Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii) Review

Just like in the original game, the hero is Harry Mason, an average guy who was in a car accident with his daughter. He passed out in the car crash and when he came to his senses again, his daughter Cheryl was nowhere to be seen. The main task in the game is to look for her all around the town of Silent Hill, a ghost town of sorts where nothing but weird stuff happens, but none of it seems quite out of the ordinary to its own inhabitants - or so it seems - so they take Harry for a madman because he keeps seeing stuff that no one else notices. Injected into the main story are separate scenes showing psycho-analysis tests where the player embodies a mysterious unknown character at her psychiatrist's office. In these sessions, the player's mind and character is being analysed.

This happens within the main game as well. The system determines one's traits of character depending on what his or her attention lingers on the most. For example, one that keeps stopping at every sign showing alcoholic beverages will be interpreted as someone who enjoys booze, one that checks thoroughly every poster of cheerleaders or women posing in provocative garments will be labelled as a pervert, and so on. On other occasions, he is given the choice to explore one room or the other, both leading forward in the game, but once the door to one room was opened, there's no way to explore the other one anymore.

The player's choices in these occasions are constantly being monitored, and these decisions will be reflected in various aspects of the game. This is one of the biggest changes brought to this new version, Shattered Memories. The areas affected by this are the looks of the NPCs, some different areas becoming available instead of the normal ones, some small details in the NPCs changing, and the appearance of enemies altering slightly.

Speaking of enemies, another huge amendment comes from the total lack of combat, which is totally different from anything the series has seen before, or has seen since for that matter. The whole game plays more like an exploration adventure, looking for mementos of Cheryl and solving some light puzzles. Structured in a chapter-like fashion, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories switches from exploration - scenes where the hero gets chased by grotesque looking creatures - and those aforementioned psycho-analysis sessions. The chase sequences are the most action one is going to get from the package. In those, Harry must avoid confrontation at all cost, and run from point A to point B for the world to go back from its nightmarish nature to its Silent Hill-esque normality, sometimes being forced to solve a puzzle midway through. While this makes for not too bad a change from the usual formula, the execution is somewhat lacking. Shaking off enemies that manage to grab onto him is fairly easy, as a mere shake of the Wii Remote and Nunchuk combo is required in the direction the enemy is to be pushed in order to get rid of them.

However, in the rush of adrenaline that may come from these scenes, one could be tempted to nervously waggle the controller combo in all directions, and this proves totally ineffective. Calm and accurate movements are required from the player, and this kind of kills the mood of nervousness that one would like to experience from such sequences.

Otherwise, the whole experience is still fairly solid and the overall feel of oppressiveness that comes from roaming the snowy streets of Silent Hill is quite unlike anything seen in consoles of the past generation. Or at least it's unique on the Wii, of that it can be assured. This is helped by an excellent soundtrack composed by series musician Akira Yamaoka, the very same guy that didn't want a Silent Hill to happen on the Wii. The music is just as good as it is in any other game in the same series. Most stunningly beautiful yet are the graphics. The lighting effects are the best on the system, with every piece of the scenery the player directs its torchlight at spreading shadows all over the place. Textures are highly detailed as well and, to be frank, the game as a whole shows a heavy attention to little details that the most attentive players will take great pleasure in examining one-by-one. On some sparse occasions, the frame-rate takes a hit from all these visual wonders happening on the insides of the Wii, but otherwise, it runs quite solidly on the whole.

All these ingredients help make Shattered Memories an experience that nobody should miss -and this, dear readers, should be experienced on the Wii at all costs, and not on any other platform on which the game is available! The Wii offers, quite understandably, the best visuals since it's more powerful than either a PS2 or PSP, despite what some unjust allegations from Nintendo detractors might have lead some to believe. Moreover, the gameplay experience is just unmatched as well. Pointing the Wii Remote at the screen to control the torchlight is just so much more intuitive than doing it with a second analogue stick that one would be foolish to want to experience it with a regular pad. Hearing the Wii Remote ringing and rumbling in-hand every time Harry Mason gets a phone call, grasping that controller, pressing a button to pick up the call and putting the Wii Remote against your ear to listen to the correspondent through the tiny speaker... This is an intuitive experience that further contributes to make the player feel as a part of the game and is an indispensable part of the bigger experience that comes with the psycho-analysis that's going on at every moment, as the game is not drawing Harry's psychological profile, or that unknown character's... it's actually drawing up yours!

For all these subtle details, excellent plot and a structure that requires at least two play-throughs to see all of its locations, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is one of the best Wii games available, and a criminally overlooked gem, despite some of its shortcomings.