Review:
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories Review

 Let me get this out of the way right now: I do not hesitate to say that Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is the most innovative title for the Wii to date, and the best entry in the Silent Hill series. This is saying a lot. I adore Silent Hill; Silent Hill 2 is one of my top 10 favorite games of all time.

Shattered Memories is a full re-imagining of the first Silent Hill title. You play Harry Mason, a writer searching for his lost daughter, Cheryl. His character is now very well defined, with better voice acting and far more depth and history. In fact, the game’s narrative switches back and forth between traditional gameplay and therapy sessions between Harry and his psychologist where you discuss with him interactively, fill out questionnaires and even color pictures. These therapy elements not only build onto Harry as a character, they change the presentation of the story. For example, Harry is asked to color in a picture of a family in front of a house, to reflect his opinions and memories of his family. How you color the picture changes the appearance of his house when you visit it, and changes the clothes on its current tenants. Filling out the psychological profile survey in such a way to indicate lecherousness changes the appearance of female characters, over-sexualizing them. It gets deeper. Evaluation isn’t the end of it. If you spend too much time staring at certain objects, like the remains of violence or sexually-explicit posters, your psychological profile changes. Even the monsters change with your choices.

That’s a layer of the game. The primary game mechanics are fundamentally different than Silent Hill fans are familiar with. Harry cannot fight. He’s a writer. He doesn’t think to pick through trashcans and grab boards to bash in zombie brains. What does he do? He runs. During scenes with monsters, Harry has no choice but to run, to hide under things, to jump across gaps, to knock things down to slow his assailants and to ward them off with lit flares. The gameplay in these segments is very ‘free-running.’ Think Mirror’s Edge or Assassin’s Creed. If you run to an edge, he jumps. If you run into a door, he slams it open. If you find cover, he’ll jump under it. However, Harry Mason is no master of parkour. He’s clumsy. When he’s climbing, monsters will grab his ankles. When he’s trying to push a barricade down in his enemies’ way, he’ll sometimes run into difficulties that you have to work around. When the monsters do finally grab him, you have to save him. You do this by making throwing motions with the Wiimote. If something’s on your back, you heave quickly upward. If something grabs your arm, you yank the arm away.