The survival-horror genre has become a staple of video games, thanks to series like Silent Hill, Resident Evil, Fatal Frame, and Parasite Eve. As the genre has evolved, it has gone through changes and iterations. Some people feel that the genre has gotten too far away from its roots. Konami's Tom Hewlett, producer on Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, is one of of those people. During E3 2009 he told G4tv.com:
"Looking at survival-horror games now, they really focus on action. You have a ton of weapons and the fun is really in shooting the gross monsters and killing them, but that's less scary."
He definitely has a point. Many recent survival-horror games go for the shock factor and attempt to overwhelm players with fast-paced action. Creating atmospheric fear through lighting, colors, and music seems to have taken a back seat to appeasing gamers that are used to shooting the crap out of everything on screen. While the focus on action helps today's survival-horror games appeal to a broader audience, I wish more developers would let artists and sound designers lead the way in creating "moods" that are truly frightening (and I'm talking frightening like Leahy's kitchen).
Click here for the HD version of the Silent Hill: Shattered Memories interview.
What do you think of the evolution of survival-horror games? Are they too action oriented these days? Do you prefer an action emphasis? Or would you rather have atmospheric fear with more subtlety?
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SourProphit
It's 2-fold.
I feel that hand-cuffing the players as far as controlling their avatar is really f-in' annoying (looking at you, Resident Evil) so I like that the trend is going towards a more intuitive control scheme.
But.... it seems as though those lousy controls are all that was keeping those games "scary" in the past.
The entire genre does need a revamp. Obviously running around with a machine gun or shotgun detracts from the fright level of most horror games, so those kinda of things should be used sparingly rather than just gimping the controls, and we really do need more subtlety in the atmosphere. Having things jump out at you is startling, but rarely truly frightening.
Antic1imacticKi11er
Was Resident Evil 5 too actiony? YES!!!! Was it frightening? NO!
kikook
Scary games aren't really scary, it's a state of mind. You aren't afriad of the game you are afriad to die and have to restart.
ProjektX13
i think horro games need a different kind of action. especially survival horror. for instance when you play as ashley in RE4 i really did feel scared the first time around because i didnt have anything to fight back with, so survival horror shouldnt be fast paced because you just miss a lot of emotion.
codered1212
in my opinion, they never were scary
i played dead space and condemned and never got scared at all
spleendingo
I'd absolutely rather play a scary game than an action game with a horror twist to it. In my opinion, the first "Fatal Frame" was the scariest game I've ever played. They did the atmosphere and lighting right. Plus having just a camera as a "weapon" was awesome. I really did feel almost powerless without some guns lol!
YearOfYourMom91
I like having weapons on me when im playing these survival hoor games.
If i just have a knife or something its just not that fun.
At least have a pistol
r_pad
@spleendingo Absolutely agree with you on Fatal Frame. There's a lot that could have been better about the gameplay, but the atmosphere was fantastic.
StrongestSaiyan
The biggest trick is to keep the horror feeling fresh. Horror games have a knack for starting out scary and then that feeling dwindles because you get used to it or figure out the trick to getting rid of a monster fast. A good example of a game with solid action that was actually scary was Dead Space. The idea that you're not really safe at any point helps, and perhaps most importantly was the sound design. You heard your enemies, saw them, and the music indicated their presence, but they didn't always come after you. Unfortunately, that was one of the things from RE4 that carried over to RE5. The music let you know that an enemy was there and it let you know when all of them were dead.
IcemanMX
Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem
Fatal Frame
Silent Hill 1 (and maybe 2)
Those games do horror right. Go back and see/play those games to find out just what makes those games awesome. For all the Resident Evil, Dead Space and other "me-too" scary clones, they are filled with cheap scares such as something popping out at you suddenly. Yet, the three games I mentioned above are moody, emotional, atmospheric, fun and really make you change your underwear every time you play.
-M
Brian Leahy
Dead Space was intense, but I wasn't ever scared by the game.
r_pad
@Brian Leahy You're scared of Street Fighter IV...at least when I'm playing it.
Brian Leahy
@Raymond Padilla,
It's funny because you don't even play Street Fighter IV.
WhiteWolfAssassin
I think many developers who make survival-horror games are trying to broaden the audience of those that play survival-horror game. But in actuality, there just alienating there core audience. I think it's OK to have action in a survival-horror game, as long as the horror elements don't take a back seat. I think the problem is that they're starting to make the player feel like an unbeatable force in the survival-horror games. I'm hoping games like Alan Wake will change this, but it is hard to say what developers need to do in order to keep this genre fresh without alienating there core audience.
Jeffrey Kanjanapangka
Brian let me borrow his copy of Dead Space, I was scared most the of the time, then he said he needed his copy back... frightening.
sinner_mass
parasite eve, really? Cool game but not what I'd call survival horror.
Vesipham
I think if someone made a survival horror game using context sensitive actions and quick time events like they're doing with Heavy Rain, plus the intensity of something like Dead Space, you'd probably end up with a decent scare factor.
I'm totally fine with there being action when I play my favorite survival horror games, but if it ever gets to the point where there's too much emphasis on killing the monsters as opposed to trying to escape with your life, then that's a problem. Monsters aren't very frightening if you're given such an easy method of killing them without any real consequence.
sts1285
Resident Evil has sucked for a long time. I stopped playing Resident Evil 4 after 10 minutes. What is the point of a survival-horror game without the horror element? It's supposed to be scary, not actiony!
Vesipham
A game where every action you make, where even if your character takes so much as a slightly wrong step and it could cost their life or someone else's: I think that is what would make a really good survival horror game.
Dredgon
@codered1212 - WTF?! Dead Space is the scariest game I've ever played! It was an actual survival horror game, unlike Resident Evil 5, which is still great, but NOT scary.
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