Silent Premonition

            In case you haven't noticed, I really like the survival horror genre.  I like those before me to write a blog are disappointed in the lack of true horror games in the modern day.  Though I have already discussed the death of the dead genre, I wanted to state that sometimes there is one or two games that makes it through without receiving the massive steroid injections and military surplus that someone has left just lying around in back alleys and pharmacies.  Now I like the classic Resident Evil series just as much as anyone else, but RE4 was great even with the action added, yet it still felt like horror, more so if you shot the merchant in the head every time you finished using him once to sell useless treasure.  This way you didn't have your own personal gun seller that has a stock that could supply enough troops to begin your own country.  With Resident Evil 5 they tried to make it a bit to action-packed and less story driven.  Umbrella taking over an area and all set up, if that's the case why go to Europe in RE4?  This is when it's story falls apart.  Now, one series does seem to keep to its guns as story driven as best as it can when the original developers quit doing it.  That would be Silent Hill, formerly of Team Silent now being produced by Climax Studios over here.

           The difference with Japanese horror games over ours is that it focuses a bit more on slow building, as opposed to American horror like Dead Space and Doom, where its all about violence and seeing how many bits you can see after the shotgun blast to the face.  Japanese focuses on mental anguish as seen in games such as the Silent Hill and Siren series where you can be your worst enemy.  Being alone, having to walk and have a light focusing and drawing enemies but needing it to see, and having to fight and solve puzzles in darkness with "Something" breathing down your neck.  I emphasize the "Something" aspect as it's the biggest part of Japanese style then American.  With American they want you to see something attacking you, or, in the case of Doom, put you into such darkness that you have to choose between light and a gun.  I know what you're thinking and allow me to tell you, you are wrong, it is different then the requiring of a flashlight, because it is a shot at cheap frights rather than nightmare causing fears, like seeing a nurse in a rusted, blood covered hospital coming at you with no face in Silent Hill; rather than lifting your light and... Nooooo!  Now an enemy is there that wasn't there 2 seconds sooner.  Silent Hill has always been the pinacle of story telling and background to a unique character that you may actually care some about, with pasts and families of there own.

          Then with the slump of horror games there are comes a new one called Deadly Premonition.  Over in Japan it was released on the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3 under the name Red Seeds Profile.  Developed by Access Games for the Xbox 360 and released brand new at $20 as a budget title.  The graphics are far behind the modern consoles, remenicent of the Sega Dreamcast than the Xbox 360, but the plot works well.  It is a sandbox, horror-adventure and I still don't know if it's supposed to have comical points in it or if it just comes across so bad in acting that it makes you laugh.  I bought this JHorror game at the same time I bought the highly anticipated Alan Wake, which is briliantly written in my opinion.  I'll have you know, I have beaten Deadly Premonition twice and still haven't beaten Alan Wake.  That may not be saying much, but think of it this way, I payed $60 for Alan Wake and $20 for Deadly Premonition and still regard it as a much more immersive game than Wake.  I know that Deadly Premonition and Alan Wake are not quite the same, one being a cheap Japanese game that is both, hard immersive and with every playthrough I learn more, including that the main antagonist has it right on his liscense plate!!  Alan Wake is still a great game, but its a bit to hard in points, more specifically when you leave the waitress's trailer after being drugged and running through the forest with Taken police everywhere and you having grenades, grenades of all things in a forest!!  Anyhow, this is showing that some are still working on great horror games in the true sense of horror.  Even if they are coming from lower budget developers and not the higher budgeted games like Capcom and Remedy.


Thanks for reading and I think the next one can go past horror in games, hope I summed it up good enough in this one to leave it for a while.  ^_^