is. The scene then cuts to Rei again taking pictures in an old, dilapidated mansion when Miku appears behind her and Rei informs her that the mansion is rumoured to be haunted but Miku ignore it "Rumours are just rumours" and immediately starts to pack away Rei's things "I'm gonna load these up" she says.

Just like Mafuyu's part in Project Zero 1, the dream sequence works as an introduction to the game but it's a little different. It's basically Rei chasing after the man through what appears to be a newer version of the mansion Rei was taking pictures of. You automatically start off with a camera, it's not the Camera Obscura but it means you can immediately start receiving points by taking photos of the various ghosts that show up. You're not in danger at this point, you cannot die but if attacked, Rei will snap out of her daydream and you'll miss some photo op's for some other ghosts.

The scene changes again and Rei has been tied up on the floor surrounded by four young girls with long black hair and stakes in their hands. Just as they set about impaling her, Miku interrupts and disrupts the day dream causing yet another cut scene. Rei is at home now and is in her dark room processing her pictures and finds the one Yuu was in. The scene skips again to Rei in her bed having a very disturbing sleep and we start the main part of the game.


Another difference between this game and the others is that all the hauntings happen in dreams rather than reality (Miku wasn't dreaming when at Himura mansion an Mio wasn't dreaming when in the lost village) meaning that there are sequences in reality that has a meaning to the game.
Every time you wake up Rei makes notes in her notebook about the various happenings and characters she encounters within her dreams. We find out from this that Yuu Aso was Rei's fiancée who died after the crash, caused by Rei who was driving at the time. We also learn that Miku is her assistant and very good friend throughout Rei's grievance of her late fiancée.
Once we find the Camera Obscura, some pictures taken throughout the dreams can be developed in the dark room and given to Miku who will find out some more information on the subject of the photo of interest.
You will also receive several letters from Kei, who was a friend and colleague of Yuu's and indeed Mafuyu's from Project Zero 1.
As the game progresses you'll find that some spirits travel into the real world with Rei and various haunting’s occur within the house. Keep a watch on Ruri, Miku's cat because it's rumoured he can be found where the various haunting’s happen.

The Camera Obscura is back but in this game we have three types, one for each character. Rei has the best one because it uses the special functions that you find around the mansion and it's more powerful meaning that it takes more energy from the nasty spirits with the shots.
Miku's camera doesn't use the special functions which means fighting with her is much harder (Tecmo are sticking with the whole damsel in distress theme with her) but she has the Double function which gives the camera extra charge and Kei's camera is weak so it takes him longer to defeat the ghosts.
The camera in this game uses Type-07, Type-14, Type-61, Type-90 and Type-Zero film and a nice thing about this game is that you have unlimited Type-07 film and Type-14 film is refreshed every time you start a dream.
Special functions include Blast, Zero, Pierce and Slow. In the previous games the camera automatically showed you the HP (Health) of the ghost you're battling but in this game you have to find the lens before it'll show you. This is a pain to get however...I was on my fourth go before I managed to get it.

Another new feature of this game is the introduction of Special Abilities. Each character has one although you hardly use Kei's special ability.
Rei has the Flash ability will send ghosts back from you when battling them, useful for when you miss a shot and a ghost is in your face.
Miku has the Sacred Stone which enables her to slow time to get better shots.
Kei can crouch. This isn't really necessary because you only need to do it once because Kei doesn't have the camera when you play as him for the first time. Crouching means he can hide from ghosts but most ghosts stay until they're exorcised.
Miku and Kei have something else going for them too. Miku can crawl under small spaces such as under the floor because she's teeny. Kei is a brawny man so can push furniture that block doors and he can take more damage than the girls can.

Let's talk about the ghosts of the game. I think they're truly remarkable and they are the best of the series. There are three in particular that deserve a thorough mention: Kiriko Asanuma AKA Crawling Woman, Tengai Narumi AKA Head Carpenter and Stroller Grandma (pictured below).

Stroller Grandma is unique in the fact that she is the only ghost who doesn't hang around to be defeated. She will strike you twice with her pram and then leave you alone...if you're lucky she'll show up a couple of times but I've managed to play the game through without coming across her once.
She is very hard to defeat because when she does show up it will be in a narrow corridor and she may come out of the walls. Your only chance is when she is coming straight at you but even then you have to get a couple of Fatal Frame shots. If you do manage to defeat her, you'll get a key which gains you access to the lens I mentioned earlier. Get this then you'll be able to tell how long the ghost has left, useful for when you get the boss fight at the end.

Tengai Narumi, the Head Carpenter is one of the hardest ghosts to beat, especially if you're playing for the first time. He's very violent and he's very fast and has a cleaver he attacks you with. He chases you throughout the first dream sequence at the game's start (He frightened me when he came out of the wall and rushed me) and you'll have to beat him several times throughout the game. He mostly bothers Rei but you'll come across him once as Miku, which she finds hard to do.

My favourite ghost of the game and also of the series is the Crawling Woman. She is a very scary looking woman with no part in the main plot of the game but she is one of the ghosts that show up a lot although you only have to fight her twice. As with Stroller Grandma you can only get her with Fatal Frame shots but it only takes one or two of them to get rid of her. The design of this character is the best - see for yourself. I found this clip on youtube.com, which shows your first battle with her. (Note: I don't know if the guys in the background are being real or putting it on but they definitely match my feelings at the time. WARNING! Bad Language.).

Another honourable mention is the Kuze Family Head but if I remember rightly you only have to fight her three or four times. Ghosts you will come across more regularly include three of the four Shrine Maidens, the Carpenters and Woman Brushing as well as the other rare ghosts such as the Engravers and the Mother and Daughter.
There is of course the main ghost of the game, Reika AKA The Tattooed Priestess, our Antagonist. Like Kirie from Project Zero 1, Reika was to take part a sacrifices before falling in love with a male visitor.


To become a priestess, the woman would have to have had suffered the loss of a loved one such as a family member. Reika's parents had died during a disaster of their hometown causing Reika to be adopted by the Kuze family.
The priestess had to be kept under lock and key in the hanging prison where she was cared for by the four Shrine Maidens, one of which was Amane Kuze. Amane is the half-sister of Kaname Ototsuki, an old friend of Reika's with whom she was in love once upon a time before joining the Kuze family.
The first ritual of the sacrifice is the Piercing of the Soul ritual where the Engravers had to tattoo her entire body whilst the Shrine Maidens sang a lullaby. The Priestess was then taken to the Chamber of Thorns where she was impaled by the Shrine Maidens for the Impalement Ritual.
Before her impalement, Reika had written about the many dreams she had of Kaname, who had returned to her thoughts after talking about him to Aname. She also stated that she hoped these dreams would last forever after her death.

The Unleashing happened when Reika was able to see Kaname one last time just before she died. Kaname had returned to the villiage after Reika's dreams connected with his and with the help of Aname he was able to sneak his way into the Chamber of Thorns to see her. Unfortunately the Family Head found him and killed him right in front of his 'love's' eyes.
Reika's spirit turned hostile to everyone within the manor and killed everyone she came across.

Now, everyone who has suffered the loss of a loved one finds them selves dreaming of the Manor of Sleep. Rei had lost Yuu, Miku had lost her brother Mafuyu in the Himuro Mansion and Kei had suffered the loss of his niece, Mayu Amakura from Crimson Butterfly.
It is up to these three to figure out the meaning to these dreams and a way to let Reika rest in piece.

I absolutely loved this game. I think it is the best of the series so far and will be hard to top. The graphics were much better in this and the ghosts looked much more real. The ghosts were scarier in this and the music that accompanies each ghost when it arrives adds to the tension. E.g. The music shifts but whilst some ghosts are predictable you will eventually come across music you don't recognise and be left waiting for the ghost to show up (normally from behind).
The fact that you played as more than one character was a nice addition to the series because it changed the style of game play. As I said previously, some ghosts are easier to beat as one character but harder as another.
The game has a lot of good extras such as extra costumes, missions in the mission mode and of course the ghost list meaning that this has good replay value.
I really find it hard to fault it. Kei's crouching ability wasn't really necessary but that wasn't enough to downgrade the game as a whole. Some may disagree with me and say that the original was the best and some may say Crimson Butterfly was the best but I give it a perfect...

10/10

Are the ghosts scarier in this game?
Is the series getting boring?
Is the game too dependent on the previous two games?

One's I've never Finished...Part 1.

Haunting Ground

Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom
Released (UK): Apr '05
Released (US): May '05

After completing Project Zero I was bored and no other horror games were due out so I got this one. Haunting Ground sounded interesting to me and even though the critics didn't think much of it, I thought I'd give it a go.


What's it about?:

The game starts off with camera going down to the basement which looks to be used as a kitchen. There's meat hanging all over the place and a large man is seen chopping it up. The scene then goes to a cage that is in the room and in it lays our protagonist - Fiona Belli.
The large man looks at her and tries to touch her but is scared off by some lightning. We see start to see the end of Fiona's dream but she is woken up by the sound of the weather.Obviously she's pretty freaked out by the whole thing - anyone would be. She sees that the cage she's in is unlocked and goes about escaping. A very angry sounding Dog is also there but runs out the room leaving its collar behind. Just before the scene ends Fiona reads out the name - Hewie, our soon to be partner in crime, and our only weapon.



Typically, our female protagonist is skimpily clad in a white satin sheet for the start of the game and this is probably the only decent part of the game as far as men are concerned. At this point you have absolutely no idea what to do except wander around but you do find yourself following a route led by some stone steps which leads you towards a big door which is essentially Fiona's bedroom.
It's here where you are introduced to Daniella (below), the castles maid. She's a little crazy and talks like a robot (a characteristic or just bad acting?). She has some clothes for you to wear - which you change in to, unaware that someone is watching you through an ugly painting.

After a little walk around the castle you meet Debilitas, the big guy from the very beginning of the game. He's playing with a doll which he discards when he sees Fiona - he runs after her.
This part introduces the Evasion process of the game - Fiona can hide from the monsters and crazy people who run after her. Beds, Tables, Closets etc all provide hiding places but if you go to the same hiding place all the time, your stalkers will get wise to it and find you.



In events a bit further on in the game Fiona is distracted by the sound of a Dog whimpering outside. It's the dog we saw, Hewie and he's caught in a trap. Hewie is used to reach high places an to crawl through tight spaces to retrieve things for you as well as attacking the monsters and crazy people chasing you.
Hewie can get in the way though and you'll find yourself feeling guilty after accidentally kicking him whilst trying to break a vase.

Vases can contain various items such as flowers and herbs which can be used to heal yourself or cause damage to Fiona. Location’s known as Recovery Points (usually a sink) restores Fiona’s status, therefore giving her higher energy.
Items such as Jerky can also be found to help restore Hewie’s stamina and speed.

Let's talk about how Hewie works. Fiona gives orders to Hewie such as "Go", "Sit" and "Come Here" an can also tell him off when he does something wrong. Hewie, just like any Dog won't be perfect to start off with. He doesn't know Fiona and although her trusts her (because she saved him from the trap) he doesn't always do as he's told. You have to make sure you praise him when he does good by saying "Good Boy" - kicking him will make him trust you less so don't do it, but as I said - it can be easily done by mistake. As the game goes on you'll find it easier to get Hewie to do as you wish.

There are puzzles along the way some of which can be quite hard to solve and may requires Hewies help. Some example puzzles include an area with spotlights that have to be pointed towards a certain area for a room to be unlocked and the Lunar room which includes panels on the floor that have to be stood on in a certain order - Hewie will help you here.

Enemies in this game are split into two categories: Pursuers and Minor Enemies.
Minor Enemies include the Luminessant, a blue orb that is attracted to Azoth energy (humans have it apparently) and once it hits you, it omits a large sound which attracts a Pursuer. The Homunculus does nothing really except make mumbling noises and standing on their heads, I don't even think they chase you. Failures are like parasites and attach themselves to Fiona’s legs as well as screaming causing Pursuers to come for you.
The Pursuers are the game bosses and Fiona’s biggest problem - These I can go into in more detail.

I've already mentioned Debilitas who's like Quasimodo in appearance. He chases Fiona because he fancies her basically. All he wants to do is hug her and stroke her but he gets carried away (like Lenny in Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck) and causes her harm. He's easy to hide from because of his stupidity but he's strong and Fiona or Hewie can't do much damage to him but he does runaway if he gets fed up of fighting.
I've also mentioned Daniella, the maid who becomes jealous her masters fascination of Fiona. She's a bit harder than Debilitas because she has access to various weapons and she's smart to the hiding places Fiona finds. You won't be able to hide from her in the same place over and over again. Daniella also crawls into hiding spaces and can make you jump if you come across her. She's also of a danger to Hewie too because she will hurt him if she cannot find you (Hewie doesn't hide with Fiona in some places). There is a good thing about Daniella though and I remember seeing her in a corridor but she didn't chase after me, she was cleaning. She will talk to you if this is the case and may even give you a useful item. If she's laughing manically then go the other way but if you come across a mirror she will be distracted by it and will stand there and scream for a while.
Riccardo (pictured above with Daniella) is a pain in your behind. He’s a bit more persistent than the other two before and will take forever searching in a room for you and if you hide in the same spot twice, he will find you the second time. On top of this he’s faster than Daniella who just walks after you and he has a gun so he can attack you from further away. Luckily we hardly get chased by this guy before we have to kill him.
Old Lorezo is someone we think is on our side only to turn out to be even more insane then anyone else in the game. He’s disabled so he can only crawl after you but he can be sometimes very fast so be careful. He cannot however open doors so if you close doors after you he won’t chase you no further. Lorenzo later comes back in two other forms but I’ll leave them out as you rarely come across them.

There are a huge array of items to collect such as health items, dog treats and accessories for Fiona to wear. Various boots are available to help Fiona make less noise when walking or to cause more damage to a pursuer when she kicks them. Chokers are available to reduce her Azoth energy so Luminessants don't bother you as much. You can also find Magnesium which blows up when someone steps on it, slowing them down.


Why I never completed it:

This is game is the most frustrating games I have ever played. I just got really fed up with it - I even got quite close to the end too but some of the reasons I gave up contain some spoilers so beware:

1) This is how the game mostly was...You make your way to your destination only for Debilitas/Daniella etc to show up. You run away and hide, wait 5 minutes, make your way back to your destination, get a little further only to be chased again. Very annoying indeed.

2) Sometimes it will take 10 attempts at trying to get Hewie to do something. I remember one spot where I needed Hewie to get a flower for me from behind a gate only he could get through. He just wouldn't go through the hole no matter how close I was to the flower myself. Just as in Project Zero, if you stay in a place too long, your stalker will find you. Debilitas showed up and I had to run away from the area.

3) Fiona can go into panic mode. If she is attacked she goes into a major panic which causes the screen to go into a blurry black and white as well as causing Fiona to fall and bump into walls. Basically, she becomes impossible to control which is bad game design if you ask me - this doesn't supply any form of tension or horror atmosphere - just frustration, pointless frustration.

4) Survival horrors have many staples in them. One staple of a survival horror game is the Map and Haunting Ground has a terrible one. The rooms have no names so it's hard to determine which room is which and it's quite small and feint. I never looked at it whilst I played it because there was never any point.

5) This contains quite a large spoiler regarding the character Lorenzo. When you first meet him he's in a wheelchair and cannot use his legs so he's quite easy to kill. The annoyance is that his character comes back to life and refuses to bloody well die. He comes back as his younger, much more mobile self and chases you all over until Fiona sets him a trap involving a large hole containing some Lava like substance. You think this would kill him but oh no - Fiona finds herself being chased by his burning skeleton. The game just would not end.

6) There's a section at what I believe is at the end of the game which took me ages to figure out what to do. I was being chased by the skeleton of Lorenzo and I died over and over and over again. You know what it's like when you play a game and die all the time - you get frustrated and when you die, you want to do it again as fast as possible just to get it done. This is why the "Game Over" screen is unbelievably irritating. The screen goes red and reads "Acta Est Fabula" with the most annoying music in the background. The whole thing goes on for a minute or two and it won't go away until it's finished. It's the equivalent of someone laughing in your face.

7) The game is 50% running away from your goal and 20% trying to get Hewie to do as he's told...It can take up to 5 minutes just to get him to follow you into a room. That means only 30% is finding out about the story and getting items and clues and so forth. It's very tiring and I found myself getting extremely restless. I could never do the section described in point 6 above so I eventually gave up and I no longer have this game, I sold it for £5. I never did find out how it ended.


You mean there wasn't anything good about it at all?

There were some good things worth a mention in this game and it's mostly aesthetic. The graphics are beautiful and the character models are fantastic, especially when Fiona and Daniella are concerned. The Belli Castle looked great, especially outside in the garden and the cut scenes are some of the best I've seen.

I've been quite harsh on this game - Does anybody disagree with me?
Fiona Belli...Could she be an overlooked competitor for best Survival Horror hero?

Project Zero

Developer: Tecmo
Publisher: Tecmo
Released (UK): Aug '02
Released (US): Mar '02

May contain Spoilers: I managed to find the first Project Zero from a Marketplace seller on Amazon.co.uk and as soon as it came I went upstairs to play it. Please note that I’m talking about this game as if this was the second in the series since I played Crimson Butterfly previous to this.

In the original Project Zero you play as men’s favourite Miku Hinasaki and it’s 1986. She has gone to the Himuro mansion in search of her missing brother Mafuyu Hinasaki, an amateur folklorist who had gone to the mansion to find his mentor Junsei Takamine who had gone to the mansion to research a new horror novel along with his production team of Kogi Agata and Tomoe Hirasaka.
When Mafuyu doesn't return from his search and Junsei and his team were also still missing Miku goes herself to find what happened to them.

At the beginning of the game you have your typical narration in the background. Miku tells you the story up to that point but also tells us that she has psychic abilities and frequently sees visions. She also points out that her Mother had died and Mafuyu was the only family she had left. Mafuyu could also see these visions which were passed on from their mother, Miyuki Hinasaki.
The game then starts off with the oh-so feminine looking Mafuyu as the controllable character to get you used to the controls of the game. He also has with him the Camera Obscura that can see things invisible to the naked eye. We find out more about the camera later and how it came to be in Mafuyu’s possession because it reveals more about his and Miku’s family history.


The Camera changes throughout the series but in Project Zero 1 it uses four types of film. From weakest to strongest these are Type-14, Type-32, Type-74 and Type-90. The camera also has several special abilities such as See (makes the spirit easier to see), Slow (Slows the spirits movement), Pressure (Pushes spirits further away from Miku), Paralyze (Stops the spirit temporarily) and Search (Finds the spirit after it's vanished). There is also a filament (at the top of the screen when in Camera mode, at the bottom of the screen in normal mode) which turns blue or orange when a ghost is around.

There are three types of ghosts that show up within the Himuro mansion:
Secret Ghosts – These can only be seen through the Camera Obscura after you’ve taken their picture. The filament will glow blue when there’s one around and the pictures of these ghosts will go onto your ghost list which is unlocked when you complete the game.
Friendly Ghosts – You can see these without the camera and will not attack you. These ghosts act as clues during the game and they tend to lead you around the mansion. These are also added onto the ghost list on completion of the game.
Vengeful Ghosts – When the filament goes orange the ghost is a hostile one and will attack you. These ghosts can be related to the story (E.g. Junsei Takamine, Kirie) or just random ghosts with stories of their own (E.g. Broken neck lady, Long Arms).
You’ll find that some ghosts are harder than other ghosts within the game such as the Blind Woman who can be very fast for someone who can’t see, the Himuro Family Master and of course Kirie Himuro - the boss ghost of the game.


Kirie was chosen to become the Rope Shrine Maiden after winning the traditional game of Demon Tag which was played especially to find the next sacrifice. In preparation for the Strangling Ritual she was confined to the house for 10 whole days and could only be seen by the Himuro Priests, veiled so that she couldn't see their faces. This was done to keep the Maiden 'Pure' so she was more appealing to the Hellgate. However, a male visitor (name unknown) was invited to stay at the mansion (again for a reason unknown) while Kirie was inprisoned. Eventually the two of them grew very close and Kirie fell in love with him, therefore losing her purity. The Ceremony Master Lord Himuro, another of the hard ghosts to beat wasn't happy about this outcome and ordered someone to kill the boy corrupting Kirie's soul.

After her lovers death, Kirie started to have second thoughts about going on with the ceremony because she felt responsible for her boyfriends death. This resulted in the Strangling Ritual failing to close the hellgate and all hell broke loose. The Calamity struck the entire mansion and spirits of those that had died at the mouth of Hells Gate broke loose killing everyone in sight. Anybody not killed by this malice were killed by the Ceremony Master who killed himself afterwards.
The spirit of Kirie split into two forms: The vengeful ghost who waits in the Mansion killing anybody who visits and her younger self who seeks help in cleansing Kiries soul.

As the game progresses you find out more about how Mafuyu has managed to survive longer than Takamine and Co. Does he survive? You have to play it to find that out but the ending is a dissapointing one (Unless you play it on Nightmare mode which as a different ending) and if you were Miku, you would be pretty much pissed off with your older Bro' after all the trouble you've just gone through.

The ghosts aren't the best looking of the series but that's expected since this was the first one made. The atmosphere was definitely there and again I was forced to take several time outs to calm myself down whilst playing it. Unfortunately though, the atmosphere dies down once you've played it a couple of times (Crimson Butterfly still keeps me under suspense when playing it). As I mentioned before the men love Miku in this game and the majority of Project Zero fans all say she is the best character of the series (Sae from Crimson Butterfly is another favourite) but I disagree slightly. She's a bit pathetic to say the least but most of the main characters in the series are...Mio and especially Mayu both fit the same bill. Project Zero 3 moves away from that, a little bit anyway but I'll talk about that game later.

It's a good game, not brilliant. Crimson Butterfly was better and The Tormented was even better than Crimson Butterfly.

7/10

Miku Hinisaki...The best Project Zero character?
Has Project Zero 1 survived well after the release of Project Zero 2 & 3?

Silent Hill 3

Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami
Released (UK): May '03
Released (US): Aug '03

May contain Spoilers. At the time this was considered the best game of the series - at least it was according to the reviews and forums. I was really looking forward to playing this one more than I was SH4 or SH2.

You play as Heather Mason, a 17 year old girl who has a bit of an attitude at first. You don't know much about her but that's what this game is about - self discovery. On your first attempt at this game you're thrown right in the deep end because you're playing from the beginning. The opening 'level' is set in an Amusement Park and only lasts a couple of minutes. At the end, you find it basically acts as a dream sequence because Heather wakes up in a restaurant, the noise of hustle and bustle going on in the background.

When she leaves the restaurant you find she's in a shopping mall. You start to find more about her here because of two things. First she calls her Dad and looks happy when she speaks to him and laughs at a joke he must have told. Then she gets interrupted by a dishevelled looking man who introduces himself as Douglas Cartland, a Detective sent to find her - "It's about your Birth" he says. Heathers not interested though (would you be?) and walks away, however, Douglas follows you. Heather, it seems, also has a bad temper because she blows when he doesn't leave her alone. She runs into the toilets and escapes through the window.

This is when the game begins and you're on your way back home to Daddy as promised. Sounds easy enough but when she returns to the Mall she find's it deserted, except for some very nasty looking monsters. Actually the Monsters in Silent Hill 3 are pretty basic, the first one you come across being the Closer, a tall monster with clubs for arms - large but they move slowly. You also have the dog-like Doubleheads, the screeching Pendulum which is safer to run away from, the Numb Body (pictured), Scraper, Slurper, Insane Cancer and the Nurses make their return.

The monsters are of the same style as Silent Hill 2 - fleshy and wooden looking, but they're better in terms of sound effects. The Numb Bodies in particular make a screaming noise while they walk and they echo from the walls which gives a good atmosphere. The Nurses have a nice scream when you attack them which also add a bit extra. Other than these two, the monsters aren't anything to scream about yourself.

One thing this game does have though is bloody good atmosphere. Each area you go you're guaranteed a scare of some kind. We've already mentioned the Shopping Centre and you get a good freak when you knock on a toilet cubicle to find the door opens to reveal a bloody toilet seat. You also have the Subway, Sewers, Construction Site, Hilltop Centre, Brookhaven Hospital and the Amusement Park with the unforgettable Borley Mansion.

The best Silent Hill 3 moment takes part in the Hilltop Centre when a Mannequin mysteriously loses it's head when you back is turned - makes you jump too because it screams. I always find it creepy when inanimate objects come to life in some way.
Heathers stalker at the Hospital also causes a shiver down your spine just because the feeling that someone else is there in a deserted hospital is a good way to creep anyone out. Silent Hill 3 makes much better use of the hospital than SH2 (it's the same design) by making it look more like a mental hospital. The stalker, the knocked over wheelchair in the basement and the phone call you receive from a maniac in the locker room.
In general Silent Hill 3 has the better 'levels' than the other Silent Hill games I have played so far.

Heather meets several people while she walks around to settle her fate. We've already met Douglas but things go really freaky after our meeting with Claudia Wolf, a cult member who is arranging for her god to be born to make way for a new paradise. Another cult member we meet is Vincent, a priest within the cult who wishes to stop Claudia's scheme. He helps Heather throughout the game though we don't know whether it's in her best interest or his own.
Supporting characters include: Leonard Wolf, Claudia's father who was committed to the Hospital for violence towards 'non-believers' of the cult in which he was a part and Harry Mason, Heathers father and the protagonist of the original Silent Hill game.
You don't feel much emotion for these characters unless you had previously played the first Silent Hill game - Harry is well known to people who have played the original and it's quite emotional to see him meet his untimely end. Claudia and Vincent don't have much personality and I doubt they'd ever be named as a favourite among the fans. Douglas you feel a little towards because he becomes a new father figure for Heather and even though it's not mentioned, the game leads you to believe they leave together when the game ends.
Then we have Heather - named by fans as the best Silent Hill character but it must be the testosterone speaking because I don't think she has much going for her. She's a strong character for sure but likeable? She's a little bratty at the beginning of the game and has a short fuse and a little stubborn. I wouldn't name her as my favourite character of the series let alone my favourite Protagonist.

My opinions on this game always change. At the time I remember not liking this game much when comparing it to Silent Hill 2 & 4 but now I think it was a better game than Silent Hill 2. It has a better atmosphere than SH2 and the characters weren't exactly great in either of them. Silent Hill 3 also had better environments but Silent Hill 2 had a better Protagonist, storyline and Pyramid Head....

9/10

The game is on par with Silent Hill 2 but this is my opinion only. The general opinion is that Silent Hill 2 had everything necessary for a horror game but Silent Hill 3 also had these things but improved on them and if Heather is the best character Team Silent have ever come up with - wouldn't that make SH3 the superior one?

Heather Mason...Is she really the best Protagonist?
Or are fans deciding with their eyes?

Silent Hill 2

Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami
Released (UK): Nov '01
Released (US): Sept '01

May contain spoilers. After being told so many people that Silent Hill 4 was garbage I decided to see how the game compared to previous instalments. Many people said Silent Hill 3 was the best of the bunch so I set off to buy that but I couldn't find it anywhere. Amazon didn't have it, neither did Game or Gamestation. I tried HMV but they didn't have it either but they did have Silent Hill 2. I was going to try them all anyway so I bought it and took it home to play that night.

In this game you play as James Sunderland who you find staring at himself in mirror of a public restroom. He looks stressed and once you lead him out of there you find out why.

You hear a lady's voice narrate a letter whilst James looks out over a lake. The letter asks James to meet the letter writer at their 'Special Place' in a town called Silent Hill where she says they had visited before.

James admits that this letter was written by his wife, Mary but he also says that Mary died two years ago from a disease. Creepy, huh? James doesn't know which special place she means "This whole town was our special place". We have to actually make our way to Silent Hill first so let's get a map and hop to it.

This games major flaw is the amount of travelling you have to do and it isn't always obvious where you're supposed to go. At first you're just following a trail but once you reach the town you're entering a maze. Some roads are blocked and you'll start getting restless trying to find to an unblocked route. A blood trail and the steps of a shadowed figure lead you on for a bit longer but then you're on your own.

At this point you have a weapon (wooden plank) and a Radio that doesn't seem to work. Where do you go from her though? The idea is to go to Rosewater Park but when you follow the road there, it's blocked. I walked around for ages until I came across a Caravan with a message inside "I'll wait at Bar Neely’s" - a clue at last, 20-30 minutes in. Once at Bar Neely’s we find ourselves on a roll and eventually we're at Woodside Apartments.

The game finally gets going now and the spookiness creeps in. The music in the Apartments is the main addition to the atmosphere (Akira Yamaoka is a genius) but the lack of light is also a factor.

The Apartment building is one of many areas you come across. Once out of the building you reach the Park, Brookhaven Hospital, the Historical Society and Prison then finally the Lakeview Hotel.

All of them have their moments: The hospital has the gloomy atmosphere. The Prison has noises coming from empty prisons and the labyrinth. Your weapons are taken away from you for part of the Hotel level and then the Apartments have Pyramid Head (below).

Named by most Silent Hill fans, favourite Survival Horror baddy of all time, Pyramid Head is a monster created by the Town to taunt James throughout his mission to find his dead wife. The first time you see Pyramid Head, he's standing behind a fence in the corridor of the Apartment building. He's bright red and definitely unmissable - I remember feeling quite excited when I saw him. The game was finally beginning to get good.

Other monsters of the series have become pretty standard within the series. The Lying Figure (aka Patient Demon, Straightjacket) we see again in Origins and the movie. The Nurses are also a fan favourite and they've featured in every Silent Hill game (though they look rather different in Silent Hill 1). Other monsters include the Creeper, Abstract Daddy, and the Mannequin, who despite having very feminine features (long slender legs) have a masculine scream, they also look very good against the dark environment giving a more freaky appearance. There's also the Mandarin, a big thing that clings to the grate ceilings with their feet, but why they're here is beyond me. You only come across 'em once and they're of no danger to you.

Is James the only person in this town? No, he's not. He comes across several people in Silent Hill, all of which have their own reasons for being there.

Angela Orosco is the first you come across, in the cemetery during you trek towards the town. She says she's looking for her mother but as the game progresses you find out little more disturbing things about this woman (who looks older than her 19 years). Then you meet the bratty little Laura briefly after she steps on your hand. Eddie Dumbrowski is rather complicated because he doesn't tell you why he's there directly - you have to follow the various clues the developers scatter throughout the game (notably his conversation with Laura at the Bowling Alley. Then you have Maria. Ah! Maria - the guys all love her. James meets her in the park and confuses her with his wife and she does look a lot like her except for a couple of things. She's dressed more provocatively and is very flirtatious.

Like Pyramid Head she is also a creation of the town and is there to torment James as much as possible. However, James doesn't see this because he's attracted to her (she looks like his wife) and likes having her around.

There are several endings in the game and if you have the Directors Cut/Greatest Hits version, there's even more:

1. Leave
2. In Water
3. Maria
4. UFO
5. Re-birth
6. Dog

There are several things you have to do or avoid in order to get these individual endings such as listening to conversations in full, being nicer to Maria and collecting items. Leave is the generic ending however and if you just play the game oblivious to all of the extras, you will get this.

Due to all these endings there is a lot of replay value for this game. On top of this you have a seperate choice of difficulty setting for the puzzles as well as the gameplay which also changes your experience. The hard riddle settings will really get your brain working because they can become quite hard (especially the coin puzzle - watch out for it).

Overall the game is good, not brilliant but good. The game didn't have the same amount of tension that Silent Hill 4 had despite Pyramid Head's wandering around. The monsters didn't appeal to me as much, though the Mannequins were the highlight of the bunch - they weren't around for much of the game.

The storyline was compelling, a letter from a dead person is quite thrilling don't you think? I didn't like the supporting cast very much - Laura is everything I hate in a kid and Angela Orosco was the most boring person I had ever come across, ungrateful too.

Akira Yamaoka did a very good job with the music he's become very well known for and really created the tension the game probably wouldn't have had without it.

After playing the game I still wasn't inclined to believe that Silent Hill 4 was the poorest Silent Hill game but it was still an enjoyable experience.

8/10

However, during playing this game I managed to get my hands on Silent Hill 3 from a Marketplace seller on Amazon.co.uk.

Pyramid Head...Best character ever?
Do you think SH2 is the best in the series?

Silent Hill 4: The Room

Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami
Released (UK): Sept '04
Released (US): Sept '04

May contain Spoilers. You're Henry Townsend, a regular Joe who lives by himself in an apartment located in a town called Ashfield. You moved there two years ago living in a carefree manner. Then the game starts by bringing you up to date - Five days ago Henry started having nightmares, which shows in the opening scene that was on the demo. At the same time Henry found himself locked in his apartment with no TV, Phone and no way out but hang on.... When Henry wakes up from his dream he receives a phone call, from a woman. "Help Me,” she asks but when the call cuts off, you find the cord has been cut - how did that happen? The door has been locked from the inside and some one named Walter has written a message "Don't go out".

The game really gets going when you hear a noise in the bathroom. A hole has been knocked right through the wall - who did that? You're the only one in the room, right? Within the first ten minutes of the game, you're already gripped, well I was, and I was spooked. How can you not be after seeing this video?

Curiosity gets the better of Henry and he forces the player to go check the hole out. On this occasion, the hole leads you to the start of the first part of the game - the Subway World. It's a little too quiet to be a subway station but you do see a woman up ahead. She introduces herself as Cynthia one of the eight other characters Henry will meet throughout the game in the various 'worlds'. You will meet a new character in every world you come across - Jasper Gein, Andrew De Salvo, Richard Braintree are among them.

These worlds all do their very best to add to the feel of terror throughout the game - some more so than others. I found both the Forest World and Water Tower World to be very intense because they make the best use of sound effects from wild animal calls to footsteps. Other environments include the Building World, Apartment World and Hospital World. The characters that you meet all have their part in the story but the character the game is based around is the life of the Antagonist of the game - Walter Sullivan (below).

At the time I didn't know it because this was the only game of the series I had played at that time but the name Walter Sullivan was mentioned in Silent Hill 2 several years earlier. Fans should have known what kind of guy he was as soon as his name came up but newbies like me were clueless. Either way, we were due to find out more about him.

What about the monsters? Games need bad guys right? The Doublehead was the only monster I had seen of this game before playing it but more were to come. The first monster you come across is the Sniffer Dog who in pairs wander around the Subway World among with the ghosts or Victims that haunt it. Other monsters include the ape like Gumhead, the quite tall and dangerous Patients, the utterly annoying Wall Men and the pointless Mothbats, Tremors and Mushrooms.

Game play starts off in quite a tedious way. I got stuck almost immediately. You lose Cynthia and meet a dead end when you find two closed off stairways and a locked subway entrance. It took me ages to realise that there was a hole in a restroom wall that I had to go through. I thought it was my own foolishness but a friend of mine got stuck in the same place also. This hole leads you back to your apartment and it's also the moment when you realise that these holes are the gateway to the 'real' world from the 'nightmare' world and vice versa. You have to keep checking back at you apartment for any new information or clues. This is also the only place you can save your progress. Henry travels light through out the game and can only hold ten items at a time. Any reject items that you don't need can be stored in a chest back in your apartment so check what you need before leaving home - this adds to the little bit of tediousness that you get at the beginning of the game. It's all quite easy until you get to the second half of the game where the dark part of the storyline really kicks off. The second half of the game sees Henry with a companion, Eileen Galvin - his next-door neighbour.

Around this time Henry sees his apartment is no longer the safe haven it was previously (before Eileen, just being in your apartment added health to your health gage) as it's now starting to become possessed by evil spirits. Silent Hill 4 as four endings which are determined by two things: 1) Eileen’s Survival. 2) % Of spirits exorcised. Eileen will become possessed herself if Henry allows her to get hurt too badly so if you want a good ending - don't let it happen. Spirits in your apartment can be easily exorcised with the use of the Holy Candle, many of which can be found throughout the nightmare worlds. The more you exorcise, the more chance of a better ending.

Then we get to the boss fight - Walter Sullivan is our target and we have to end him within a time frame, which is dependent on how well you've played. Eileen becomes possessed at this point but how badly possessed she is highly depends on if she was badly hurt. Walter has to be killed before Eileen walks into the machine Walter had invented - if she's badly possessed she walks faster so you have less time to kill Walter in but if you want the bad ending then don't worry about it. Overall the fight is quite hard - you need to make sure you bring enough health items with you and that you're equipped with a pistol, some bullets and a melee weapon in case your bullets run out. The fight should take around 10 minutes to complete it but it is very likely you will be on your 5th attempt when you do.

I loved this game. I thought it was atmospheric, intriguing and disturbing all at the same time. The hauntings in the apartment always had me scared to see what new spirit had occurred and the Doublehead didn't disappoint me - there's a point in the game where you see six of them waiting for you at the end of a large corridor, blocking the exit out of there. I was hesitant to move any closer.

I've since heard a lot of complaints about the game and Silent Hill fans have said that they hated it and I couldn't see why they should say that. I've since played the other games and even though I can see what they mean - It wasn't set in Silent Hill at all, there was no flashlight or radio, Henry could only carry ten items and no more - but you can't criticise the game too much. The Room originally wasn't going to be a Silent Hill game at all and you can tell but it wasn't a crap game. Would fans have been as critical if the game wasn't part of the franchise? I doubt it.

The game's good points were plentiful: Better graphics, good-looking monsters, excellent plot and the best thing? Walter Sullivan still is the best horror antagonist of all time (in my eyes anyway).

10/10

I wanted to find out for myself how these games could possibly be better than this one. So I did....

Did you like Walter Sullivan?
Was Silent Hill's greatest Monster in SH4?
How was Henry as a Protagonist?