PS2 Games | Dealspwn

Mon, 8 Mar, 10

Author:
Lydia Low

Category:
Games deals

Tags:
PS2 games, Silent Hill, Survival Horror Games, Wii games

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories £17.95 @ Zavvi [Wii & PS2 Games]

Zavvi are currently selling Shattered Memories for £17.95 as part of their Mega Monday promotion. This is a great deal for both the Wii and PS2 versions of the game but the PSP edition can be found for a couple of pennies cheaper at Asda Entertainment. The next best price for the game on Wii is £23.97 from Tesco Entertainment, while Shop To is the runner up for the PS2, meaning that Zavvi’s deal will save you £6 or £4 depending on your choice of console.

You may want to hurry to take advantage of these deals as they last 24 hours only and stock is likely to go fast.

At first glance the game looks to be a straight remake of the original PSX Silent Hill and, indeed, it starts in near indentikit fashion with protagonist Harry Mason crashing his car and then regaining consciousness to discover that his daughter Cheryl has disappeared. However, once these beginning scenes are dispensed with the game takes a radical turn. The town presented here is a barren and icy wasteland and scenes in a psychiatrist’s office are added to those taking place in Silent Hill itself. Thankfully, the new story is perhaps as deep and emotional as that of the original and, coupled with the taut, chilling atmosphere, offers a haunting experience and moments that may leave you slack jawed and awed.

It is not just the narrative that has taken a sharp detour. The clumsy combat of old has been dispensed with and now you will not need to fight at all, just run for your life. Furthermore, this is the game that “plays you as much as you play it”, meaning that the choices you make during the psychiatrist’s office portions of the game reflect upon your experience throughout the rest of your time with Shattered Memories with changes made to the monsters you face and the appearance, behaviour and even gender of the NPCs that you encounter in your journey through the icy wasteland that is this game’s vision of Silent Hill.

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is very well paced, keeping you engrossed in the action, even as you notice the slightly formulaic nature of the gameplay, but ultimately ending far too quickly. The graphics are great and help to create an, at times, truly disquieting atmosphere, bolstered by Akira Yamaoka’s excellent soundtrack. The puzzles are clever and engaging and interspersed with nerve shredding chase scenes that leave you breathless. Despite its short length the game has surprising longevity as you will want to go back to it to see the different results and ending that you can achieve through small alterations of your own behaviour. Silent Hill: Shattered Memories £17.95 @ Zavvi [Wii & PS2 Games]

If you have the option, it’s highly recommended that you go for the Wii version of Shattered Memories as the graphics are better and the game feels great to play, as if tailor made for the motion sensitive controls.

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Silent Hill: Shattered Memories Preorder £17.95 @ Zavvi [PSP & PS2 Games]

Despite its disappointing brevity, all reports seems to suggest that Shattered Memories is the first worthwhile addition to the Silent Hill that fans have been waiting for and as such is well worth celebrating. While this “reimagining” of the first game takes some serious departures from the original, and as such should probably be approached with caution, it offers an incredibly creepy atmosphere and a deep and emotive storyline that will stay with you long after the six hours playtime is over.

While the PSP and PS2 versions retain the same great story and gameplay, I highly recommend that you opt to buy the game on the Wii if you can. Apparently on Nintendo’s console feels brilliant to play, with excellent, intuitive controls and improved visuals and offers a far better experience. (Zavvi have the cheapest price for Wii but only by a couple of pence).
However, if it is the PSP or PS2 version that you are after then Zavvi are doing a pretty sweet deal, selling both at just £17.95 and undercutting Shop To’s runner up price of £21.86 (for the PSP or PS2), by nearly £4.

The plot begins in the same way as the original Silent Hill, with players taking on the role of protagonist Harry Mason who regains consciousness following a car crash to discover that his daughter Cheryl is missing. However from this point on the plot takes a radical detour, offering a completely new experience. The action occasionally cuts away from the town of Silent Hill to a therapist’s office where gameplay moves to a first person perspective and the psychological themes at work are further explored.

Gameplay has changed too. The game “observes” and evaluates the player’s behaviour and choices in the psychiatrist’s office and changes in accordance; the decisions that the player makes affects multiple aspects of gameplay such as the monsters that you encounter and the behaviour, gender and clothing of the NPCs that you meet. The Silent Hill that Harry explores is no longer fog-ridden and prone to suddenly melting into an industrial nightmare of blood and rust; now it is snow-ridden and prone to suddenly freezing into a wintry nightmare of ice and glaciers. Combat has been entirely dispensed with and now, instead of awkwardly slapping deformed monsters with a wooden plank or golf club, you will be doing a lot of running. An awful lot of running.

When serious rumours first arose of a Silent Hill remake, the most persistent was that this new game would be based upon the atrocity that is the Silent Hill movie. Thankfully these turned out to be unfounded and Harry remained Harry instead of being swapped for the supposedly more palatable female parental figure (as per the film) that was rumoured.

Like most fans of the series, I am approaching this newest incarnation of the Silent Hill myth with a good deal of trepidation but remain tentatively optimistic.

Thanks to chun_li at Hotukdeals!

Alone in the Dark £2.30 @ Amazon [PS2 Games]

There is a decent game hiding somewhere amid all the myriad technical issues and visual flaws of Alone in the Dark but you may find yourself having to dig very deep to find it.

However at just £2.30 from Amazon, it may just be worth a punt. This is a great step down from the next best price of £7.99 from Shop To, saving you over £5 and perhaps even making the game worth the cash you hand over (but you’d probably get more enjoyment if you use the money to buy a pint instead).

Click here to buy Alone in the Dark for £2.30 from Amazon

You play as Edward, an investigator of the paranormal, who finds himself on a rooftop, anticipating death when his guard is suddenly killed by an unseen force, giving the amnesiac Edward his chance for escape. As he makes his way through the building, searching for an exit, he sees people being possessed or killed by some kind of supernatural phenomenon. Could the old man that he meets hold the secret to everything that is going on?

Alone in the Dark boasts a good soundtrack and, well, not a whole lot more. The graphics are shoddy and drab and frustratingly dark, the dialogue extremely weak and hackneyed. The controls are overcomplicated and awkward and the gameplay is hampered at virtually every turn by glitches. The game has great, high aspirations but stumbles at every turn and though it wishes so hard to be an epic horror adventure, it is instead a sadly broken mess that is just no fun to play. Alone in the Dark £2.30 @ Amazon [PS2 Games]

Thanks to Adam2050

UPDATE: Too late – you were too slow and missed this hot deal! Why not subscribe to our email updates or RSS feeds to make sure that doesn’t happen again?

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