Silent Hill: Origins

"An incredible experience"

So there I was in EB Games a few days ago wondering what PSP game I could spend my hard earned cash on, and a quick run through of the games showed that there wasn't too much quality on offer. But then I saw Silent Hill: Origins and was rather intrigued. I did a review a while back on the shooter F.E.A.R. and complained that it didn't give me the "scary" experience that I was looking for - this game fills that niche quite perfectly.

I have never owned or played any of the Silent Hill games - they never seemed to grab my attention. I picked up Origins purely on a whim because I was looking for a fun new game to toy around with, and I sure made the right choice. It's a prequel of sorts which explains some of the events that happened before the first Silent Hill game, so SH vets will most likely play it to fill their knowledge of the franchise's story, while newcomers - like myself - may be a little confused about how the game's story unfolds or how it ends. Not to worry though, because I believe that the game itself is good enough that every PSP owner should give this game a go.

You play as Travis Grady, a lonely trucker with an apparently troubled past. As he hauls his rig along the highway late one night, he happens to stumble upon a sleepy little town called Silent Hill, in which he decides to take a detour. Things change for him however, when a little girl runs in front of his rig, causing him to slam on the brakes. As Travis follows the girl, he comes across a burning house in which someone is trapped. From there, Travis' story spins out of control as he enters Silent Hill and discovers the horrors lurking within. The story is really quite impressive and as you play through the game, Travis' role in this hellish town becomes more and more clear - lets just say that he has a few more connections with the town than he first thought. It's told through snippets of information Travis finds as well as a few "flashback" moments and some really top notch FMV scenes, and it never gets boring because you genuinely want to know what happens next, or rather what happened before (in the past). There are a few endings as well with one of them connecting with the first Silent Hill game, but as a newcomer, I felt a little underwhelmed by the information-limited conclusion.

Graphics-wise, this is one of the best games out there. From the subtle static on the screen to the incredible lighting effects from your flashlight, the game's graphics do an incredible job of drawing you into the world. The game takes part in four major areas of Silent Hill and a few smaller regions, and Travis reaches these places through running through the deserted streets (deserted by people, anyway). Outside locations are awesome, with a gentle fog cast over things in the distance so you can't quite see what's up ahead. The four locations - a hospital, mental asylum, theatre and motel - are all really well designed and are quite large, meaning that there are plenty of puzzles to keep you occupied - but more on that later. Travis uses mirrors to cross over to the "Otherworld", a form of your location seemingly ripped straight from Hell itself. Instead of smooth white walls in the hospital, you get blood and grime caked walls with rusted bars and destroyed furniture - it looks really awesome and freaks you out time and time again. The monster design is another aspect that lends to the scariness of the experience - some of the weirdest and freakiest monsters I have ever witnessed can be fought in this game. There's a thing that looks like a human except that its top half is encased in a jelly sac thing so that it can move around inside it but not break free. Or there's the skinned cow thing that uses is hind legs to push itself forward because it has this bloated, limp upper torso. The monsters are freaky and are even more so when they jump out at you from the dark as you traverse the different locations. The boss fights are incredible too, simply for the design of them, but I won't ruin them for you as they are best experienced first-hand.

But how does it play? As a survival horror game, the key point is controls and gameplay and how they work together. Moving around is done by using the analog stick and the various face buttons are allocated to attack, interact, map and flashlight. Pressing the SELECT button brings up the inventory where everything is split into different categories which are selected using the R and L buttons. After a while getting used to the controls, everything works really fluently and intuitively and you'll get the hang of it fairly quickly. When Travis encounters a demonspawn (or whatever they are), you simply hold down the R button and Travis adopts the combat stance, where whatever weapon he is holding can be used to inflict sweet, sweet pain. A touch of the D-pad switches between melee and firearm weapons and the different weapons in each category. It works well but sometimes trying to quickly change to a good melee weapon after your previous one breaks in the middle of combat can be a bit too fiddly. Oh yes, weapons can break and they will do so more than you'd like. However there is a large range of items that can be picked up and used ranging from televisions and drip stands to scalpels and katanas which means that you'll never be short of something to use against your opponents. When you attack a monster with a melee weapon enough times, they'll drop to the floor and lie there for a moment. If you don't execute a finishing move, they'll get back up again and keep fighting. However, I had a big problem with the game not responding when I stood next to a fallen enemy and pressed the X button - a lot of the time Travis would stand there and do nothing and the monster would get back up, prompting me to just run due to the fact that I couldn't be bothered spending more time killing a monster I'd already killed. A minor issue but fairly annoying nonetheless.

There's more to this game than killing monsters, however. Travis will encounter many puzzles during his visit to Silent Hill, and these puzzles play an important part to both the gameplay and the story. Most of the puzzles require some exploration and logic, and they all help Travis get further in each location. For example, in the hospital, you need to recreate the insides of a person by placing plastic organs in a dummy. However, the missing heart is locked in a box with a code attached which can only be deciphered by exploring the hospital and finding messages scrawled on certain walls in blood. Once the dummy is complete, its eyes will open and you must then use the eyes to open a locked doorway - weird stuff indeed. Travis also needs to travel between the normal world and the Otherworld to solve these puzzles which also lengthens the game and adds some more depth, and it really adds to the experience.

All horror games need a killer soundtrack, and Origins does not disappoint. From the flickering static to the creepy music, Origins' sounds also draw you into the world. You really need to play this game with headphones on and no other distractions just so you can really immerse yourself in the world and the eeriness it creates. I did encounter a bug in the later stages of the game where sound effects didn't play, which was quite annoying. It seemed to go away after a restart though, so maybe is was a one-off bug.

One of Origins' biggest drawcards is the atmosphere it creates. Playing this in a dark room with headphones on is the best way to play this as you'll be fully immersed in the world it creates. There's also heaps of replay value too - which is good, I finished it in under 4 hours - with different accolades for how you finish the game and unlockable costumes. However, I felt myself wanting to go back and play it straight away just because it's so freaking good and I enjoyed every minute of it. There's tons of stuff I haven't mentioned, like how monsters become more frequent in the streets the longer you play or how theres some parts which just scare (and disgust) the complete **** out of you - but this is game you really need to play to get the most out of it.

If I had to pick a game of the year for PSP, this would be it. Great graphics, an intriguing and mysterious storyline, excellent atmosphere, incredible boss battles and monster design and a great soundtrack really create a first class survival horror game which simply reeks of awesomeness.

Buy it if you're a Silent Hill fan, and if you're not, buy it anyway.

9.5/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 12/12/07

Game Release: Silent Hill: Origins (AU, 12/06/07)