Siren Blood Curse is a zombie-fest sequel to Forbidden Siren 2.
Siren Blood Curse
(Sony. PS3)
One day, we'll buy all games by online download, which means games stores will go the way of CD stores, which have become fewer and more niche.
Sony is to be congratulated for taking the next innovative step by offering its highly anticipated sequel to the horror game
as a download from its PlayStation 3 store.
Even more interesting is that you get the game as a series of 12 episodes. Very TV. Training Episode 1 seemed to take less than 10 minutes to complete.
Similar to the PC Steam Windows client for games such as
HalfLife 2
, we are beginning to see more and more games forgo the traditional wrapped box or even the down-sized de-facto standard plastic DVD case in favour of a more digital download to your games platform.
I've been interested how many people mention they bought one of the games I have raved about this year such as
Metal Gear Solid 4
but had to give up before finishing the game. It wasn't because they were dissatisfied with the game but they seemed to run out of patience to complete the many long hours required.
Maybe for a generation used to one-hour max TV shows, this is the answer - to release episodes that you collect.
I'm pretty used to this with Japanese material. I enjoy anime and the series everyone is talking about at the moment -
, which comes out as a DVD of three to four episodes once a month. To be honest, that's painful for a captivating anime series. It seems a bit of a long wait between episodes and you wonder if it's better to wait for the eventual box set of all the episodes.
The first episode of
Siren Blood Curse
on PS3 is $18.90 - a little cheaper than your average DVD movie.
The trailer certainly looked eerie enough (to heighten the atmosphere, the visuals are actually very dark and it lives up to its promise of blood and gore as the first horror to hit the PS3.
It's kind of a remake of the previous chilling PS2 game
but uses Western characters even though it's still made by a Japanese studio. Presumably this is to give it wider global appeal.
It's set in the Japanese village of Hanuda where an American TV crew are filming an expose on an urban myth about a vanished village where human sacrifices were said to have taken place.
Hanuda is a dark strange world, frozen in the 1970s and surrounded by a red sea.
In fact, an ancient curse has been set upon the town and you have to save the remaining inhabitants but to survive you have to defend yourself from the twisted scary-looking zombies (Shibito) using things like axes and sledgehammers. They're determined zombies that are not easily put down.
Within seconds of falling down, they're up after you again, in fact it seems as if you just can't kill them. You play as one of seven characters with an objective to complete for each mission.
It turns into a kind of Groundhog Day as you get trapped into a time loop where events eternally repeat and change.
It may be hard at first as you're thrown in the deep end without much of a training tutorial. The controls are camera oriented and frequently change and this in combination with being a bit stiff make it tricky - you have to shake the sixaxis controller sometimes but the sightjacking mechanic - is a winner.
This lets you see through the eyes of an enemy and determine there whereabouts and activities. Since most of the game is spent sneaking about, you need this ability to get past the daunting Shibito patrols and to track the enemy as the screen splits in half giving you your current view and one through the Shibito's eyes.
If you're claustrophobic or don't cope well with blood-dripping monsters jumping out of the pitch dark, you'll find this a challenge.
For the rest of us, turn the lights out, put the headphones on and be prepared to get freaked.
MadGamer's rating: 8/10
Auditors PwC: Cited disruptions to operations from that IT upgrade.