I picked up the Wii version since it seemed like the version the game was really made for. The controls are... a mixed bag. They work really well in terms of just the usual exploration stuff and feel very natural for the most part, but they're a bit unresponsive when it comes to trying to throw off enemies or drop objects behind you as you run. So it loses points for that. Still, as far as this stuff goes it works pretty well on the whole. I haven't been too annoyed by it, and I think it only got me killed once.
I know that I'm almost always the guy who goes on and on about short games not being worth the price, but I make an exception for Silent Hill. In part this is because the past games have been very replayable if you're a whore for the little things. There's always new stuff to find, they have multiple endings, and the experience itself honestly... I just couldn't take much more than a few hours. They are harrowing experiences if played properly and taken seriously. They're deeply disturbing and grotesquely beautiful games, and certainly more complex than you can really gather from just plopping down in front of the TV and playing a while. There's a lot more going on than what first meets the eye. I feel no hypocrisy for saying that I'd happily drop a large sum on a new Silent Hill while avoiding doing the same for a Modern Warfare. Granted this is because of preference, but it makes sense to me.
That said, I've heard that this latest one isn't really so replayable as a lot of the past ones, and I think that probably goes for Origins as well, though I'm not actually sure about that. I played it once and never really went back to it, so I'm not sure. In fact, I don't even know about how Homecoming operates in that regard. Those weren't developed by the usual team at Konami, so I'm not too sure what differences there may be as far as that stuff goes. There was actually a lot of goofy extra shit in the first 3.
Either way, it remains one of my all-time favorite franchises, and even though Shattered Memories is very, very different, it does end up eventually meandering its way back to feeling at least somewhat like the games we know and love... it just focuses very heavily on different aspects of the series and draws out different feelings because of that. The art style in particular is a notable difference. In general the technology and presentation feels very Silent Hill, but the lack of the same kind of rust-covered otherworld we're so used to does make it feel like it took a step away.
But yeah, I'm really liking it and am very eager to finish it. This is one that I may play again just to see how the pscyhological profiling works on subsequent playthroughs... see if doing things differently will alter the game significantly. I haven't heard too much about it, so I suspect that's a bit more gimmick than true design element, but I honestly don't know either way.
