First Look at Silent Hill 5 & Origins

By David Rasmussen
10th Nov 07

Hey, kids! Are you ready to take a scary new trip up the Hill?
And by that I don’t mean Capitol Hill… we’re going someplace less scary than that!

Riddle me this, what does an American game development house have to do to impress the Japanese in an audition to win the rights to develop the next generation of a well known horror franchise?
How about actually showing up to the auditions with something other than their (bleep)s in their hands!
That apparently was the strategy behind The Collective’s (known for Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s jaunt into video games as well as Marc Ecko’s “Getting Up” GTA mechanics cloner game of graffiti tagging and general mayhem) pitch for the Silent Hill franchise. Apparently (according to EGM in a recent article by them written by one Shane Bettenhausen) they actually decided to show up with an actual playable prototype in hand of their vision of Silent Hill 5 (the series‘ first jaunt into next gen Silent Hill).
Now let’s see… one company shows up with something tangible to play, the rest show up with their (bleeps) in hand and nothing else… yeah, I wonder who got that job!

However from the word go apparently the enthusiasm of The Collective didn’t seem to impress the fanatical die hards of the franchise. Once news came to light that Konami was handing the franchise over to American developers… well, some of them just didn’t take it very well. I won’t reprint the one quote used in EGM’s article but let’s just say Americans are noted as (in a round about sort of way) NRA card carrying original white meat sure to (bleep) up the franchise. Yeah. Right. That’s abit harsh considering we haven’t even seen their stuff out yet… that and the Japanese don’t need help (bleep)ing up the franchise as you’ll see later in this article… but that won’t be the case for long, especially since they are not the only show in town with an American Silent Hill franchise.

Apparently SH5 will NOT be the first game out of the starting gate to feature an American developer’s handiwork, oh no. That distinction goes to the now slightly delayed (from what I heard from early word it should have been ready in time to haunt your PSPs this Halloween, but now it looks like it’s going to come in November instead) Silent Hill Origins (more on that in a minute). Origins, however, won’t come close to the experience waiting you once you unwrap SH5 (the first Silent Hill for the next gen consoles), but at least it’s on a present gen title (handheld) so at least you don’t have to drop $300-$600 for an XBox360 slash PS3 (respectively) to get your hands on SH5.

Slated for release in the Fall of 2008 (as you’ll see later in this article a lot of horror related titles are slated for a 2008 release), this game for the PS3 and XBox360 (yes, Wii owners got the Wiimote up the arse once again) comes in four years after the last outing of the franchise (Silent Hill 4: The Room). Sure, I guess that is a long time… right? Well… not really. It’s not like we’re talking about banging out another PS2 slash Original Xbox game here to follow up The Room (even if Silent Hill to SH4 : The Room all came out within a 5 year period), we’re talking taking the game that next step up to Next Gen so some time between the games should be expected. Also, well, there’s the fact that they changed developers and all (from Japan to America, which wasn‘t done from Silent Hill to SH4 from what I‘m taking about the big hoopla over the change with SH5‘s new developer) so, well, there you go.

First off, if you’re wondering, The Collective is going to NOT follow the trend of tying this to previous games. As of this next gen game, the entire franchise is getting a reboot with this being a “stand alone” story with all new cast of characters to “help reboot the previously dense narrative” (according to EGM). Yeah, somehow however I don’t expect this to be a warm up exercise as I am sure, once SH5 is proven to be a hit, The Collective will no doubt pick up where this game leaves off and create their own storyline which will no doubt run from Collective era Silent Hill game to sequel. Of course that is only speculation, but can you fault The Collective if (at some future date) they decide to craft their own little “playground” within the Silent Hill world complete with their own storyline and character progression? I can’t.

Silent Hill 5, however, won’t be a totally alien environment (it will be, in my opinion at least, a springboard for more Collective jaunts into the SH franchise where they can (allegedly) make their own mark on the franchise… allegedly). They do promise that you will find some familiar ground in the game, and it won’t be a blank fresh slate with completely unrecognizable characters, settings and situations.

One thing about SH5 which may be the most innovative thing you’ve seen in terms of the franchise is the person who you’ll play during the game. Meet Alex. He’s a 22 year old war vet who’s recovering from a war wound over at the military hospital. Now they don’t drop which war, but I’m betting he’s an Iraq war vet (since there isn’t any hype about this game being a retro flashback game like Origins). Well, while he’s in the hospital he receives a premonition that his little brother Joshua is in trouble. With that said he’s off back to his hometown of Shepherd’s Glen, where he finds his mom near catatonic, his brother and father missing, and the ghastly fingers of Silent Hill reaching out into his home turf covering all in fog and horror.

So far nothing innovative about that, right? The innovation isn’t the story but who the story focuses about… mainly the character who also happens to be career military. Now I don’t know about you, but to me a guy who is career military should be far more capable of bashing up the freakish horrors of Silent Hill than any of the previous guys (or whatever girls went the route past our lady friend in SH3) who have taken the plunge into the bloodsoaked rusty “paradise” of past outings into the Hill. And, since he’s military, I am expecting that he should be able to provide a fresh layer of innovation in the way your character interacts with both the horror of the “world” of Silent Hill, as well as the world itself.

As if to lend hope that this is the case, early promises about his character says that his background as a soldier will influence both SH5’s gameplay as well as it’s overall narrative… yeah, no more drugged out I’m overtly jaded to the point I’m not too freaked about the blood/rust laced world narrative like SH3, or the narrative from SH4 : The Room! However, and you’re going to probably hear this when SH5 releases next year, game developers promise that they are not trying to make SH5 a political statement… eh?

WARNING!!
You are about to leave the safety of a video game first look!
Be warned! Political talking heads are scolded, and Cable News Networks (CNN and otherwise) are bitched at for horrors they won’t start talking about until Post E3 2008 at the earliest! (Once the mainstream media gets a large hunk of SH5 down their throats and taste imaginary political statement).
If you want to skip the horrors of the Monied Media skip ahead to the ALL CLEAR section and read on from there…. If not? Prepare to be BLOVIATED in the O’SPIN ZONE!!

Yeah, if that wasn’t a clear sign Alex just came back from Iraq I don’t know what is.
Yes, lord knows we can’t even have an Iraq war vet in a horror game like Silent Hill without somebody shrieking about it being some sort of “political” statement or whatever (but it‘s The Collective who first cried out no Political Message in this game so I‘m just rolling with their paranoia). And yes, before this game finally is released in the Fall of 2008 (and once it is released) expect to hear the slowly rising roar of the monied media crying out about this little alleged factoid louder and louder and louder until it reaches cresendo on release (unless the concerns turns out to be unwarranted and nobody pays it any mind). Yeah, though if it does turn out to pique the Monied Media’s short term interest then I guess not even a game about a military man being sucked into a dark world of shifting realities, freakish horrors, and faceless nurses that seem to make burping noises when smacked about can’t escape some political connections between the Iraq war (pro or con) slash War on Terror slash pro or anti US Military statement of some sort or another (even if said statement is only in the heads of talking head monied media on CNN, MSNBC and Fixed Noise… I mean “FOX News”).

People? Before your favorite BBC, Network News or Cable News talking head starts chewing your brain out over this let me just say right now (a whole year before the rising horror of media hype roars to life) that this is only a game! The eternally damned of Silent Hill will not be releasing pro or anti Iraq or pro or anti President Bush anything commercials within the year promoting any stance on anything!
There will be no “We are the faceless nurses of Silent Hill, and we approve this message.”
No “MoveOnToHell.org of Silent Hill wants you to know that President George W. Bush is an anti-undead horror President! He is against Government sponsored medically insured faceless undead nurses, he is attempting to deport the flesh eating undead back to hell, and he also opposes the bloodsoaked rust covered “Paradise“ from assimilating the Earth (and all Public Schools).”)
So let’s not try to make the game out into something it’s not (mainly some sort of tool for whoever thinks they can bank the most political cashout on whatever stance spin doctors can pretend the game’s military man in the game represents).

For god’s sake, after a glut of first and third person shooters set in the Middle East (which seems to be falling out of style with only Call of Duty 4 being the only game I know of coming out soon set in that part of the world) why is this game (of all games) suddenly supposed to be making a “political statement“? I mean nobody accused Battlefield 2, Call of Duty 4, or that game where you hunt down and kickbox Osama as having “political messages“ (or the few dozen games all set in the Middle East at present day or close), so why accuse a game that has NOTHING to do with politics of being politically motivated?!?

It’ll happen, however, that I am sure of. Just pick a political cable news network and see if you can’t pick out their stance on how Silent Hill’s imaginary political statement is translated by whatever newsman (Glenn Beck, O’Reilly, Keith Olbermann, etc) is doing the voodoo improv of Alex’s psychological state (and the visages of Silent Hill created by said psychological state).

So Mr. Beck, is that creeping horror a pro-war statement? How about you, O’Reillicus? Do those undead nurses creeping about have a Cindy Sheehan anti-war stance? How about you, Mr. Olbermann? Does your Countdown explain if there is an anti-military conspiracy in how the world shifts and evil things with large teeth try to gnaw you to death? How about you, Colbert? Is that weirdly limbed Siam thing wandering about the game working for Blackwater, or is he/she just a statement for pro gay/lesbian marriage? (And will you consider making Siam your Vice President in your run for the White House?) Wait! Should you care (and by you I mean you who happens to be reading this)? No. Not really. Leave the psychotic delusional conspiracy theories about how Silent Hill 5 is trying to get nominated President of the United States (or Secretary of Horror or Vice President under Stephen Colbert) or win a Nobel Peace Prize on it’s pro or anti war stances to the nut jobs of cable news, because we have sexier undead faceless nurses to ogle over.

ALL CLEAR! You may now crawl out of your Anti O’Reilly Shelter, chant your Anti-Beckisms, throw salt over your shoulder to ward away any unwanted FOX News Henchgoons and live your life once again! Halleujah, you can live your video game playing life again!

Don’t worry though, maybe you’ll get to play with someone else in the game than Alex.
Providing the female heat (since no matter how hot the undead faceless nurses are they won’t follow you forever in this game) there’s a “spunky female friend named Elle ”who will aid Alex (and you) on this game“. Now whether or not she is an unlockable character (through gameplay or code) remains to be seen, but according to EGM she’ll provide a mix of streetwise sexy ala Maria from SH2 and the girl next door cuteness of SH3’s Heather (hopefully though without the facial graphics that make her look drugged out). Oh, and it looks like she and Alex come to Silent Hill with a ton of past between them, so there’s a possible (messy) love story between them… maybe.

Spoiler Alert! The Collective does admit that they want to “recapture the emotional impact you felt with the cast of Silent Hill 2“ when it comes to Alex and Elle... So, you know, if you played Silent Hill 2 then maybe you have a theory about how that’ll translate with SH5 and Alex/Elle.

Expect plot twists and a story deeper than finding his brother, as it looks like there may be some deep connections between Shepherd’s Glen and Silent Hill… whether this translates to Shepherd’s Glen being the launching points for future Silent Hills or a dire warning that Silent Hill’s reach extends far beyond the borders of the town itself (which was seen in Silent Hill 3 & Silent Hill 4 : The Room) which may translates into the chance to generate different “starting points” in future Silent Hill games (and different ways Silent Hill has slowly poisoned the landscape one city and village at a time) remains to be seen. Oh, one thing, you’ll actually journey to Silent Hill during SH5, no dark wormhole tunnels (which was actually tunneled by a giant trans-dimensional worm if I remember right) to make the link.

Now the bad news (sorta).
While SH5 does promise “a more user-friendly camera angle (controlled with the right analog stick)” (probably based on the 3rd person shooter camera used in RE4 though I haven’t seen any footage of it yet to either confirm or deny it) that seems to be the only innovation the game offers… the game promises that the look and feel of the game will remain true to it’s roots, with only a pretty coat of HD (and undead nurses that look like hot undead cheesecake centerfold lingere models… without faces) splashed over a world that (in my opinion) desperately needed that spark of fresh innovation that The Collective could have brought to the table in terms of game mechanics and gameplay. (Try not to ogle the nurses too much as they are trying to kill you. Pretty? Yes. But they want to hurt you… and not in the you‘ll pay a hundred dollars to be punished by the nurse hurt either)

From there talk goes about exploring the tainted real world and the dark bloody “paradise” world. That is all well and good, but cowtowing to the diehard fan base by keeping the game faithful to the franchise was not how The Collective should have approached making Silent Hill 5! I mean look at Resident Evil! After so many games with the same old same old they started to innovate and break away from that into new looks! The first attempt, yes, failed. The whole light gun shooter thing with the strangely James Bond-esque storyline in the dark days between RE3 and RE4 was bad, I admit it, but it also laid the groundwork for eventually inspiring the usage of the 3rd Person Shooter slash First Person Shooter cameras seen in RE4 (where real innovation came to light).

That is what Silent Hill needs. Silent Hill needs to spend some quality time trying to break it’s own mold, daring to innovate in new ways and change the “landscape” of the world by changing the way you play in the world (even if it means falling on their faces from time to time to reach that sense of perfection). Yes, the world of SH5 is pretty eye candy, but without a real lightyear leap in gameplay innovation what good is all the pretty eye candy if it plays familiar to people who played this franchise before? I thought Silent Hill 4 : The Room was the first step to evolution… but it wasn’t enough.

Well, all is not lost as SH5 does sport it’s own small step towards evolution, only maybe (if all goes well) this step is the right stone that’ll catapult the franchise into it’s RE4 hyper evolution. This is, however, this step is not like RE4’s evolution… because it has nothing to do with gameplay as it does with the addition of a realistic physics engine to the game (the popular Havok physics engine).
This now means that things are no longer just hard unmovable barriers, as even bumping into a chair in this game will set off a chain reaction where (in the past) you could run full force into objects and nothing happens. This means if you, say, bump into an unstable large shelf in a store it might topple over (causing a nerve shattering chain reaction that’ll make you jump from shock).
Spoiler Alert! The AI in this game promises to be ultra smart in at least one respect, responding to the slightest disturbance rallying to your position if you make too much noise (like in the scene mentioned above). No promises that they’ll then try to outflank and surround you but at least they come at the slightest noise. Make sure to have your meds by you should you go into a panic attack or something from the game suddenly making sudden loud noises during gameplay.

Another attempt at innovation is how you fight in the game (of course only playing the game will reveal whether it is truly innovative or a pain in the butt when played in full). This, however, is again not as much a major leap in innovation as it is an innovation linked to the innovation of having a character like Alex in this game (being career military). Unlike previous SH leads, Alex is military (with a buttload of military training being brought to the gorefest). Previous clubfests (Silent Hill 3 and Silent Hill 4 : The Room) you were in control of those who were not so military-inclined, thus the way you fought was basically the time tested method of flaying about wildly like a character in a bad side scrolling beat-em-up game. This game, however, promises on combat that will include a character that is more maneuverable than previous leads, as well as an actual combo list of moves from light to heavy attacks, as well as utilizing the new Havok engine to knock enemies into the now breakable environment.
To carry this out The Collective gave Alex (in the demo) two weapons, a knife and a lead pipe. More weapons are sure to be available in the final version, but as to what who can say? The one thing that can be said (about the weapons) is that the demo showed off a taste of the promised depth of possibilities both weapons offered up to players. Also there is new grappling moves, but this is balanced out perfectly by a no-fail system… basically if you fail grappling you’ll leave yourself open to being given a split personality by your enemies (for starters). Toss in countermoves and an evasive-roll move (which hopefully takes a page from God of War on ease of rolling) and you have yourself a real taste of innovation that is as pretty as the undead nurses… and no I won’t stop talking about the undead nurses, most of EGM’s article about SH5 dregs up as many shots of said nurses as possible in as many angles so I’m not the only one fixated on them it seems!

Oh, and there will be a shooting mechanics. Don’t expect RE4 style shooting though, as once again guns will not be the main focus on the game (they even promised that they have no intention to making SH a shooter game)… except, mind you as you’ll see later, nobody gave that whole no shooter memo to everyone making a Silent Hill game as somebody seemed to have broke the rules on that one.

But again more on that later.
So, as you can see some evolution can be said to have come to Silent Hill.
A new character with a new way to approach the game (and the world of the game).
New combat mechanics to take advantage of the new character.
Now how about them AI, are they going to get an overhaul?
Yes. According to EGM the AI are now smarter than before, which is a good thing (right?)

To balance out the stronger character Alex is, the AI are adjusted accordingly so that this will not be a total slaughter fest (I.e. you running right over them mowing them down Bruce Campbell in Evil Dead video games style). Foes will now kick open doors to get to you (on the upside this means if you are laying a trap then you won’t actually have a difficult time luring them into it as they’ll let themselves into your “lair” this time out), sound and visual clues will actually pierce their rotting brains and register (so you can’t just stand out of their “comfort zone” in plain sight watching them shamble about anymore), and some stimuli can also be a big attraction to them. The hot sexy undead nurses, for instance. They seem to react to light (as of the demo) so using lighting to your advantage could be a good thing (for distracting them for instance). I am sure each minion of the Hill has their own quirks and “attractions” which will mean probably experimenting which each to see how you can be circumvent each in turn.

SH5 creature design has both returning favorites (yes, once again, the nurses who now look a helluva lot sexier in Next Gen… go figure) and new beasts to burden you. Amongst the rumored creatures is a being called “Schism” (a “hideous humanoid with a massive blade-shaped head split by a zipper”) and “Smog” (an “emaciated gas spewing corpse covered in pulsating boils). Both of these just being the tip of the bloody iceberg you’ll play with as you roam the Hill in this outing.
Tranny alert! Look for the male/female whatever thing called “Siam”, which has both male and female body parts attached to it.

The big innovation with the creatures is the movement program, which combines a “Jacob’s Ladder” twitching style with full motion captured performances by people in green suits (also a first).
One thing that I am a little concerned about, though, is The Collective hinting to delivering massive boss battles with an emphasis on Zelda style duels against said foes… what? Where did that Zelda reference come into play? Don’t you mean RE4?? That is just a metaphor, right?

Otherwise there is no large leap in innovation (still murking about the Resident Evil inspired fetch quest puzzles for instance). However the game does promise a sense of open ended gameplay despite the fact it is still a linear point to point game. Uh… that’ll work, right?
One thing to note? Morality plays into unlocking multiple endings this time out. The way you treat the world about you , and those you run into, will decide how the game ends… so, what? If I anal probe a hot undead nurse will I get an alien abduction ending (Heeellllloooooo undead nurse!)? How will that work!

Thing is, however, even EGM admits that (at the time they talked to developers about the game) they were still having the heebie jeebies because of negative fan reaction over the changing of the guard with the game. Yeah, I guess there is some reason for that and all but (really) do they have to be so jittery?
Well then I guess you shouldn’t take this all at face value right off the bat. Give it a few months, let The Collective calm down, and once they’re no longer appearing jittery maybe we can trust in what they’re saying isn’t just fan service to quiet the angry hordes. Maybe. I’d say we’ll get confirmation of all of this when E3 2008 hits. By then they’re over their fan jitters and in their comfort zone over revealing more about the game (and not just stuff they hope will soothe fan fears).

However just because The Collective is making a Silent Hill game it doesn’t mean Japan isn’t doing anything Silent Hill right now… they are. Oh god are they making Silent Hill content!

Silent Hill : The Arcade Game
And here I thought arcades were doomed. It looks like this Fall will see the Japanese get a brand new shiny gift in their arcades in the form of Silent Hill : The Arcade Game. Themed on a “House of the Dead” stuck on rails shooter (if I remember House of the Dead right) the game will… wait a minute… I thought the Silent Hill franchise frowned on making the games into generic shooters… well, no wonder the SH people couldn’t jump fast enough to move the franchise to America if this is what they’ve been cooking up lately in Japan!

How does it look? It looks like somebody took the SH franchise and (bleep)ed all over it, that’s what!
I only have this one screenshot of the game and it looks awful! Uninspired creatures in an uninspired environment that even my PS2 could visualize better, with the promise of “corny” scripting and the whole shooter thing? Yeah, I am sure this is what Silent Hill fans have been dying to play.
Oh, what is it based on? Turns out it’s rumored to be based on the “Little Baroness” plot mentioned in Silent Hill 2... You don’t mind that being bastardized in this “game”, do you?

Silent Hill Interactive Manga
Yeah, if you remember Metal Gear Solid Interactive Comic for the PSP I figure we’re getting the same with Silent Hill… though whether or not it will one day make the leap to the PSP remains to be seen. The head writer and designer from SH2 and SH3 reunite for these interactive cell-phone manga series (Cage of Cradle and Double Under Dusk) featuring a mix of new and returning characters.
Too bad the only version you’ll get ia a no-so-interactive version of Cradle only… yeah, that sucks.
I guess nobody told the people porting this manga that the whole appeal of a new interactive manga is the whole interactive part. Go figure!

Silent Hill 2 the Movie
Yes, loved it or hated it it looks like it earned enough money for a sequel.
According to TriStar the first one was a hit… though I don’t seem to remember many of my associates waxing poetic about said movie… bad news is that it’ll go forward with a new director and screenplay writer. Of course if you happened to have hated Silent Hill 1 maybe fresh blood in that dept. just might be what the crazy cult woman called for. Who knows, you might actually fall in love with the Silent Hill movies with a newly revamped and revisioned “sequel”! Of course the movie could slide even deeper down the (bleep)er and make everyone hate the movies even more than before. One or the other.

And now…
Silent Hill : Origins
You know what? I am not holding my breath about the chances of SH : Origins being the breakout hit of the PSP. Right now that distinction seems to be held by God of War : Chains of Olympus.
But since I said I would talk about it here’s what the latest news is about Silent Hills Origins.

Well, let it not be said that (at some point) the people behind Silent Hill did not at least TRY to innovate using the innovations learned by RE4... Only if they were actually serious about infusing RE4 innovation into Silent Hill they should have done it on a system actually capable of handling said innovation!

Case in point Silent Hill : Origins for the PSP.
Now the PSP is a leap in innovation in and of itself for the handheld market, but it is still not perfect. If games like Me & My Katamari, Godfather : Mob Wars and quite possibly the as yet seen Elder Scrolls Travels : Oblivion for the PSP proves… the system can only do so much. So now load up a new version of a classic horror franchise like Silent Hill and try to splash a coating of RE4 innovation on it and… well… expect something ugly to occur.

The RE4 infusion came from developer U.K. home based Climax (who lost their L.A. operations recently which was working on SH : Origins before the game was shifted over to a one of Climax‘s England based teams) and early word of the gameplay was that ugly… and from the one screenshot of it in EGM you can see why. Compared with the new game footage from new developer you can see there’s a vast difference between the two! The L.A. version is wonky looking, the scene looks bad and the monster in the scene looks badly animated. Now look at the far better looking screenshots from the UK based team and see how much better the game looks with a new team working it. Strangely enough it still looks like RE4 screenshots but they promised they went back to traditional Silent Hill with the new version (to be precise it mimicks Silent Hill 2 instead of Resident Evil 4 this time out, while promising to flesh out the storyline of Silent Hill (original) in the process.

SPOILER ALERT! Odd… didn’t they mention in the game’s early plot synopsis that your character saves a girl (badly burned) from a building in Silent Hill? Doesn’t that seem to sound like the origins of a character from Silent Hill 3? Yeah, that’s probably from Silent Hill (Original) too but I just like bringing up facts concerning everyone’s favorite faux druggie from SH3... Yeah, I’ll never get over her facial graphics and how drugged out she looks… I mean, well, damn!

Now here’s one problem I have (already) with Origins.
It’s based on the look, feel and playability of Silent Hill 2 (with a few tricks from later games like the breakable weapons and grappling… only without the deathly consequences of grappling in SH5) but… what? The game is supposed to be suffering from the same total lack of playing time ala Elder Scrolls Travels?!? Are you kidding me??

First off isn’t SH2 a PSOne era game?!? Even if it’s PS2 it’s manageable PS2 right? So then how does a game that the PSP should be capable of handling end up being so short! It’s not like the game is hacking in a (bleep)load of content like Elder Scrolls Travels (yes, the PSP cannot handle next gen system stuff, not even Xbox stuff, so to make the game true to it’s Xbox Original/next gen console brothers is a sure way to make the game extremely limited!) so how come it’s clocking in at a rumored… what?!? Whattya mean Silent Hill Origins may only be so many hours long! (And totally lack a difficulty select mode)!!

Yeah. Sometime tells me Silent Hill Origins isn’t going to be that game everyone is going to want for Christmas… which kinda sucks because new word on God of War : Chains of Olympus says they’ve abandoned their plans for a Holiday 2007 release and pushed it back to Spring 2008... Oh, suckitude!

But Silent Hill isn’t the only thing on the block to look out for.
As we wrap this preview up let’s look at what 2007 to 2008 has in store for you in terms of horror.
In chronological order…

October 2007
Clive Barker’s Jericho
Good news! It’s a PS3/XBox360 game called Jericho that doesn’t have the words “CBS’” before the name! Yeah, I really wanted to play a game about a show that should have had the words “Do Not Resurrect” slapped on it’s contract after it’s first season ending.

Good news? It’s a game from Horror master Clive Barker.
Bad news? It’s also a squad based shooter… uh… isn’t horror games supposed to be a solo affair between you and your own damnation? Maybe not… if Left4Dead is any indication of the future of horror shooters this may be a trend we might see much of in the coming years.
However I’ve looked over some of the screenshots and it looks pretty (I’ll give it that).

Dementium : The Ward
Now don’t be shocked when I tell you this but… it’s a Nintendo DS game!
Don’t run! Don’t run! As it turns out Dementium may make you finally forget the travesty that was the horror known as Resident Evil DS. And, while I’m at it, maybe it’ll also make you forget that horrible crappy zombie shooter pretending to be The Suffering (only, you know, except for the part that The Suffering didn‘t suck like this game sucked) called… and this should be your first warning the game sucks if the name of the game sucks… “Touch the Dead“! (I don’t know if this game is trying to make me throw up or hit on me (which would be sexual harassment))! A horror title promising impressive 3D visuals, and the ability to use your stylus to keep a log of your romp through a nightmarish hospital (the land Medicare forgot)? This may be the breakthrough game for the DS -- if it can only avoid sucking like the few other attempts at Survival Horror on the DS had fallen into the dark pit of suckitude!
I’m going to review it in the near future, keep an eye out for that review!
SPOILER ALERT - Expect jokes about the company who made the game… they’re called “Gamecock”.

Fall 2007
Resident Evil : Umbrella Chronicles
Let’s face it, this game is just an alsoran included with the bright shiny new Wii Zapper to introduce it to the world. Odds are you’re not going to really respect having a Wii Zapper until you purchase Medal of Honor Airborne (which has been made to be interactive with the Wii Zapper once it releases).
(Hey! Did you see that they’re releasing a complete Trilogy version of LEGO Star Wars on the Wii featuring both the original and Original Trilogy Lego Star Wars II in one game?!? That should be fun if the controls are as good as the PS2/PSP controls and you can max out the amount of little itsy bitsy LEGO Star Wars characters are occupying your bar or cantina at one time!)

Winter (Holiday?) 2007
Alone in the Dark
Yes, somebody over at Atari thought it’d be about time to reboot Alone in the Dark for next gen consoles the PS3 and XBox360... Apparently the movie didn’t completely make people never want to see this franchise ever again. Whether that is because the movie was good, or people are just too stubborn to give up on the franchise is a matter of personal opinion.
Oh, and you get to romp through a messed up Central Park in NYC in this game.

Spring 2008
Condemned 2 : Bloodshot
Wait. Isn’t Condemned the game about beating up homeless people?
This time out you steal a few pages from Gears of War for this PS3/XBox360 next gen game by having the ability to smash people’s heads through things, and stomping on their necks. If there is any other comparisons to Gears of War, however, nobody is saying… yet.

Left4Dead
The aforementioned co-op first person shooter where you team up with friends to fight off the undead, or become the undead (“boss infected”) and hunt the living. Sounds like fun, hope it is fun when it comes out as it may be the next evolution in survival horror gaming.

Sometime in 2008
EA Games is working on an original title called “Dead Space” for sometime in 2008 (which, despite the title, isn’t a game based on the void between Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck’s ears) for the PS3 and XBox360, Eidos is going back to it’s Fear Effect franchise (no firm date set) and Brash Entertainment learns nothing of the failings of every other movie to game translation by trying their hand at… wait for it… wait for it… a Saw game! Yeah, the franchise that refuses to die (now out with Saw IV) is now coming out with a video game… let’s hope the Saw franchise is still “alive” and “well” when the game arrives… and the game totally doesn’t kill off the franchise by being crappy (which I am sure it will be).

Now the meat and potatoes of 2008!
Fall 2008
Alan Wake
The horror in this game comes from sleep deprivation (though not the sleep deprivation that comes from the unwillingness of you to set the controller down, turn your XBox360 off and go to bed)!
As you are unable to sleep, hunting for your missing fiancee, you find that you are slowly being driven insane! Your un-life journal is filled with insane ramblings that may or may not be your own, you keep glimpsing your missing fiancee as if she’s haunting you, and someone in the shadows is screaming your name… only it’s not like Cheers in that they don’t seem to be glad that you came. So, is this all in your head because your staying up too late, or is it real? That is the question, isn’t it. Too bad this game, which sounds like it should be good, is only for the XBox360 (exclusive). Yeah. The Wii so totally sucks with ZERO horror games this and next year! Damn! But we have the ultimate LEGO Star Wars game dammit! That has to count for something!! Still, even the DS has more horror love than the Wii and doesn‘t that suck! What gives with that!!

Silent Hill 5
What we’ve been talking about for pages on end.

And finally…
Resident Evil 5
Hold your breath, because right now it’s tethering between a promise of a Christmas 2008 release, and the downer of being pushed back as far as “Early” 2009 (which might roll as far as Spring 2009!)
(As of last word on the game, however, hope turns to pain as word is now the game won’t see the light of day until sometime in 2009 (maybe the Spring of 2009 if we’re lucky!))

Based on, yes, the movie Black Hawk Down (the movie based on reality set in Somalia about the American military team hunted by crazed people who might be guilty of being black because of, you know, their zip code of residence and the movie being emulated and all)! However in this game it isn’t just the people who’ll kill you, as you experience hallucinations brought about by the damn heat of the African deserts cape… oh, and that girl Sherry from RE2 is rumored to be in this game and totally older than before… well, somewhat older at least… hmm, is she going to be President‘s Daughter from RE4 cute as a button in this game (hopefully with less smart-itude up her mouth though)? Whether or not she becomes a playable character again remains to be seen (but rumor has it she is indeed playable).

So that’s it. A year to wait before the horror of Silent Hill returns (and runs smack dab into insomnia and a new round of Resident Evil, which is odd now that both games are numbered equally at 5 (RE5 vs. SH5). So then… let the best game that doesn’t take forever and eternity to release win… that may mean you SH5, but I’ll always love Resident Evil regardless.

-- David Rasmussen 10th Nov 07