The Lost Art of Survival Horror

Just like in books and films, atmosphere can play a big part in your gaming experience. Setting and ambiance play a big part in immersing a person into the game that they're playing. The games that take full advantage of this fact and play it to their advantage would be the sub-genre of Survival Horror. Just as it sounds, the basis for the survival horror genre is just that, to survive given the bleak circumstances that surround you. Take the earlier Resident Evil games as an example. More often than not, the game have you very limited resources and forced you to strategically navigate through it. Things tend to get a lot more tense for a player when they can't shoot their way through a scenario.

Of course these earlier games had more than just low ammunition going for them. The set up for these scenarios often find the player left to fend for themselves in some remote location. Said location is a big part of creating the proper atmosphere. In Konami's Silent Hill series, the titular location is always the foggy town of Silent Hill. On the surface it might just come across as a an old ghost town but there's more going on than one would think, as shown here in the trailer for Konami's latest entry into the series, Silent Hill: Downpour.

Not all out scary but there's definitely some moments implanted in there to keep you on the edge of your seat. Survival horror, while having it's fair share all out scares, has always been more about uneasy tension. While it keeps you on edge and ready for anything, it still doesn't keep you from getting a bit jumpy sometimes. One scenario that immediately comes to mind is in the original Resident Evil. After your first zombie encounter you're probably just a little anxious to see what's coming next. Moment later as you enter a hallway you're surprised by several zombified dogs leaping through the mansion windows to attack you. This is encapsulated by the ominous background music and effective lighting situation. And while I don't want to give credit to a crappy camera system, the fixed angles in the original Resident Evil games helped better sense of confinement as opposed to the over the shoulder camera styling of Resident Evil 4 and 5. 

By taking advantage of a few key elements; setting, music, space, and limited in game resources, developers manage to create an uphill struggle for survival. Thankfully these days we're seeing a small resurgence in this style of developing. As stated before, Capcom is attempting to reboot their Resident Evil series by going back to their survival horror roots. Though they'll be taking into account what they've learned over the years with subsequent sequels. Personally I wouldn't except the return of fixed camera angles to take create that old sense of claustrophobia. I'd even go as far to guess that they won't give the player heaps of ammunition as well. Nothing adds to the suspense more than having to face down an enemy knowing that the only thing keeping you from dying at that moment is that final magazine in your inventory. At the other end of the survival horror spectrum stands the other innovator, Konami and their Silent Hill series. As you can see from the trailer above they're still hard at work with the 8th game in their series due out in the fall of this year. In just a few months time we'll see if their decision to revitalize the franchise pays off.