Whether its bad or good, since its on XBLA it means I can officially ignore its existence, much as Konami likes to ignore PS3 users existence with their increasing catalogue of XBLA games of franchises that are multiplatform.
[UPDATE] Rumor: Multiplayer Creeping Into Silent Hill
- Thread starter Tom Goldman
- Start date
My reflexive response is that this is a bad idea. Silent Hill, when it works, is about atmosphere, character, and story. Good multiplayer tends to have more to do with things we associate with so-called "emergent gameplay"- the unexpected events and ways of doing things that come up when different people are thrown together in a situation.
It's hard to have meaningful characters in a multiplayer game because almost by definition each character has to be expendable- you can have one player "die" and go on, you can play with two players or four, and so on. It's even harder to have the sense of isolation and uncertainty SH thrives on when you have to account for the actions of multiple players. And it's very difficult to carry on a story by the typical means when you have several players clamouring to get on with it whenever anything resembling exposition is occurring.
Left 4 Dead comes as close to this as I've seen, and it's still got a ways to go despite championing a number of innovations. With the increasingly slipshod and desperately experimental directions SH has been going, I'm sorry to say I don't expect them to pull it off.
It's hard to have meaningful characters in a multiplayer game because almost by definition each character has to be expendable- you can have one player "die" and go on, you can play with two players or four, and so on. It's even harder to have the sense of isolation and uncertainty SH thrives on when you have to account for the actions of multiple players. And it's very difficult to carry on a story by the typical means when you have several players clamouring to get on with it whenever anything resembling exposition is occurring.
Left 4 Dead comes as close to this as I've seen, and it's still got a ways to go despite championing a number of innovations. With the increasingly slipshod and desperately experimental directions SH has been going, I'm sorry to say I don't expect them to pull it off.
Dear Lord, Uber Evil, I wish it was. I honestly do.Uber Evil said:
But nay my friend, production begins this year, and we can expect a release in 2012.
There were rumors of it being cancelled, and it almost was a few times, but then production got given to James Cameron, who calls it "The best movie since Aliens" or something like that.
Meanwhile, Lovecraft rolls in his grave.
As long as it doesn't interfere with Downpours Singleplayer experience, I'd like to see Konami give it a crack.
Konami obviously understands that Silent Hill is an effective horror game that revolves around the solitude of the primary characters in order to deliver its strong, lonely atmosphere. The company makes its point clear tat if there is to be a multiplayer, it will be released as DLC or an entirely different chapter. No need to bawl about it ruining everything.
I can't imagine Silent Hill as a competitive multiplayer experience where one team or individual attempts to best another group in the town of Silent Hill. The true horror was never an actual entity as Yahtzee always points out from his favorite of the series, the town itself projected the fears and regrets of the main character. That being said, Konami might not be thinking about releasing some sort of VS. multiplayer.
If you were to ask me "Well, how can Konami release an engaging and fun multiplayer experience that doesn't stray too far from their formula?" I couldn't come up with a decent answer, only ideas I came up with from playing Silent Hill and thinking 'this could work with an extra player or two."
Let my imagination run rampant for a bit...try picturing what it would be like.
Wow. As a fan of the Silent Hill series, or most of it anyways, I can't imagine a multiplayer experience that can be both fun and suspenseful. The creepiest segments from my favorites always came from the little bits of information of death or murder that you tie together while playing the game and the cutscene/scripted sections that make you cringe. These factor into an engaging single player experience, but it seems to be that if multiplayer is to exist alongside Silent Hills singleplayer, they're going to need one heck of a director to pull it off. The game won't work as some sort of shoot-em-up or "this group vs. the other group" since its combat system was always so lovingly clunky. Any kind of co-op experience will run stagnant after completing it with others and trying to have some sort of script involved or story might not be found so appealing by gamers because if they wanted to solve mysteries with others, I am sure there are other titles who do just that.
Also, post your ideas.
Konami obviously understands that Silent Hill is an effective horror game that revolves around the solitude of the primary characters in order to deliver its strong, lonely atmosphere. The company makes its point clear tat if there is to be a multiplayer, it will be released as DLC or an entirely different chapter. No need to bawl about it ruining everything.
I can't imagine Silent Hill as a competitive multiplayer experience where one team or individual attempts to best another group in the town of Silent Hill. The true horror was never an actual entity as Yahtzee always points out from his favorite of the series, the town itself projected the fears and regrets of the main character. That being said, Konami might not be thinking about releasing some sort of VS. multiplayer.
If you were to ask me "Well, how can Konami release an engaging and fun multiplayer experience that doesn't stray too far from their formula?" I couldn't come up with a decent answer, only ideas I came up with from playing Silent Hill and thinking 'this could work with an extra player or two."
Let my imagination run rampant for a bit...try picturing what it would be like.
Wow. As a fan of the Silent Hill series, or most of it anyways, I can't imagine a multiplayer experience that can be both fun and suspenseful. The creepiest segments from my favorites always came from the little bits of information of death or murder that you tie together while playing the game and the cutscene/scripted sections that make you cringe. These factor into an engaging single player experience, but it seems to be that if multiplayer is to exist alongside Silent Hills singleplayer, they're going to need one heck of a director to pull it off. The game won't work as some sort of shoot-em-up or "this group vs. the other group" since its combat system was always so lovingly clunky. Any kind of co-op experience will run stagnant after completing it with others and trying to have some sort of script involved or story might not be found so appealing by gamers because if they wanted to solve mysteries with others, I am sure there are other titles who do just that.
Also, post your ideas.
If each player started in completely separate locations, and had no way to tell themselves out at a distance would add a powerful factor.
Between this and the QTE bosses the Silent Hill series has offically lost ALL of it's dignity, just kill it, you have no clue what you're doing!
Multi-player = 6-8 hour campaign/story and then an assumption that players will be happy making their own entertainment, even though they paid full price.
No. Just no. The whole point of SH is that you are alone, out numbered, frightened, and cannot protect your own back.
Fuck multi player.
No. Just no. The whole point of SH is that you are alone, out numbered, frightened, and cannot protect your own back.
Fuck multi player.
The survival [em]horror[/em] genre is not improved with the addition of multiplayer. I'm glad that multiplayer has been denied in the interview (even if it was not ruled out in future installments). "But what about Resident Evil 5," I hear you say. That was Survival Action, despite what tag it may have fallen under. RE5 is only vaguely horror because of the monsters you face, but it is more closely Action than anything else. So multiplayer works there.
I often dislike it when multiplayer us the go-to place for a game to try to cheaply instill more enjoyment. We all enjoy the company of friends, and some experiences are really enhanced by this. But I feel like it's the game designers cheap way of injecting fun into a game; why build a platform for experience when your players can connect and do that themselves with minimal effort? Cheapness, and I do not enjoy it.
(I don't want to imply that I dislike multiplayer; I really enjoy it. Just not used as a cheap trick in game design.)
Silent Hill hasn't been the same since the original creators left the project behind after SH4: The Room. They told their story, and it was done ever since. Now it's just another game property. Like another installment of Mega Man, or Final Fantasy. What's Wiley doing now? 8 Robot Masters? What a game changer. To me, the story of Silent Hill has been told, and Alessa/Heather slayed God. The end. (With no multiplayer, too!)
I often dislike it when multiplayer us the go-to place for a game to try to cheaply instill more enjoyment. We all enjoy the company of friends, and some experiences are really enhanced by this. But I feel like it's the game designers cheap way of injecting fun into a game; why build a platform for experience when your players can connect and do that themselves with minimal effort? Cheapness, and I do not enjoy it.
(I don't want to imply that I dislike multiplayer; I really enjoy it. Just not used as a cheap trick in game design.)
Silent Hill hasn't been the same since the original creators left the project behind after SH4: The Room. They told their story, and it was done ever since. Now it's just another game property. Like another installment of Mega Man, or Final Fantasy. What's Wiley doing now? 8 Robot Masters? What a game changer. To me, the story of Silent Hill has been told, and Alessa/Heather slayed God. The end. (With no multiplayer, too!)
One thing that could make this work is if you go back to the roots of Silent Hill. Remember, in many of the games you were never sure if you were actually seeing monsters, or if your mind was turning against you and the things you've been bludgeoning to death are actually people. If Konami makes a multiplayer game, one way to keep it scary is to show other people as monsters, or not at all. You could be running around in the dark with a bunch of other people, but all you see is random stuff moving as the other players interact with it, or you see some monsters running around with you. In order for this to work, there would have to also be actual monsters, but in a multiplayer game, that's a given.
Also, they could show random flickers of the characters, like how in cutscenes you see other people, but they're actually memories? Maybe every once in a while the game records a players death and plays it back. Now it's starting to sound like Demons Souls, but if it was implemented properly it could be extremely effective.
My point it, don't just start bashing Konami for deciding to try something new. If you just say "Silent Hill is about being alone, therefore multiplayer will suck balls", then if you do try it out you'll have the preconceived notion that it sucks and won't ever like it. Also, please try this at home: play a scary game with a friend. I assure you, their reactions will scare the shit out of you more than the game will.
Also, they could show random flickers of the characters, like how in cutscenes you see other people, but they're actually memories? Maybe every once in a while the game records a players death and plays it back. Now it's starting to sound like Demons Souls, but if it was implemented properly it could be extremely effective.
My point it, don't just start bashing Konami for deciding to try something new. If you just say "Silent Hill is about being alone, therefore multiplayer will suck balls", then if you do try it out you'll have the preconceived notion that it sucks and won't ever like it. Also, please try this at home: play a scary game with a friend. I assure you, their reactions will scare the shit out of you more than the game will.
If they force multiplayer into Silent Hill, i'll be furious. Please don't fuck this up like Capcom did with Resident Evil.
"Hey guys, how do we innovate when our fans don't want us to?"
"I know, stick multiplayer in there. Yeah, worked out for those chaps making Assassin's Creed and Dead Space didn't it?!"
"Great job team. Now we don't need to spend that fifty thousand on research and development to create new mechanics."
"Hey guys, how do we innovate when our fans don't want us to?"
"I know, stick multiplayer in there. Yeah, worked out for those chaps making Assassin's Creed and Dead Space didn't it?!"
"Great job team. Now we don't need to spend that fifty thousand on research and development to create new mechanics."
You know, Double Agent and Assassin's Creed managed to pull off a very good (if not broken) multiplayer adaptations to their series, I don't understand why Silent Hill can't.
Just saying.
One person starts off as a monster, and you always know where the human playing character is. The human is going around searching for clues, and the monster has a seperate objective and gets bonus points on when and where to attack the player.
Grow it off something like that.
Just saying.
One person starts off as a monster, and you always know where the human playing character is. The human is going around searching for clues, and the monster has a seperate objective and gets bonus points on when and where to attack the player.
Grow it off something like that.
Personally, the only really good 2 player survival horror game i played was ObsCure on the Xbox. Good times. Something like that could work.... maybe... :S
