Silent Hill Downpour: DAY ONE

[sincere]

Ahhhhh there's no restttttt now we're going to be creeped out until we go to bed and then be creeped out late at night ahhhhh

Comments

[sincere]

The opening menu is super atmospheric. There's just rain, and creepy noise, and occasional background screams, and then it slowly builds up to actual music.

[sincere]

The opening menu fades into the opening video!!

[sincere]

But rainfall is worried about it being full of spoilers, so we're not watching it! Wheee.

[sincere]

lol the title ZOOMS IN and there's another screen as we choose a new game.

This game feels a little louder somehow than Graces...

[sincere]

Game difficulty: easy.
Puzzle difficulty: normal.

[sincere]

The loading screen helpfully says, "If you run out of ammo, you can use your gun as a melee weapon."

Then it says, "Are you sure you're alone?"

[sincere]

Okay, Murphy is in jail. The guard leads him to a room and somewhat creepily calls him cupcake and says "I left a present for you on the bench."

In the shower room.

Then the guy is like "If you turn on all the showers we guards can't see anything you do. Get my meaning?"

...shhhhower rape?

[sincere]

All right, turning on all the showers. On the bench is a pipe and a knife. We pick up one and then the other one is no longer pickuppable.

Then a huge guy enters and is like, "Wait, what? I'm an isolated prisoner, I'm not supposed to see other people ever. Where are the guards?"

There's just... Murphy, holding a weapon... and a set-up...

Uh-oh.

[sincere]

Murphy, e.g. you, beats him with the pipe for a while, then stabs him with the knife for a while, then beats him with fists for a while, then... kills him I guess.

It's grotesque and painful. And effective.

[sincere]

rainfall: WELL, I FEEL SICK WITH MYSELF :D
rainfall: I assume Murphy has serious reason to hate this guy
rainfall: but he's so pathetic.
rainfall: So. It's a very effective opening scene.

[sincere]

rainfall: It's positively nasty of them to not let us know, even now, why we murdered that guy. Assuming it really happened.

[sincere]

rainfall: So much cupcake'd

[sincere]

So now we're on a march out of the prison. The other prisoners holler at us as we go. Now we're freeeee.

[sincere]

rainfall: lol unreadable subtitle font.
rainfall: I mean it's fine. But it's a ridiculous font to use for subtitles. X3

[sincere]

Murphy says, "You don't remember me, huh? We used to be neighbors."

The guy starts shrieking and running and begging for guards to come.

[sincere]

We get on a bus! A tough lady cop is escorting us home.

rainfall: She has it in for us
rainfall: It must be the murder 8D

[sincere]

omg the music is gooorgeous right now.

[sincere]

rainfall: Definitely not Akira Yamaoka, but fitting all the same.

[sincere]

Murphy is dreaming restlessly about a little boy -- a crashed bicycle -- police --

He wakes up, and the other prisoners start asking him significantly if he "really did it," if the rumors are true. The lady cop tells them to shut it, some bickering and loud noises start, the driver looks away from a road for just a second...

AHHHH ONE OF SILENT HILL'S ABRUPT ROAD ENDINGS AHHHH

The bus goes very sharply over a cliff.

[sincere]

TITLE SCREEN!

[sincere]

rainfall: So far so good. The sequence outside Silent Hill was -- interesting and horrible. 8D
rainfall: Creative.

[sincere]

So we're alone when we get up. Murphy finds the bus, in horrible condition, and then continues on. rainfall doesn't linger to investigate it.

We find a body being eaten by crows. Murphy observes this death didn't happen in the crash. YOU GET, FLASHLIGHT! He's a more active flashlight-user if he holds it, but he can also clip it to his belt to free up a hand.

[sincere]

On the shore of a creepy, foggy lake. You can wade up to hipdeep in water before Murphy observes he can't make it, he can't even see the other side.

Back into the creepy forest!

rainfall: It almost feels like exploring a real woods, because you can take a lot of different paths to get to the same place
rainfall: I can walk up this hill any way, between any two trees...

There's a wide, varied path that you could believe as a forest, instead of just one obvious corridor.

[sincere]

rainfall: The last loading screen tip said just "STOP DOING THAT", all in caps.

I like that.

[sincere]

This is the fourth time rainfall has plummeted off this log over a ravine. The balancing mechanic is... obviously challenging.

...When you're using the wrong stick, as rainfall cleverly observes on her fifth try!