Silent Hill: Homecoming

From the instant the air raid siren sounds, a chill went up my spine and the atmosphere seemed to engulf the very air I breathed. The world around me slowly morphed into a creepy sepia colour, with bloodstained walls, steam punk surrounds of rusting metal and cogs with wallpaper made of stretched skin, it was then I knew I was back in the familiar surrounds of the game known as Silent Hill.

You play as Alex Shepherd arriving back in his hometown of Shepherds Glen which is known to players of earlier Silent Hill games for its unsavoury past, from what you believe is a stint in the military. The weather is foggy and it’s eerily quiet as the general population of the town seems to have disappeared from the face of the earth. Feeling alone isolated and confused, you morph from the real world to the “otherworld” on a regular basis and don’t know what the hell is going on, gradually piecing together the story through flashbacks and jolted memories.

Of course there is more to it than what the hand full of people left in the town is letting on, as you travel down the path of deception, sacrifice and insanity meeting old friends, family and weirdo’s wondering why there are so many deformed and mutated creatures wanting to tear your head off at every turn. You need to find your father to shed some light on the situation whiles constantly chasing after your little brother Joshua as the little snot just wont stand still and he keeps leading you deeper into trouble.

Apart from the skinless feral dogs and the giant bugs most of the enemies have that distinct Silent Hill look about them. For those unfamiliar with the “Silent Hill Look”, this means the enemies look like a blind mad scientist has dissected and dismembered several humans and animals, placed the internal organs on the outside and sewn them back together with complete disregard of where the head, arms and legs are meant to be. Then replaced some limbs with sharp implements and brought them back to life Frankenstein style. Some creatures will make you jump, some can be avoided and others just wont let up and require different strategies to put them down for good.

If you slash at certain enemies that have skin (like the pendulum headed Schism) with the knife or axe they receive an open wound, and when they eventually die their bodies stay on the ground and do not miraculously disappear like in some games adding a bit more realism. Along with the action there are also many puzzles to solve to receive various items, open tombs and doors or escape from buildings.

The combat system mechanics are easy to use on the Playstation 3 (PS3) version. R1 brings up the weapons select screen, L2 gets you into combat stance and automatically locks on to the nearest enemy while R2 fires. The control pad is used for quick swap between shotgun, rifle, handgun and axe as well as turning your torch on and off. When you run out of bullets or just want to save them for the boss, you can equip the knife using quick and strong attack combos or if you choose, the slower crowbar and axe. The L1 button gets you into the inventory to use your health drinks, first aid kits and the health serums or any items like keys and plaques that you pick up along the way. You pick up maps for each building and main areas of the game that shows save points and mark where you have been making it easy to navigate your way around each area.

There were a few annoying parts like when faced with multiple occultists only one at a time would fight while the others stood idly by and although most cut scenes can be skipped over there were some boss fights where you had to endure the same monologue from certain characters without the ability to skip through the ramble. It would also have been a nice touch if the six-axis controller (PS3) had been used in some parts of the game, like when you have to turn valves.

There was another unfortunate thing that was no fault of the game creators, because Australia does not have an R rating for games, Silent Hill: Homecoming was delayed so some scenes could be altered to pass through the old ladies on the classification board. This meant some scenes go black where normally you would have seen horrific detail. As much as I am against censorship (I wont go on a rant about War and violence on the news shown in prime time etc), for me this did not matter because sometimes what you can not see and what is hinted at can be more horrifying if left up to your imagination.