‘Silent Hill: Homecoming’ XBOX360, PlayStation3 Konami B ‘ ‘ ‘ In ‘Silent Hill:… ‘Silent Hill: Homecoming’ XBOX360, PlayStation3 Konami B ‘ ‘ ‘ In ‘Silent Hill: Homecoming,’ another tormented soul is subjected to the twisted purgatory that is characteristic of the Silent Hill series, albeit a sleek, modernized version of Konami’s classic nightmare. ‘ ‘ ‘ As the first entry of the series onto the next-generation consoles, ‘Homecoming’ developer Double Helix Games is saddled with the task of updating the style and motifs so closely tied to the identity of the Silent Hill games for essentially the first time in the series’ history. ‘ ‘ ‘ Unfortunately, as with most updates to well-established favorites, the upsetting flaws greatly outnumber the scintillating successes. ‘ ‘ ‘ Like all Silent Hill games, ‘Homecoming’ follows the tribulations of a single protagonist ‘mdash; in this case, recently discharged war veteran Alex Shepherd. ‘ ‘ ‘ At the game’s outset, he returns to his hometown of Shepherd’s Glen, a town adjacent to the infamous Silent Hill. He comes home to learn that his father and brother have disappeared, and his mother is saddled with an empty gaze and a shotgun, moaning wearily for Alex to find his brother. ‘ ‘ ‘ As Alex sets out into the eerily deserted town in search of his family, he quickly begins to encounter the monsters standard to the Silent Hill series: convulsing nurses, twisted abominations and all other sorts of horrors. Soon enough, Alex encounters the ‘other side’ of his town as the corruption of Silent Hill spreads fully into Shepherd’s Glen, and he watches the once-benign walls begin to peel, quiver and bleed. ‘ ‘ ‘ This all sounds very much like the previous iterations of Silent Hill, and in a sense it is, as Double Helix faithfully reintegrated almost all of the motifs of the previous games: the heaven/hell paradigm, the atmosphere of despondency and melancholy, the subtle terror of omission and especially the tension of mental delusion versus supernatural phenomena. ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘Homecoming’ even addresses some thematic elements that no other entry ventured into. In particular, it addresses the familial relationships of the protagonist and the horrors that come with it. The plot in general is also free of the obscurity of the previous games, being possible to mostly ingest in a single play-through while still being deep and symbolic as per tradition. ‘ ‘ ‘ However, the big differences are in something just as crucial: the game’s execution. ‘ ‘ ‘ As can be expected with a translation to a new league of consoles, the graphics in ‘Homecoming’ are a vast improvement over those of its predecessors, although not without some holes. ‘ ‘ ‘ While Alex and the other main characters are all well-rendered (with appropriate, if not always perfectly synced, voice acting), it seems as if the details on the periphery ‘- the generic corpses littering the landscape of Shepherd’s Glen in particular ‘- are overly pixelated and seem shoddily inserted into an otherwise gorgeous game. This lack of attention to detail is, unfortunately, characteristic of the problems that plague ‘Homecoming.’ ‘ ‘ ‘ A small point about the visuals is that they resonate with influence from the Silent Hill film. Opinions of the film aside, it was a highly successful entry in the game-to-film genre and far more critically acclaimed than its predecessors ‘- meaning, of course, that it shaped the public’s knowledge and expectations of the Silent Hill franchise. ‘ ‘ ‘ Of course, Silent Hill is known for a number of technical aspects beyond its visuals. From the days of ‘Silent Hill 1,’ a number of artificial constraints were placed on the game play in order to create a specific effect in line with the game’s purpose, such as clunky controls (to simulate the experience of an untrained individual handling weapons like steel pipes and guns) and awkward camera angles (to simulate a cinematic experience). ‘ ‘ ‘ Even when the games became more technically sophisticated, these constraints remained as a unique part of the series. ‘Homecoming’ finally eschews these, providing a dynamic camera and more fluid controls, justified by the main character’s military training. While these obviously improve the simplicity to an extent, they eradicate some of the charm and intensity characteristic of the series. ‘ ‘ ‘ In hand with this, ‘Homecoming’ is much harder than previous series incarnations, as they always gave the player some leniency because of the self-imposed control and camera burdens. The game is jarringly unforgiving ‘- the new dodge feature doesn’t compensate for the much more difficult and frantic combat, and there’s a distinct lack of health items and ammo throughout. ‘ ‘ ‘ Ultimately, these problems are all just minor technical annoyances. The true problem with the game is that it adds very little, other than simply being another entry in the series that mostly preserves what makes the series distinctive. ‘Homecoming,’ while not being a step back, is hardly the leap forward desired when a series moves to a new generation of consoles.