Gamertell

Title: Silent Hill Homecoming
Price: $39.99 from most retail outlets
System(s): *Xbox 360, PS3, PC
Release Date: November 06, 2008
Publisher (Developer): Konami (Double Helix Games)
ESRB Rating: “Mature” for Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language, Sexual Themes
Pros: Revamped controls, revamped combat system, sound and music is still atmospheric and creepy, graphics at times are a high point, interesting story, some of the best voice acting the series has had yet.
Cons: Can be too easy, soundtrack for songs with lyrics really don’t work as well as others, story is quite often straight out of Jacob’s Ladder, graphics usually aren’t that great.
Overall Score:  One thumb up and one sideways; 82/100; B-; * * * out of five.

Silent Hill is one of those series that either sucks you in or spits you out. If it didn’t get you within the first 30 minutes, it probably won’t regardless of what it throws at you. It’s possible that it never will.

If it did get you, chances are you’re familiar with a few of the previous five games and are wondering whether or not Silent Hill Homecoming is worth the money. With the number of things wrong versus right with this game being about equal, it comes down to personal taste.

The Light

SH Homecoming has quite a bit of good with it. The control system has been improved in ways that make moving around the world a lot more fluid. It also makes surveying your surroundings easier.

Camera - save the cutscenes - and general movement is all done with the analog sticks. You also have the option to switch in and out of first-person view, which can help you out with noticing smaller details or objects that might otherwise blend in with the background. While in first-person view though you can’t move around.

The combat system has been fixed to make sure that your character doesn’t survive largely on dumb luck. Some people did complain that it made the game too easy but it works. It wouldn’t do to have a military man who doesn’t know how to fight, let alone shoot. The easiest way to describe the combat mechanics of Homecoming is to tell you to look at Resident Evil 4 since they are almost exactly like that.

Graphics for surroundings (save for the fog), shifting to and from the Hell-state of the world and certain monsters (namely bosses) are all highpoints for the series. On the audio end, sound design tends to be much more eerie as the town’s acoustics have been vastly improved making more echoes and usually more difficult in telling which direction a sound came from. Music, when there are no lyrics, is emotional and about as moving as other Akira Yamaoka’s Silent Hill instrumental pieces.

The Dark

SH Homecoming is unoriginal since it almost copied and pasted entire scenes from Jacob’s Ladder. An example is the opening scene from the game, which is almost exactly like the little trip through a hellish hospital that happened in Jacob’s Ladder. While it is still pure Silent Hill, it just takes the Jacob’s Ladder appreciation to an entirely new level that doesn’t work due to how far they go with it.

The revamped combat controls do make things a bit too easy unless you’re playing on the hard setting. This is another problem with the game.

There are only two settings when most of the Silent Hill series allowed for more customizing of the game settings allowing for shifts in gameplay and puzzle difficult. Even the original game of the series had more than two difficulty settings, though it lacked the gameplay customizing of SH2, SH3, SH4 and SH: Origins by only having two settings for gameplay difficulty. So replayability is on the low side for the franchise, even with the amount of endings there are.

The graphics for character design, monster design and fog effects just aren’t up to par with what “next-gen” is often looking more like PS2 graphics or, in the case of fog, bordering between PSX and PS2 graphics.

The song that have lyrics are just tiresome because of the fact that they are so cliched, forced and come across as gothic or emo for the sake of being gothic or emo depending on the song. The songs with lyrics are just boring and uninspired.

Murky Side of Reason

This game, much like the rest of the series, is an acquired taste. Some people will not like it even though this is one of the most accessible games in the series. Other people might see it as a genius game.

By all rights, this game is about as average as it gets for the series but if you are willing to drop money on the game, chances are you’ll find it enjoyable. Just rent it first, unless you’re a die-hard fan of the series, of course.

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