Month: December 2009

Konami are brave souls for picking up the publishing duties for this one. See, Silent Hill is considered to be the pinnacle of survival horror, so any dark and dank third-person adventure game in which the main character uses a flashlight usually gets compared to it. Why release something that is bound to be considered inferior to a product that already exists? Probably because the SAW series is absurdly popular.

The premise is pleasingly simple – Detective Tapp wakes up in an abandoned mental asylum with a key sewn into his chest. This key happens to be for the exit, and so everybody else that has been brought into the asylum to play Jigsaw’s twisted game is after Tapp. From start to finish Jigsaw sets various tasks and puzzles while the asylum itself is rigged with traps. It’s not a particularly scary game, just a bit grim at times. Like having to put your hand in a toilet bowl full of used syringes and grab a key before the pain becomes too much.

As soon as the second level Tapp has a shotgun collar put around his neck – come into contact with anybody else wearing one and it’ll detonate. Enemies usually go down with three or four punches so they’re not exactly anything to fear. In some sections guns are available but fortunately they don’t turn the game into a mindless shooter as ammo is limited to what’s inside the gun when you find it. You can also set up your own traps by using shotgun shells, paint thinner and other objects. A definite highpoint is the battle against Pig Head, who is too strong to take down with melee weapons, instead requiring some clever trap placement to kill.

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