Look, sorry, but it's hard maintaining an Ιnternet show -however cheap- when you don't actually make any money off of it. People tend to dismiss your work when it's not actual work and you need to re-prioritise when things come up.
So, between those, Easter (it was after the game's release here) and a very bad break-up I'm still trying to recover from, this will have to do.
I feel that, after so many delays I may have to just come out and say it: "Silent Hill Downpour" is probably the truest title to the rest of the series since "Silent Hill 4: The Room" (2004). It has a lot going for it, but I wouldn't break out the champagne just yet.
You play Murphy Pendleton, a prison inmate with a shady past, which he is reluctant to reveal until you're far enough into the game to not care anymore. During a transfer to another facility, the bus crashes and he has the chance to escape. Sadly, to earn his freedom, he must first cross the haunted town of Silent Hill, which as far as miracles go is like not having to go to work one day, because you have explosive diarrhoea. Now Murphy must use fists and wits to escape the nightmare.
Konami's main objective for a long time now has been to introduce a more flexible and "westernized" movement and combat system into a series that used to feature stiff and barely responsible controls. "Downpour" is the first title in a while that does this well. There is one basic attack and one basic block move. Combat requires timing and discourages mashing the attack button. Breakable weapons make a return from "Silent Hill: Origins" (2006) and there are tons of objects Murphy can pick up to protect himself, from rocks and bricks to lead pipes, fire-axes (sadly not the kind that is really engulfed in flames) and guns.
The game is a little too liberal with those and undermines the danger the monsters pose, but at the very least it allows avoiding fights, which has been missing from the series for a while. Especially against multiple enemies, where the dodge button is ineffective, you're advised to leg it, if possible.
The puzzles have made a moderately successful return after years of "phoning it in". Most of them are simplistic and easy to discern, but they are usually fragmented into stages and take a while to solve, thus becoming the main method of progression through the game; a nice throw-back to the better days of the series.
The biggest new feature that the developers hyped during production are the new side-quests and, considering how the classic titles used to focus so much on exploring the town, it's odd nobody had thought of it before. Many of them are easy to find around town, even if you're not looking for 100% completion and they reward with small perks for the rest of the game. They are also a nice motive for exploring the town-- a necessary motive, in fact, because good old-fashioned curiosity and sense of adventure will die out soon after you've tried to use the ridiculously unhelpful in-game maps.
Not all is good in the Otherworld, however. Literally, where the game trips and falls really, really flat is Silent Hill's hallmark "Otherworld" (the horrifying Hell dimension that randomly takes over the town), by extension, the scares. The monsters pose a threat, but their design is plain, uninspired and most of the time, a little too human. The fog that surrounds the town, as well as rain and thunderstorms that kick in occasionally, are a nice touch, but Silent Hill doesn't feel nearly as claustrophobic as it did in the earlier installments of the series.
And of course, the Otherworld. Downpour's Otherworld is truly fun. There are more extravagant puzzles in comparison to the "real world" and these elevate creatively the game. Sadly, this "Alternate Silent Hill" (also referred to as "Nightmare Silent Hill") is also way too well-lit, not rusty enough, with few monsters, a little too linear and lacking any sense of blood or gore that made these sequences so disturbing and scary in another generation. For the most part during these brief segments, Murphy will be running away from a very not-scary, contextually undefined big red orb-- like the town is your mom and she's trying to suck you back into her vagina... which would've been a considerably more disturbing idea, come to think of it.
In the end of the day, I guess Konami can call this one a win. They finally managed to tweak the combat system enough, without damaging the "survival" part of the "survival horror" genre. I'm just not sure this is what they should be focusing on.
"Silent Hill" is one of those series that peaked very early on and ever since the only thing it has been doing is trying to cope in a new generation of games by endlessly mimicking itself. It's hard to solely blame developer Vatra Games for this, but I can't pretend it doesn't matter either.
Much like the abominable and entirely out-of-place "Silent Hill: Homecoming" (2008), this latest installment lacks any sense of an original thought, as well as relevance and psychological depth, complexity and significant subtext; and unlike the bolder (and criminally underrated) "Silent Hill: Shattered Memories" (2009), it seems incapable of setting strong foundations and showing different directions for the series to take in the future.
The thing that Konami has yet to understand since Team Silent called it quits is that the latest entries, both the good and the bad ones, just aren't as intelligent anymore. That's what elevated the series originally (in conjunction with the scares).
Still, if you can do away with all of the above and your pretences of what a "Silent Hill" title should be about, Downpour is an otherwise solid game that offers lots of fun and has enough passion poured into its design to distinguish it from the countless production-line games out there.
The Good: Solid controls, fun gameplay, great length, moderate replayability, satisfactory graphics, good music and sound design.
The Not-So-Good: Framerate issues on the PS3 version, lack of scares, dull atmosphere, the story and presentation don't make the most of what they have, symbolism either too heavy-handed or non-existent, little new to offer to the series or the genre in general.
The Terrible: Where is the damned siren?!?
Rating: 3.5/5 ('ABOVE AVERAGE'- bordering to 'GOOD')
You can view the Abridged version of the review below:
So, between those, Easter (it was after the game's release here) and a very bad break-up I'm still trying to recover from, this will have to do.
I feel that, after so many delays I may have to just come out and say it: "Silent Hill Downpour" is probably the truest title to the rest of the series since "Silent Hill 4: The Room" (2004). It has a lot going for it, but I wouldn't break out the champagne just yet.
You play Murphy Pendleton, a prison inmate with a shady past, which he is reluctant to reveal until you're far enough into the game to not care anymore. During a transfer to another facility, the bus crashes and he has the chance to escape. Sadly, to earn his freedom, he must first cross the haunted town of Silent Hill, which as far as miracles go is like not having to go to work one day, because you have explosive diarrhoea. Now Murphy must use fists and wits to escape the nightmare.
Konami's main objective for a long time now has been to introduce a more flexible and "westernized" movement and combat system into a series that used to feature stiff and barely responsible controls. "Downpour" is the first title in a while that does this well. There is one basic attack and one basic block move. Combat requires timing and discourages mashing the attack button. Breakable weapons make a return from "Silent Hill: Origins" (2006) and there are tons of objects Murphy can pick up to protect himself, from rocks and bricks to lead pipes, fire-axes (sadly not the kind that is really engulfed in flames) and guns.
 | |
| My name is Murphy. I'm contractually obligated to have a tortured past. |
The game is a little too liberal with those and undermines the danger the monsters pose, but at the very least it allows avoiding fights, which has been missing from the series for a while. Especially against multiple enemies, where the dodge button is ineffective, you're advised to leg it, if possible.
The puzzles have made a moderately successful return after years of "phoning it in". Most of them are simplistic and easy to discern, but they are usually fragmented into stages and take a while to solve, thus becoming the main method of progression through the game; a nice throw-back to the better days of the series.
The biggest new feature that the developers hyped during production are the new side-quests and, considering how the classic titles used to focus so much on exploring the town, it's odd nobody had thought of it before. Many of them are easy to find around town, even if you're not looking for 100% completion and they reward with small perks for the rest of the game. They are also a nice motive for exploring the town-- a necessary motive, in fact, because good old-fashioned curiosity and sense of adventure will die out soon after you've tried to use the ridiculously unhelpful in-game maps.
Not all is good in the Otherworld, however. Literally, where the game trips and falls really, really flat is Silent Hill's hallmark "Otherworld" (the horrifying Hell dimension that randomly takes over the town), by extension, the scares. The monsters pose a threat, but their design is plain, uninspired and most of the time, a little too human. The fog that surrounds the town, as well as rain and thunderstorms that kick in occasionally, are a nice touch, but Silent Hill doesn't feel nearly as claustrophobic as it did in the earlier installments of the series.
 |
| The Screamer is the most common enemy in the game. She's only mildly unnerving in the first encounter. |
And of course, the Otherworld. Downpour's Otherworld is truly fun. There are more extravagant puzzles in comparison to the "real world" and these elevate creatively the game. Sadly, this "Alternate Silent Hill" (also referred to as "Nightmare Silent Hill") is also way too well-lit, not rusty enough, with few monsters, a little too linear and lacking any sense of blood or gore that made these sequences so disturbing and scary in another generation. For the most part during these brief segments, Murphy will be running away from a very not-scary, contextually undefined big red orb-- like the town is your mom and she's trying to suck you back into her vagina... which would've been a considerably more disturbing idea, come to think of it.
In the end of the day, I guess Konami can call this one a win. They finally managed to tweak the combat system enough, without damaging the "survival" part of the "survival horror" genre. I'm just not sure this is what they should be focusing on.
 |
| The biggest threat in Downpour's nighmarish Otherworld is, apparently, disco. |
"Silent Hill" is one of those series that peaked very early on and ever since the only thing it has been doing is trying to cope in a new generation of games by endlessly mimicking itself. It's hard to solely blame developer Vatra Games for this, but I can't pretend it doesn't matter either.
Much like the abominable and entirely out-of-place "Silent Hill: Homecoming" (2008), this latest installment lacks any sense of an original thought, as well as relevance and psychological depth, complexity and significant subtext; and unlike the bolder (and criminally underrated) "Silent Hill: Shattered Memories" (2009), it seems incapable of setting strong foundations and showing different directions for the series to take in the future.
The thing that Konami has yet to understand since Team Silent called it quits is that the latest entries, both the good and the bad ones, just aren't as intelligent anymore. That's what elevated the series originally (in conjunction with the scares).
Still, if you can do away with all of the above and your pretences of what a "Silent Hill" title should be about, Downpour is an otherwise solid game that offers lots of fun and has enough passion poured into its design to distinguish it from the countless production-line games out there.
The Good: Solid controls, fun gameplay, great length, moderate replayability, satisfactory graphics, good music and sound design.
The Not-So-Good: Framerate issues on the PS3 version, lack of scares, dull atmosphere, the story and presentation don't make the most of what they have, symbolism either too heavy-handed or non-existent, little new to offer to the series or the genre in general.
The Terrible: Where is the damned siren?!?
Rating: 3.5/5 ('ABOVE AVERAGE'- bordering to 'GOOD')
You can view the Abridged version of the review below:
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