Silent Hill 5!

[Aazealh]

Played it for about 2 hours last night. I always play SH at night, in the dark because I'm a huge loser.

I wouldn't say that, rather I find it heightens the experience. Playing "scary" games in broad daylight sort of hinders their atmosphere to me.

The graphics are fantastic and music is really good, but no surprise there. I'm surprised though that this game only outputs to 720p. Where's the 1080 love?

Hehe, I don't think many games actually support 1080p... You'll probably have to wait for the next generation of consoles to see it widespread.

 

[handsome rakshas]

I had the day off work yesterday so I managed to finish the game last night. The ending was predictable if you actually paid attention to a few things during the course of the game, not bad though. I don't have the energy to beat the game five times so I looked up the other endings and the one I got was the best of the bunch. Unfortunately they even seemed to suck all the fun

Spoiler

out of the UFO ending, this one was shitty.

If you want to get the better ending IMO

Spoiler

Kill his mother, don't forgive his dad, and give Wheeler a medkit when he's dying.

There was actually one part of the game that creeped me out and that was the hell descent followed by the boss of that area which I think was probably one of the creepiest bosses of the series

Spoiler

Scarlet

.
I actually got a little better at the melee fighting and was kicking some monsters butts without getting hit. Overall it was an o.k game I just think they took too much inspiration from the movie and even Silent Hill Origins. And way too much from Jacob's Ladder! Now I'm free to play Mega Man until Dead Space comes out. I hope I don't get stuck on that game because EVERYTHING (School, work, personal life) else is getting thrown aside at the end of the month.

"The time has once again come for the forces of good and evil to engage in their ancient battle. Dracula's castle beckons for you..."

 

[Vampire_Hunter_Bob]

Overall it was an o.k game I just think they took too much inspiration from the movie and even Silent Hill Origins. And way too much from Jacob's Ladder!

Wasn't most of the series based off David Lynch films and Jacob's Ladder?

 

[handsome rakshas]

I wouldn't say "most" of the series was based off of one person's films. I think Silent Hill 1 had a more Stephen King feel to it than anything else. I guess I said that because the main character is a "veteran" and there were similiar scenes.

 

[Walter]

SH2 seemed heavily inspired by Jacob's Ladder to me too. I mean, James even has a veteran's jacket.

 

[Vampire_Hunter_Bob]

SH2 seemed heavily inspired by Jacob's Ladder to me too. I mean, James even has a veteran's jacket.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjMjYzB4-yM Jacob's Ladder Hospital scene [don't watch if you've never seen jacob's ladder... also hit your self for not seeing jacob's ladder. I mean really?]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjMjYzB4-yM Silent Hill 2's hospital part [it starts at the 3 minute mark. Also I think this was a Lets Play or something]

Also Rakshas take a good look at the Jacob's Ladder video. They pretty much did base the other world off of this movie.

 

[Aazealh]

I wouldn't say "most" of the series was based off of one person's films. I think Silent Hill 1 had a more Stephen King feel to it than anything else.

As a long time lover of Stephen King's short story The Mist, I can tell you I've always assumed that the town's fog and the hellish creatures coming out of it were directly inspired from that story. It's just too similar not to be the case. And I have to agree that there's a Lynch feel to some parts of it, like the characters for example. That being said, the first game goes beyond simple borrowed elements and has a rather rich (if somewhat messy/random) lore.

As for Jacob's Ladder, I'm also with Bob and Wally about SH2 resembling it in some ways. Even SH1 in fact, with some of the otherworld, or the way the bad ending has Harry hallucinating while dying from the car accident for example.

 

[Cronus]

The designers said in the Making of SH2 DVD (or was it SH3?) that the motif for SH was mainly inspired by The Mist and other Stephen King works. The hell world motif is Jacob's Ladder, at least the scenes in the hospital. Hell I noticed some references though perhaps unintentional with Eli Roth's Hostel, mostly in camera work.

 

[Zelz]

Silent Hill: Home coming, kind of disappointed me a bit. The combat system was great and everything but I think it was lacking a lot of originality like the first games had and was not as scary or tense either. One other big thing that I was disappointed about was the fact it showed around 3 cut-scenes of "Pyramid Head" but you didn't even encounter him once in actual game play. Overall though I would agree that it is a decent game but it seems this series starting to get a bit tired now which is a shame, since Silent Hill has been the only surival horror game that can give me a bit of a scare.

 

[Aazealh]

The designers said in the Making of SH2 DVD (or was it SH3?) that the motif for SH was mainly inspired by The Mist and other Stephen King works.

Awesome, thanks for the confirmation. I knew I was right!

Hell I noticed some references though perhaps unintentional with Eli Roth's Hostel, mostly in camera work.

For this new SH5 you mean? Because except Origins, the others all came out before Hostel was released.

 

[NightCrawler]

Wouldn't you guys agree that Jacob's Ladder is terribly underrated?

 

[Oburi]

I decided to buy this last night and boy am I glad I did. With all the mixed reviews I wasn't sure if I would like it, but seriously I played it for 5 hours strait. The combat system is much better than the previous games and even though it's more tied in with the movie it still delivers the scares. I think most people that are disappointed with it are kids who just loved Silent hill: the room so much but never actually played the first three. I mean these games are old and Homecoming reminds me of the those first games. Anyway I'm addicted right now and loving every second of it. I don't think it's too dark either. You know you can adjust the darkness setting right?

 

[Vampire_Hunter_Bob]

You know you can adjust the darkness setting right?

Yeah, I've done that. I'm starting to think my tv is just going up.

 

[handsome rakshas]

I think most people that are disappointed with it are kids who just loved Silent hill: the room so much but never actually played the first three.

No, the people who are disappointed with it are the people who've been playing it since day one. You should check out the first three titles if you've never played them.

 

[Zelz]

Yea, I've been playing Silent Hill since the first one came out on Playstation and I was still disappointed with Homecoming, although it was an decent game.

 

[Aazealh]

I think most people that are disappointed with it are kids who just loved Silent hill: the room so much but never actually played the first three.

That's a rather presumptuous assumption.

 

[Oburi]

Well I just beat the game on the normal difficulty and I must say it was a very good experience. Very well put together game. Although I'll admit it seemed short and actually very easy. I saved tons of health and ammo for the end of the game and I beat the final boss in less than three minutes and still had seven medkits and and 5 health drinks. It was almost too easy, I would have played it on hard first time through had I known. It wasn't as scary as it could have been. I never had mush trouble with the combat system and the puzzles...were so incredibly easy they weren't really puzzles. The last puzzle I didn't even think about I just tried random combinations and got within two minutes. Overall a good game but I really wish I rented it or borrowed it from a friend because it took me only three days of playing and I prolly won't play it again often. Although when I was playing I was having massive amounts of fun and it was time well spent. I also played for 6 hours at time for four days or so. Now I'll go back and get all the different endings, then leave the game to collect dust on the shelf for about 5 months and finally trade it in for less than a quarter of the value.

 

[handsome rakshas]

I just couldn't put up with the idea of going through it multiple times. If you youtube the other endings like I did you'll be glad you didn't. Get rid of it while it still has value and pick up Dead Space (playing it) or Fallout 3. In 5 months you'll be able to get this game for 20 bucks. I'm glad you enjoyed it though.

 

[Aazealh]

Get rid of it while it still has value and pick up Dead Space (playing it) or Fallout 3.

How's Dead Space?

 

[handsome rakshas]

It's pretty good so far, kind of a Resident Evil 4 in space. The gameplay is pretty tight and responds well, aiming is very easy. There's currency which you use to buy new items and power nodes used to upgrade your suit, weapons, and special abilities. Monsters are very reminiscent of The Thing and pop out to scare the hell out of you quite often. There is a lot of backtracking so far but the game sends you to new levels pretty often. I'm on level three and I haven't fought a boss creature yet.

 

[Aazealh]

Sounds good, I'll have to check it out! Thanks man.