Silent Hill: Origins (Demo) Review

I've just tried out the demo of Silent Hill: Origins, and I'm quite pleased with this PSP version. Set before the original Silent Hill game, Origins will explain to the player how Silent Hill became the creepy place it is now. You control Travis Grady, a trucker who saved a girl from a burning house when he made a pit stop at Silent Hill. The demo throws you straight into the hospital, where Travis goes to find out what happened to the girl he saved last night.

Along the way, he meets a rather shady doctor, who suspiciously deflect his questions and hurries off without giving Travis an answer. Travis follows the doctor to the second floor, where he finds a portal to the alternate world via the mirror in the operating room.

The portal to the alternate world

With frequent traveling between the two worlds required, the developers have made sure to include different visual effects for both worlds, so as to be able to tell them apart. Here are two shots of the same room in the two worlds.

In the normal world


In the alternate world

As you can see, the normal world looks normal, of course. The alternate world, however, is mostly covered in a blood-red visual effect, adding to the eeriness of this game. In fact, a tip at the start of the game advises you to play this game using headphones and with the lights off. With the superb background music and spooky visuals, it's got to be one gaming experience you'll never forget.

If you thought monsters were only found in the alternate world, think again. Your very first monster encounter in the game happens right in the normal world.

That's one freaky nurse

Combat in Silent Hill: Origins is a very simplified process. Equip your weapon in the menu, hold R-trigger to make Travis enter combat stance, and press Cross to swing your weapon/fists. There is an automatic target lock-on so you don't need to mess around with complicated targeting controls. In this demo there's only a limited choice of weapons, such as the sledgehammer and scapel. Weapons also break after a limited number of uses, so you might have to count on your trusty fists most of the time.

Yes, a TV is a weapon too

Once the enemy is down, it'll continue writhing on the floor until you go up to it and finish it off. Do remember to do this for all enemies, else they'll get up after a while and come back to hunt you down.

Finish off the monsters...


...else they'll come back to haunt you

The audio in this game is done up quite nicely, with appropriate music to build up the atmosphere of spookiness as you move around in-game. For example, the buildup of the drum and bass as you approach the elevator at the start of the game. Visuals in this game really bring out the full experience of Silent Hill, with your flashlight lighting up the dim corridors and casting realistic shadows on every object. Frame rate remained constant throughout the demo, with no noticeable slowdowns.

Notice the excellent lighting effects

In this short demo of about 30 minutes, Origins has given us a pretty good glimpse of what to expect in the full version, due to be released in about a week's time. With monsters showing up at unexpected corners, baffling puzzles to be solved, and an air of mystery around the place, Silent Hill is all set to give players an experience they'll never forget.