Spawn Kill Favorites: Silent Hill
Posted by WITA on February 8th, 2010
One decade ago, Konami left a neoteric imprint on the survival horror genre with Silent Hill, a video game that would inspire a number of future titles, a movie, and several books and comics. But Harry Mason’s investigation into the fog-covered town and its strange occurrences accomplished more than just a household name among the likes of Resident Evil. The heart-pounding adrenaline rush introduced gamers to a nightmare founded on psychological Japanese horror and an equally unnerving musical score by composer Akira Yamaoka.















Sometimes I go to bed thinking about Big Boss. I know I shouldn’t, but the man haunts me. He is so much machismo. So much manly dominance. He is testosterone. Thus you can imagine my delight seeing the Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker demo heading to the PSN this week. It boasts the four missions seen at E3, is in English, and is ready right now.
The talented composer Akira Yamaoka has left Konami after working on their various soundtracks for sixteen years. Yamaoka was best known for his work on the Silent Hill series, both the internally-developed titles and those handled outside of Konami’s studios. Yamaoka also released an album of some of his original recordings shortly after working on the Silent Hill movie.
A few months ago, an ESRB rating for what appeared to be a PSP port of the PC and PS2 adventure game Shadow of Destiny popped up, leaving many to wonder how long it would be until Konami made an official announcement. Well, that day is today, as Konami has revealed Shadow of Destiny PSP will arrive in North America in 2010.
It wasn’t very long ago when I was sitting at work talking to customers about their gaming experiences. I was still stuck in the PS2/Gamecube era, and the folks I conversed with had told me about amazing experiences with their Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 systems. I’ve lived through several next-generation conversions, though to my knowledge the more recent hardware changes offered little more than graphical enhancements. My interest in Sony’s six-hundred dollar machine was piqued when I heard stories of games with far-out mechanics and non-traditional presentation. When I made my purchase and dived into familiar genres, I wasn’t too impressed. It wasn’t until I picked up a few key titles that I was truly sold on what next-generation meant. These five games are the ones that sold me on the premise of next-generation gaming.

