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Silent Hill: Origins

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: May 10, 2008
Author: Amazon User

This Silent Hill game is the lead up into what happened to bring the first Silent Hill into being. That being said by the name of the game alone, the review can go on.

The Silent Hill game series has always been a game series that held a special place in my black little heart, and this one is no exception. The battle system, while basically the same, has improved with the additional hand-to-hand combat ability, now has a more realistic weaponry system as well; it is now possible to use items like portable television sets and radios as heavy weapons which can be used up close or be thrown from a distance, but can only be used once no matter how they're used. There are also light weapons like scalpels, mid-weight weapons like sledgehammers, weak weapons like splintered wood, and excessively strong weapons like the Great Cleaver and the Moon Gauntlets with a ton of other weapons. This battle system, at least for me, has given this game a high replay value. Of course, this IS just my opinion...

Monsters like Nurses (in the hospital... I'm sure they need no further introduction) and Straightjackets are back in the mix (the monsters with no arms and spit acid out of holes in their chests)-- very nostalgic-- as well as new monsters like Remnants (in the Sanitarium)and Two-Backs (at the hotel) make their first appearances in this incredible addition to the Silent Hill series.

Also, a very new addition has been made to accessing "The Otherworld". Rather than occasionally being triggered through event sequences, you can go back and forth between them at will by touching mirrors, which is how one makes progress through the game.

And finally, the Accolades also give this game high replay value. Each Accolade gives Travis (the main character of the game) a new costume, of which, there are fourteen... the CodeBreaker Accolade is gotten by using one of Konami's oldest game cosed (Contra fans will know what it is by this reference alone) and is obtainable after beating the game once. There's only one skill level, which is a drawback, but considering all things in this game, I can say with all certainty that anyone who likes the Silent Hill games will love this one.

Almost another Silent Hill masterpiece.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: May 22, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Summary:

I love this series, and this game is no exception. I had a great time exploring this classic, unique psychological horror experience. It has loads of benefits working for it, but there are some production quality issues that just keep this addition to the Silent Hill series below par to the rest.

Why I love this game:

1. Visuals: Great graphics. Very appealing and unique style, especially for the psychological horror genre. Enemies are very realistic and creepy; fun to look at and fun to bash in. :)

2. Music: Perfect. Memorable tones accompany the story progression, infusing it with emotional impact. Eerie tracks keep you on your toes during combat situations.

3. Sounds: Great. Sounds match the enemies. Ambience works great to pull the game world together.

4. Difficulty: Balanced for the player's enjoyment. Plentiful weaponry and healing items counterbalance the more difficult aspects of the combat such as gripping enemies.

5. Story: Great psychological horror thrill. Most of the gameplay is tied into the grand story in the game. Story progression is slow enough to spark curiosity, but fast enough to retain interest. Being a prequel, this game is very much tied into the future of the Silent Hill series.

Why I hate this game:

1. Controls: Generally fine, but there are three serious hang-ups: (a) slow button response, (b) difficult to perform 'finishers,' and (c) investigation/attack button overlap.
(1a) The slow button response I found to be really annoying. When you press the PS2 triangle button to open map or the X button to investigate the game world, there is often a very slow game response. This causes me to push a button twice, wondering if I had pressed it at all. Double pressing causes me to instantly open and close a screen I wanted or to skip investigating an item I just picked up.
(1b) The 'finishers' are when your character kills your opponent with a final blow while they are knocked out on the ground. The major problem for this is activating it. On some enemies, it is very hard to position your character to activate the 'finisher.' This can be very very annoying when you miss the 'finisher' and have to knock out your enemy all over again.
(1c) Investigation, attack, and 'finishers' are all performed with the same button - the X button. This causes you to investigate when you want to attack if you're too close to an object of interest (any object that prompts text when you investigate it). And trying to perform 'finishers' near doors can cause one to exit the room by accidently investigating the door.

2. Shadows: Shadows tear frequently. By this I mean the should-be solid shadows have broken lines across them sometimes. Very visually unappealing and very unrealistic.

3. Soundtrack: Music and ambience randomly stops. For no apparent reason, the soundtrack in the game just randomly ends. This is a serious disservice to the wonderful soundtrack and the player. I don't think I've heard a track completely through in this game. It just seems like bad production quality.

4. Bugged: There is a glitch when you reload a gun from the menu screen. The graphic of the gun changes to a handgun when reloaded, and the gun selection cursor is changed to the first gun on the list.

Hope for the series yet

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: May 26, 2008
Author: Amazon User

In my opinion, the Silent Hill series began to fall with the third installment, but was completely annihilated with the fourth game - but in Origins...Silent Hill is resurrected from the dead and has this long dedicated fan salivating for more.

This time you play the role of truck driver Travis, whose persona has a lot in common with the memorable James Sunderland from the second game, as deep supressed and unwanted memories are forced out the more the haunted town claws its way into his soul. While Travis goes into this world of self discovery, you the player uncover the Origins of Silent Hill and see firsthand the separation of Alessa and Cheryl, and the birth of all the madness.

The exploratory element that the third game neglected to utilize is brought back in Silent Hill Origins. All the streets are there for you to explore. Other than the usual Twilight Zone scenery, its unfortunate, however, that there is not much to discover down the narrow alleys or at the end of each road like what we had with the second game (like a corpse clutching on to the page of his final journal entry, or another Bar Nelly's with a blood stained map and strange writing on the wall talking about disappearing holes). That bar alone from Silent Hill 2 caused mile-long discussion forums all over the internet. Them were the days....

But the streets are there to explore nonetheless, and to think that they were all absent in Silent Hill 4.

One of the other small gripes that I had with this title is that the monsters appeared too early. I prefer a slow agonizing descent into madness, getting more intense the deeper you explore. This was something Silent Hill 2 perfected with the walk through the woods; first it was strange sounds, then strage shadows, then tracks of blood....a good build up before you were even confronted with anything. Not so in this game.

I also think creatures should be stranger and more otherworldly, not bigger and more aggressive in a Silent Hill game. But that's just me.

And I'm tired of having ways to warp back and forth from world to world, which this game borrowed from Silent Hill 4 with its stupid tunnels. Was it not crazy enough when the whole world around you would physically Shape-Shift every time the fire Sirens screamed? This I personally believe Silent Hill 1 was best at (check my review for that game).

Those are my four biggest complaints. This is otherwise a very authentic Silent Hill game, and by the time you make it all the way to the Riverside Hotel, you will feel like you're playing Silent Hill 2 all over again. This game features four abandoned buildings to explore which include the Hospital (of course), a Sanatorium, an Amphitheater and the RiverSide Hotel. A couple smaller placeses include a General Store, a Butcher's Shop, a Lumber Yard and the Antique Shop (where the altar from the first game is). Its the small things that give the town a character of its own and that's important since its the town that keeps bringing players back.

When Silent Hill comes out for Next Generation, I expect mostly every vacant house and room open for exploration, with ghastly little surpises in each. One can only hope. This game has got me waiting anxiously for the next title of a series I thought died with "The Room".

My Silent Hill Origins Review

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: June 21, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I would like to start by saying I have been a huge fan of this series since the first game in the late 90s for the Play Station. However with each new game they release I always feel a little more let down in some ways.

This game was originally realeased for the PSP; the problem with this is that the PSP is a gamble, and a large number of gammers, some being former fans of the Silent Hill series hated the PSP. So they decided later that they would rerelease this title for the Playstation 2. When I first heard about this I was pretty hyped up about it. When I first saw it in stores, I bought it without a second thought.

It didn't take me too long to find something very screwed up about this game.

Simply put; SHADOWS... They screwed up the the shadow graphics very badly... When you shine your flashlight on an object, you get a strange jig-saw pattern that is suppost to be the objects shadow, and it's distracting and annoying. Next to that, the game is too freaking dark, and I don't mean that in a good way, I mean you can't see any further than a couple feet away from your character, even with the flashlight on. Because of this it becomes difficult to avoid enemies that are too close to you, and you may often miss important items that you run past unless you pay very close attention. The darkness facter in this game seems more geared towards eye-strain than trying to increase the fear-factor of the game as a whole.

Also it seems that since this was originally a PSP game, they got pretty simple with the level design sometimes, a lot of rooms in this game there were absolutely no need for... Very often you will open a door to an empty room with absolutely nothing in it... No monsters... No items... Not even a picture on a wall... Just an empty room... How exciting. And lets not forget the glitches with the inventory system. In the firearms menu for example, as soon as you change or reload a weapon, the picture of the weapon you are toying with will change to the next weapon to it... Why is it that your handgun suddenly turns into your shotgun?

Overall I did enjoy this game and I loved many of the ideas behind it. I loved the new combat system. I found the temporary melee weapons interesting, as well as a little annoying sometimes. I loved the new monsters they introduced. And most of all, I loved the fact that this game was a prelude to the first game, I enjoyed learning more about the story history behind what caused the first games' story to be.

This game had a lot of promise, but I just felt let down because it feels like the makers didn't care enough to test play it a few times before releasing it again. There are just too many glitches and errors that I felt that if they would have taken a little time to test it first that they may have been able to fix them before releasing the game.

For both silent hill completists and fans of horror, a psp port of ps-2 quality!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: July 08, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I've played every single Silent Hill. My first experience was the first game. Sadly I was not really able to appreciate its' deeper more profound symbolism when I was a younger age. Only reflecting later would I truly understand Cheryl and Alessa were the same person as well as the warped physics of the other-world. I finally realized just how brave Harry was and how much he had to lose. Truth be told Silent Hill was always more complex then Resident Evil. It focused more on the psychological and the occult then viruses and zombies.

The games that came after always either hit it big with me or had me give up. Alot of fans say "SH 2" was the best in the series. It was a good game but I could not really relate to a guy who killed his sick wife. (By now I'm sure EVERYONE knows about that. SH 2 has been out a LONG TIME.) However SH did introduce everyone's favorite geometric headed butcherer Pyramid-head as well as the possibility SH's energies are not only fueled by Alessa but rather by anyone who enters its' borders. SH 3 was a game I loved. Heather was one of my favorite protagonists and though people often critique her for being "too sassy" or "too whiney" I thought she was supposed to be a normal teenaged girl in the first place. Despite her short comings she was still brave and capable of caring for others. I get tired of people expecting their heroes to be perfect. If anything Silent Hill is about "imperfections" that come back to haunt us. SH 4 let me down completly. Once again some people thought it was awesome. I thought it was "good" for the genre yet something about it did not feel quite like "silent hill" to me. Henry was not "unlikeable" and being a bachelor I could relate to him finding comfort in solitude but all the back tracking and ending variables hinging on Eileen's health and exorcising spirits made the game more of a frusterating chore. Actually protecting Eileen would have been a reasonable task if not for those damned ghosts that can phase through walls to come after you. Walter Sullivan was one of the best antagonists in SH but the flawed gameplay broke the mold in a bad way.

Now we come up to origins. Honestly I was worried intially. Afterall I was buying a psp port to my ps-2. Would the game look like crap? Would it play like a dying mule? Would Climax seriously mess up some of my favorite characters in the SH canon? I'm happy to say "no" to each of those.

As you well know you are put in the shoes of Travis Grady, a stoic trucker who gets caught up in Alessa's life and tries to stop everyone's favorite crazies from seriously messing up conventional reality. There have already been complaints such as "Travis had no reason to be in SH." Hmmm. If you think you just clipped a little girl with your semi truck wouldn't you be just a tad concerned? If you say "no" to that question you likely need to talk to a therapist.

Anyway, Travis ends up following Alessa back to a burning house and saves her from a ritualistic sacrificial burning. After he passes out he awakes in Slent Hill. As you know once you're "in" silent hill it is hard to get out until you've conquered your inner demons. Not only does Travis stay around out of concern for Alessa but some of his own past memories are lurking the town's foggy streets. From this we are able to dispel the silly notion he has "no reason to be in silent hill."

Origins really sticks its' neck out to make new innovations. Some are great. Others are not so great. For example melee weapons break after a few uses and you can lug around tvs, toasters, and type writers to literally throw at oncoming nasties. To balance out the weapons issue Travis can go fistacuffs with opponents like a boxing champ. The only problem is when more then one monster is in the vacinity he'll often keep focusing on the baddie knocked down instead of facing the lurching one that is the bigger threat. Honestly though "Survival horror" is not about making combat perfect. If you could easily cream hordes of demons it would be more akin to an action plat-former. Travis though being the toughest protagonist is still in over his head. If you are a true SH fan you want it that way. Having a flashy pretty boy like "Dante" from DMC running around unstoppable on the streets of silent-hill with a big sword and infinite ammo would kill the atmospheric terror aspect quick.

One thing you should be aware of is this time around the creatures are faster and meaner. The first time I saw "the patient" monsters in the distance I thought I could easily out run them. Afterall the similar monsters in SH 2 were slow as a southern drawl right? Wrong. These "things" are unrelenting. They will shamble at you quickly and try to crush you with their legs or in the case of the nurses put a rusty syringe in your neck. That cannot be sanitary! This brings up another new combat mechanic. Travis can "shake off" assaults by tapping the x button really fast. I find overall this is a good feature because without it you would be even more screwed.

Instead of shifting to the other-world at random Travis acesses mirors to step between realities. Some say this kills the suspense but frankly so much is creepy about the game it is hard to say if it took the frantic edge off my nerves personally. Afterall I first encountered "the butcher" in the "normal fog world" cutting open a nurse creature with a huge cleaver. I didn't really feel safer in either dimension.

Moving along you will meet Dahlia, Kauffman, and Lisa. Though they look significally different their personalities are very much entact from the first game. Dahlia is as evil and creepy as ever so the designers did not try to make her a more sympathetic character like she was in the movie. This does stay in line with the first game though her movie counter-part had more layers. Likely that was one of the things Director Gans did well. For some reason Dahlia seems like Cruella Deville from 101 dalmations to me. Antagonists that are evil just to be evil work for cartoons but they do not do so well in a serious and frightening survival horror setting. If they portrayed Dahlia as at least having some guilt and remorse issues the end result would have been much better contrieved. What if for example you found her telling her confessions to a preacher in a church weeping? You would still not like her but she would come off as being alot more "human". Yeah she's crazy, but can't crazy people still love their children?

Kauffman is cold,aloft, cruel, and calculating living up to his usual "ice man doctor" arch type to a perfect T. Lisa is sweet, flirtatous, yet misguided which is refreshingly loyal to the ground work in the first game. For some reason people yammer about poor Lisa seeming like a "slut" but she does not seem to go about things differently in her interactions with Travis then she did with Harry. She flirted with Harry too and everyone knew she had an abusive relationship going with Kauffman. Does that coupled with being a nurse make her a tramp? For those few self annointed "elites" complaining I'd like to say "whatever prudes." You had no problem with her in the first game despite her drug addiction yet you do in origins? Bury the fan-baby angst already. It's not as if Climax tried making Lisa like Cynthia. (Not that Cynthia was a bad person either. Being a "hooker" does not make a woman automatically deserving of death or less of a person.)

Beyond this point you can guess the formula. Alessa needs your help and guides you through Silent Hill. Each time you defeat a boss you get pieces to the overall puzzle unlocking more info about the cult and your own difficult past. My only complaint is each completed area seems to get locked off. Yes, you can beat the game in 5 hours if you're good at navigation and have a faq handy to tell you where everything is but most likely if this if your first time playing it'll take you 8-10 hours.

Wrapping up I have to say this is my favorite SH game since 1 and 3. I'm surprised it looks so good on my PS-2 being that it is a psp port and equally delighted Climax handled each and every detail with loving care.

Pros

+ Loyal to the SH canon.

+ Alessa gets more love and a chance to let out more frustrations onto her tormentors.

+ Lisa is likable this time around too. I know some disagree with me over that fact but I found myself caring for her and feeling sorry for her just like I did in the first game.

+ Monsters are varied and vicious with new attacks though admittedly alot of their designs seem to be from the other games.

+ Great scares but you should play it in the dark for more jump out of your chair moments.

+Vivid and lucid sound-track.

+ Travis is a good guy. I found it easy to relate to him and liked how he took responsibility for his own actions.

Cons

- Character models were changed aesthetically a bit. I did not care so much but I know certain fans will.

- Camera angles can be really bad here and there.

- Alessa seems more "mischievous" and "dangerous" then "innocent" and "helpless". However I understand why she'd be driven insane and want to screw with people after being burnt alive. Poor kid.

-Combat can get frusterating especially when fighting multiple foes or the "biggy-beasts" in this installment. Word to the wise. Its' ok to run sometimes!

-Arguably the shortest SH if you know exactly what to do and where to go.

- The power to travel to the fog world and other-world at your own leisure may kill the suspense for you. It didn't for me though. Both places seemed equally twisted.

Cool little game.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 3
Date: March 19, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Origin would be my first Silent Hill game that I've taken seriously. You play a character named Travis who comes into a small town, Silent Hill. Origin centers around on a macabre theme; at times the game is simply freaky, at other times the game is scary, and other times the game is just exciting. It's such a nice break from the zombie themes of Resident Evil.

Here's a list of things I liked and didn't liked:

* Anything can be used as a weapon. You can pretty much go melee the entire game. From your fist to a sledgehammer to guns, pretty much anything can be used as a weapon. Melee weapons, such as a hammer, have limited lifespan; each time you attack an enemy, the weapon degrades until it can no long be used. It gets kind of ridiculous near the end when you are carrying nearly fifty different weapons. I think the game should have had a weight limit on how much you can carry at once.

* Great music. I think the music really saves this game. I think the music made me sweat at one point in the game as I was walking in a dark hallway and I didn't want to continue since I thought something would jump out at any second. Truly, the music in this game complements the game play perfectly.

* Some minor bugs I noticed. I thought it was because I was playing on a ps3, but I've found that people playing on ps2 have the same issue. If you reload a gun in the inventory and you have more than one gun, you see duplicate images of the gun you reloaded. It doesn't appear to corrupt your game in any way, and once you re-open the inventory, the gun images are back to normal.

* Story is outstanding. I actually wanted to play the game until the very end. I was mildly disappointed with the ending, but I won't spoil it for anyone. The game is short and sweet.

* The puzzles are mediocre at best. They're not hard, but not exactly easy. There were two parts in the game that I became stuck on, but the reason why is simply because I didn't fully explore some areas. If you explore every room in this game, you will be able to solve all of the puzzles without much effort. The most exciting puzzle comes at the end when you have to solve this triangle-shaped-Rubik-cube-like puzzle. It's sort of exciting to see it, but once you notice the pattern, which you will have no problem in doing so, you'll be mildly disappointed.

Overall, I say get Origin if you can. It's a nice grab in the final stages of the PS2's life. Also, Origin made me want to try out the other Silent Hill games. I recently went and purchased Silent Hill 2, and I am thus far pleased with it.

Silent Hill Origins (Prequel to the first Silent Hill)

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 3
Date: March 25, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Ever longed to run around in a creepy Sanitarium or Hospital, ever wished you could take a stroll around the kitchen with the infamous pyramid head aka "The Butcher"? Well then Konami's got a game for you my friend! This game has components of the other four mixed in with it's own sense of style ( through the mirror lies another world). I have been a long standing fan of the silent hill games way back when Harry Mason was searching for his daughter, Cheryl, on the PS 1 and i must say they are one of my fav. game seriess'. Origins is the prequel to the first Silent Hill, and you start off with a lone trucker named Travis. He see's little Alessa in the road and ultimately gets sucked into the dark history of Silent Hill and his own troubled past. First off he searches to find out what became of the little girl he saved but then starts to unravel the repressed memmories of his childhood. I was very impressed with this game. I'm always up to play something new in this series and even though the camera angles can be quite annoying at times, in my opinion it didn't outweigh the fact that this game was fun and certainly creepy at times. It's one of my favs....So i would deffinately suggest all Silent Hill fans or horror fans to check it out, but beware of the lady locked in Seclusion Rm 5!!!!!!!!!!!!

THIS IS THE PS2 VERSION!!!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 7
Date: March 05, 2008
Author: Amazon User

For those of you who don't know, SH0 was released as a PSP game first, and was later created for the PS2 so that a wider audience could play. This is the PS2 version so if you're looking for the PSP game you're on the wrong page. A great game but not much difference than the PSP version. If you own the PSP version there's no real reason to buy it except for collector reasons.

Mind Blowing Surprise!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 17
Date: March 07, 2008
Author: Amazon User

The surprise is that the character that you play as in this game is someone who you've ran from like crazy in previous games! Terryfing isnt it!? Play the game to see his story and how he came to become what he has become!

Waiting Maybe Best

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 2
Date: May 17, 2008
Author: Amazon User

From what I've read of your thoughts on SH:O, perhaps it's best if I save my money for the PS3 and just play SH:5. I love SH and play no other horror games. And I never, ever play it in the dark!!

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