Topic: Extra Life #2: Silent Hill: Shattered Memories

[NWR_Neal]

Extra Life is a weekly column focused on giving games a second chance. Each week, I'll look at one game that I missed. It could be a game that received universal appraisal, or one that seemingly nobody played.


This week's entry is Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, the reimagining of the first Silent Hill game that came out last December.

[Halbred]

Loved it. Yes, Cybil would very likely be naked in my version. It's entirely probable that I would restart the game and give different answers until she walked in with a DoA bikini on.

[pyrokamileon]

I'm only about five hours or so into the game myself so I wouldn't want any spoilers..  but I would really like to hear his impressions about later parts of the game.  I'll just make sure not to come back until I've finished the game, please put up more impressions when you can!

[NWR_Neal]

I'm only about five hours or so into the game myself so I wouldn't want any spoilers..  but I would really like to hear his impressions about later parts of the game.  I'll just make sure not to come back until I've finished the game, please put up more impressions when you can!

I'll probably be playing more as soon as I can, so I'll probably post more impressions in this thread as I go on. I'll spoiler tag them, of course.

[ShyGuy]

I want to read this but, I don't want to spoil myself. I need to buy this game.

[Stratos]

I loved this game. Reminds me that I need to go and finish it. I got close to the reported end of the game but got distracted by new titles. It's held my attention to this point and I need to find a night to sit down in the dark and finish it. That's the best way to play it.

[KDR_11k]

The developer stated that one of the main goals in development was to make sure everybody finishes the game.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

If I spoil it now, no one will come back here.

[Jonnyboy117]

I'm loving this feature!

[Ymeegod]

Finished it awhile back and didn't care much for it.  The story was the one saving grace but everything else didn't amount to much.  Sure the chase & evade worked nicely for a "scare" but not when it's the only option.  They needed to mix it up IMO, like a few levels where you played another character who could fight or something.

[broodwars]

Hmm...considering this is a feature dedicated to playing older games and giving them a new shot at life, it feels kind of early to be doing this for Shattered Memories already.  In any case, I liked the game, but the story was the only saving grace for me as well.  As I've stated before, I found the exploration sections so utterly unfrightening or even unnerving (which is usually what Silent Hill shoots for) that they kind of bored me.  And they really would have been better off making those ice sections completely linear and just focusing on the escape aspect, rather than having the player juggling fleeing from the enemies and trying to find their way through increasingly labyrinth-ian areas.  Then they could have really played up the danger and pulled some spectacular set piece moments.  Instead, they're just kind of annoying and tedious.  The Psychiatrist sequences really saved the game, though.

[KDR_11k]

I don't mind the lack of fighting but the enemies were too predictable (and thus not scary). They never really change the enemy behaviour up and there's only one type of enemy. Also even if they do grab you you can just throw them off again with a simple gesture (worked for me every time until the last chase sequence and that seemed to be a supposed-to-lose fight since the story continued anyway after I got overwhelmed). There's practically no penalty to running straight at the monsters and pushing them over once they latch on. Project Zero let you fight back yet the enemies were scarier because they could teleport around you and turn invisible, meaning they could randomly appear in any position while you frantically try to spot them before they get to you.

[fernoumr]

I'm a fan of the whole "Extra Life" feature idea.  Too often, coverage for games is concentrated solely before the game's release.  The coverage seems to follow this timeline:

• rumors
• speculation
• predictions
• anticipation
• reviews
• ..... [crickets]....

Reviews are great and all, but I also like reading about someone's anecdotal experience with game.  It's exceptionally rare for me to purchase a game on or near release date, so I like to learn outside the marketing hype.