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Jan 10, 2011

Silent Hill 8: New Name and Details

Seminal survival horror franchise getting wet for latest outing.

First there was Heavy Rain - now Konami has revealed that the next iteration of its seminal survival horror franchise is to be named Silent Hill: Downpour. Rumours of upcoming Super Mario: Shower and Call of Duty: Light Drizzle still to be confirmed.

Anyway, it seems US magazine Game Informer has first dibs on new details for the game previously known as Silent Hill 8 and they've come trickling onto the internet over the weekend.

Unsurprisingly, malevolent water appears to plays a big part in this newest excursion into everyone's favourite holiday destination of the Damned, with its appearance looking like being the trigger for Silent Hill's familiar collapse into its Otherworld self.

Game Informer cites an early sequence in a diner as an example: a sprinkler system comes on unexpectedly and the entire room collapses upward into the town's classic mix of rust-red industrial horror and endless darkness (no ice world here, folks!), water cascading in the most unexpected directions.
Elsewhere, Downpour seems to feature a version of Silent Hill: Shattered Memories' psychological profiling system, with decisions you make - from obvious narrative choices to the clothes you wear - effecting story developments.

Also similar to Shattered Memories, it appears there's as much emphasis on fleeing from enemies as there is on combat. Apparently, protagonist Murphy Pendleton can only hold one weapon at a time and your opponents can put up quite a fight.

Elsewhere, Downpour also promises a return for the classic skewed camera angles of yore to heighten the tension, the game switching between a third-person and more cinematic perspectives as various intervals.

Finally, it looks like there's going to be plenty of Silent Hill to explore this time around, with a gameworld big enough to require the use of the town's subway system to get around. However, developer Vatra promises plenty of new locations to discover - both throughout the main story and in sidequests uncover by picking up clues on your travels - with series staples such as the school and hospital out of the picture for this latest installment.

All in all, it sounds like the Silent Hill series is set to receive the kick up the arse it desperately needs - expect to hear more on Downpour very soon.

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