As much as I like to talk about games I love or I find curious or interesting, I’d like to, also, talk about games and genres I don't like, or I can’t play, whatever the reason may be. As the title say, today I'm gonna talk about Survival Horror.
Not only I will talk about why I don't play the genre, but also I'll talk about some titles of this genre:
You see, I'm not known for being a coward, not even near; but survival horror is a genre I cannot play at all, because of the following reasons:
1: Having someone challenging me and telling me that I don't have the guts for it? pffff don't care at all, cuz I know my limits.
As a good Scorpio is not hard for me to accept some challenges, but sometimes my common sense tingles and I can scape with my health bar intact.
2: Because I know myself, I won't accept that challenges specially if I know I'll end in the most ridicule of the situations or I will end with hysterics.
The survival horror genre always has their surprises, spooky moments, dark ambient, or rotten or tetric or horrible or gore, etc. I'm a really nervous person by myself alone, so if I get to play a game like one of these, I know that one of this things will happen:
- I will intone an "AAAAH" with all my lungs and decibels that rivals those of an airplane. Sometimes it will be a swearword.
- I will jump on the spot and break the roof with my head; or at least I will fell from the chair
- if something accidentaly rubs on me, I will react hitting hard -you can ask the sewing cabinet on my back, the door is always opening by itself and has received plenty punches by now- (This option is the one that happens the most...)
3: because I get quickly desperate with the environment.
Excesive tension in the likeness of "now is when a monster appears" or "don't have enough ammo!" or "where can I hide?!" or "I cannot see a $hit three feets from here, what the shell is that shadow?" or "DIEMONSTERGETAWAYFROMMEEEE"; my patience drops to zero and the game’s disk will meet its end at flying high into the night after I threw it.
There are some exceptions I can play, like "Alien vs Predator" for PC, but I was only able to play while in the Xenomorfs's skin; playing as a human or a Yautja had me totally nervous, I could only think that, at any time, a facehugger would drop in the screen, giving me the fright of my life. So I played as the parasitic xenomorphs and enjoyed it, to the point that I infected a human and fought my way out of his chest through biting; I even laughted and said "I give myself the creeps, coooool!" before laughting.
By the way, with this last game, the one who got a great scare was my brother while playing as a Predator, a facehugger trapped him and it was a full screen capture, that made him jump from the chair while I was at my own computer at his side. That surprised me, because he usually doesn't have a problem at all to play survival horror games.
He adores the genre; curiously I usually ended helping him with them, looking at details or solving puzzles for him, in games like this ones:
(Don't loot at me like that, man; I'm scared too...)
An old graphic adventure from the best ones, but a little survival at key moments, I can say is a good balance with the best of both genres, where you have to resolve puzzles to continue, mix inventory items in order to advance to the next zones or scape from an horrible death at the hands or creepy monsters.
Bassed on the well known Cthulhu Mythos from Lovecraft, the game takes place in 1910, and concerns the visit of a young British photographer, John Parker, to the isolated New England town of Illsmouth (an alteration on Lovecraft's Innsmouth) to witness and photograph the passage of Halley's Comet. When he arrives, Parker stumbles upon a sinister conspiracy and must survive the three days between his arrival and the comet's passage while finding out what happened in 1834.
A lover of Lovecraft's stories and games of this genre, my brother was unable to resist any tentation and played it, getting trapped sometimes in puzzles and labyrinths really complicated, sometimes with solutions halfway from bizarre and "good idea to get my a$$ outta here.". Here, I found out more about his stubborn's side, he spent two days trying to solve a puzzle from the movable plates to form an image kind, while ignoring my assistance; he didn't remember that when we were children he used to play games like Street Fighter while I opted for puzzle games like Sokoban. The third day he gave up and called me to solve the evil puzzle (took me one minute... sorry bro, but you know I love puzzle games!) and finally gained access to a cave full of creatures that, when steping on the main character's path, a full screen of the monster appeared, making your heart pumping as crazy as the heart of an F1 pilot on the track. Another labyrinth where I opted for him to explore any single room while drawing a map for him to guide him; specially useful because he discovered that, once in the end, he has to get the main char outta there in reverse way to scape from being eaten alive. It was a funny afternoon, he were exploring every corridor while I was drawing the map and putting warnings in some rooms.
Good times, when I couldn't stop laughting everytime he messed up things and ended in the belly of a Deep One. (He laughted too... a few hours after.)
Personally, I never knew of this game until my brother got it and brought it home, recommended by a friend of his. Plot, you know: zombies invaded Raccoon City, the T-virus has plaged the city and two figures appears and are still alive: Leon Kennedy, a newbie police that was sent there and Claire Redfield (an applause for that tough girl fighting zombies!), an university student who is looking for her brother Chris, from the STARS unit. Leon and Claire are forced to take different paths to find a way out of the city and scape alive from the zombies attack.
Guaranteed frights from the begining, could never forger the scare my brother had when he got near from a boarded up window and the zombies's arms grapped him. He even screamed and I laughted really hard -I'm not bad... just a little sometimes XD- Gotta admire him for continue playing, because between zombies and creatures like this one...
Gene Simmons apprentice... (pff amateur...)
Still got fresh in my mind the "F*CK" he yelled out loud the first time this, obviously, cuddly and lovely lil’ fella, jumped on him.
Between this puppies and myself, telling him predictable things as a joke, like "and now the zombies in the floor will rise when you move to get out of the room" or "puff that tank-like man sure looks like if he is going to burst again in the other corridor and you will had to kill him again"; the worse part was not me telling this all the time, but that I WAS RIGHT. He asked me to stop telling 'prophecies' and to just keep remembering passwords and key zones. Dunno why, he kept taking scares up without my advises.
Everyone here, at this point, knows the plot of Silent Hill series. You know: creepy fog, creepy monsters, creepy places, creepy -but interesting- plots and plot twists... and this refined gentleman...
"A man’s knife speaks for itself" ...with that size, I’m sure that knife has more to say than his owner...
...a ‘man-thing’ that I wouldn't dare to turn my back on, not even for mere seconds to open a door with a giant EXIT sign on it; no one able to use that butcher's king's size knife with a single hand while wearing that metal pyramid helmet deserves to be out of your sight, not even for a single second.
Silent Hill is like the Sacred Land for a lover of Survival Horror. You’ll be surrounded at all times by a thick fog that wouldn’t allow yo to see a damn thing until it’s REALLY and dangerously close to you. Monsters like the acclaimed Pyramid Head, and even worse, will chase you, scare you, give you shivers for weeks, and the worse part is that you will enjoy it... you know it...
On this game, my brother got the 'trying too hard' award, awarded by me, because he had no better idea than playing it at EARLY MORNING to enjoy it more! I even praised him for having that guts, I was on shock while preparing to sleep, watching him still in Silent Hill's hospital, with the gentleman up here chasing him...
Days after starting the game, he asked me at 1 AM for help on that cursed game: he wanted me to get him out of an underground labyrinth where he was searching aimlesly for hours to reach the exit, while pyramid head was patroling the corridors. At first I contanied my laughts; not only because was early morning, but after having a look at the labyrinth...-dark with blood and flesh walls- I understood why even him was scared! I helped him outta there and in the end, helped him the rest of the game; while keeping on reading a book to keep my nerves under control, meanwhile he shooted the monsters down.
This didn't stopped the game’s hability to be able to cast some more frights into us both, but I've never had to stand as hard as the title that comes next in this post.
CALL OF CTHULHU: DARK CORNERS OF EARTH
Again in Lovecraft's word, the main char is Detective Jack Walters. His adventure begins on September 6, 1915, he is summoned to a decrepit manor house in Boston, Massachusetts. The manor is inhabited by a small bizarre cult called the Fellowship of the Yith, led by Victor Holt, who has asked specifically for Walters to come and talk to him. Taking cover from an ensuing firefight, Jack finds himself separated from the police and trapped inside the mansion, with no option but to investigate. When the rest of the police finally break in, they find the cultists dead by mass suicide and Walters apparently insane. He is committed to Arkham sanatorium, where he stays for several years.
Six years later, Walters is released and becomes a private investigator. On February 6, 1922, he takes up a missing person case at Innsmouth (don't go there, buddy), a xenophobic coastal town, and the site of the recent disappearance of Brian Burnham, a clerk that had been sent there to establish a local store for the First National Grocery chain. Arriving in the isolated town, which appears to be depopulated and in a state of collapse, Jack unsuccessfully asks around for Brian. He stays the night at a hotel, where he barely escapes an assassination attempt and then flees from a chase by an armed mob.
Many puzzles and riddles to solve, and moments of runing in a "try to save your a$$ at any cost" style, yeah, you hitted Jackpot! Got to say, the game has an incredible environment sound, that is so goddamn good that, while my brother was playing it for the first time, I was on my computer, next to his, totally nervous, at the brink ot my self control; even more when he was at the part when Walters had to scape from the hotel while the monsters where trying to kill him, he got killed more than a dozen times, and the horrible sounds, the music and the screams were getting my nerves into even higher levels; I ended totally hysterical, to the point that I ended yelling at him and decided to help him to get out of that stage, looking at his screen while yelling "GO RIGHT, NOW GO FRONT AND JUMP, TAKE THAT DAMN STAIRS AT YOUR LEFT, THAT ONES YOU... DIDN’T YOU SAW IT BEFORE?!?! QUICKLY, GODDAMITT, RUUUUUUUUUN, DON'T YOU JUST STAY THERE LOOKING IF THEY GET CLOSE YOU IDIOT! YOU ARE WASTING TIME JUST-RUUUUUUUN!" ...it. Was. Horrible.
My nerves could’t stand so much pressure if I try to play them myself; that’s why I can only watch other play this games and help anyway I can.
Come visit Illsmouth; it is well known for his exotic species.. yeah right...
Any time he asks me for my help in this game I always ends really nervous; the sewing cabinet ended punched a lot of times that week; damned loose door...
As I said; with things like that, is not like I lack courage to play this game genres, but I have plenty more of jitters and I usually get myself in mode "I first hit wathever it was and the I look at what has touched me", and is not recommendable. Not only for my sake, but for the furniture’s safety. Even so, they are interesting, most of them, and their plots are truly good, so I still keep and eye in many Survival Horror games to talk about them!
