SHHF Exclusive Interview with Tomm Hulett - READ IT HERE!

[rm2kking]

In another thread somebody suggested that we might get our own "Nowhere". THAT would be cool.

Silent Hill was never about combat though, and, honestly, the combat sucks in the older ones. Silent Hill tried to get more combat intensive in Homecoming, which was a noble pursuit, and I did enjoy the combat, but it caused a lot of long, frustrating battles (damn needlers). Resident Evil tried to go the same rout and now that series is more like action horror, not survival horror. Silent Hill would be deeply cheapened if that happened. I'm not saying that I don't like combat in my games, I own God of War 1 and 2. I'm just saying that I'm glad that they took some of the focus off of combat before it got out of hand. In an interview I read somewhere, the producers likened Silent Hill to a nightmare. You don't fight in nightmares (typically), you flee! and that's part of the fear.

Did you enjoy the Silent Hill movie? There wasn't any combat in that (besides shooting PH's arm and stabbin a dude) and it still retained the essence of Silent Hill. I'n fact, the way the Raw Shocks attack in the walkthrough resembles the Grey Children scene in the movie quite a bit.

And the throwing-the-monster-off mechanic present in the walkthrough seemed to take the place of direct combat, so it seems defense and evasion based, not just evasion, and that's good.

[The Hawk's Eye]

Really, really long interview. I give the guys a lot of credit for how much they answered, although I'm disappointed my question didn't make it. I thought it was a good one too. : /

[rm2kking]

What was your question?

[angelofROOM302]

Thank you Tomm and Sam for answering our questions!
The website design looks amazing so far! Good job!!

Aww, I should have asked a question but you guys all did a great job on asking about everything. I know all that I need to know to keep me excited for playing the game when it comes out!

This was from the interview;

PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER_SHOW PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER:

DISTANTJ: I'm worried about the running from monsters. Will there still be surprises if the monsters are only in the dark world, and the light world is just puzzles? Will I still feel like something might jump out at me?

TOMM: I’m going to toss this question to Sam Barlow from Climax, the game’s Lead Designer.

SAM: We have had focus testers ask to stop playing because they are 'too scared' during exploration. The world of Silent Hill is not a nice place, so exploring it isn't a walk in the park. Yes there are scares, but in the main it's about suspense -- the atmosphere of dread and not knowing when the nightmare is coming -- in this case it's not always as clear cut as it was in the previous games (where the nightmare would come once you'd ticked off 90% of the map). Also, given the things you will see and hear there, it's not accurate to call exploration the "light world". It's a place where bad things happen; things so bad they have to be frozen.

I love that!! This was kind of the answer that I was hoping someone would ask.
I'm kind of a scardy cat, so nothing makes me more excited or scared than exploring out on my own and not really knowing where I'm going or what I'm doing and having something just attack me. I LOVE to scream like bloody murder!

Everything just seems so interesting now! I'm so excited!
And the fact that the answers that you pick and every little action that you do changes the gameplay is just awesome!! The Silent Hill team is just so fresh and innovative! We are so lucky!

There are more things that I want to say but my mind is just spinning. In the good way! Oo, Excitement!

[The Hawk's Eye]

What was your question?

Q: What was the inspiration to create a Silent Hill game that is not canon with the other games in the series? Are there hopes to maybe establish other Silent Hill games congruent with Shattered Memories, or would you sooner continue with the existing continuity?

[rm2kking]

That is a good question. But I bet it's meant to just be a stand alone. Who knows though. Too bad they didn't answer that one, I would have been interested to hear what they said.

[Clyde]

What was your question?

Q: What was the inspiration to create a Silent Hill game that is not canon with the other games in the series? Are there hopes to maybe establish other Silent Hill games congruent with Shattered Memories, or would you sooner continue with the existing continuity?

One of the reasons they chose to go back to the story of the first game was to try and introduce Silent Hill to a group of gamers that never got to play the original, and are thus hesitant to try any of the newer games due to their unfamiliarity with the story.

[flown]

What was your question?

Q: What was the inspiration to create a Silent Hill game that is not canon with the other games in the series? Are there hopes to maybe establish other Silent Hill games congruent with Shattered Memories, or would you sooner continue with the existing continuity?

i think your question did get an answer (there is alot about the canon). as tomm states in the introduction some questions got bundled under 1 question and i think some parts of questions he just couldn't /wouldn't answer didn't make it to the interview. i'm sure he read all of our questions and tried to come up with an answer as good as he could and was allowed to. i liked your question by the way.

thanks vixx for the oportunity and the effort.

[Hannah]

Interesting, interesting. I can't help but feel none of my personal questions (granted, I didn't submit them because they were fairly specific/snarky/plot-breaking) were answered. All of the questions they answered one could've easily come up with via speculation. All this does is make it official.

Still, it's nice to get some clarification on certain issues.

Hmm... he avoided the question about whether Lisa was in or not...
Sounds like they're planning something with her character.

Alternatively, he could've avoided the Lisa question because they didn't put her in the game.

Which would be hilarious.

[Ratiocinator]

ENIKA: When working with the storyline, have you drawn any inspiration from the Silent Hill movie?
TOMM: The movie exists in its own reality outside of the games, so no.

KRYSTA: The SH1 universe has been exploited to the limit already (Origins, movie, comics, play novels, SH3). I'm tired of SH1 ... will you do a reimagining of SH2?
TOMM: It seems like reimagining SH1 was dangerous enough… would you guys really want us changing what is arguably the fan-favorite of the series?

Those two questions... those two questions and his response won me over. I'm sold just by this man's thinking.

But this was an incredible interview. I couldn't believe how many questions were answered and with good, thorough responses and a good sense of humor where approriate. Judging by the varying paths this game can take from the beginning psych evalution and ongoing evaluation should shift the degree of differential monsters greatly. Playing against ever-chaning monsters each playthrough will be a blast.

... and we may learn more about Harry's wife (and her name)? Wow!

[rm2kking]

Seems as if Silent Hill is in good hands

[GrievousGarland]

Hmm... he avoided the question about whether Lisa was in or not...
Sounds like they're planning something with her character.

Alternatively, he could've avoided the Lisa question because they didn't put her in the game.

Which would be hilarious.

Then why not just say no? He answered the one on what he thought of her (and it seems he does think highly). =/

So why would he intentionally leave out a character he liked?

EDIT: I'm really starting to get the feeling that Lisa is Harry's wife this time around. He confirmed we'd find out her name, yet didn't tell us what it was. That leads me to believe that the name is one that is recognizable and therefore would ruin a surprise.

I'm just guessing though. lol

[Dark Sky]

I think perhaps to a certain degree we should stop thinking about "which characters from the original game will be in it?" because ultimately I don't think any character from the original game WILL be in it!

Instead there are NEW characters which have the SAME NAME as characters from the original game, but not necessarily anything else in common. Cybil may still be a cop in Shattered Memories, but that doesn't mean she has any of the same character traits.

I think it is VERY likely that there IS a character called "Lisa Garland" in Shattered Memories, but whether or not she's a nurse or has anything in common at all with Lisa from SH1 remains to be seen.

And of course none of the above takes into the consideration that character appearance and personality will vary depending on the way you play the game!

[GrievousGarland]

Well, if Cybil got to keep her occupation then it's only logical that Lisa would get to keep hers too. I'd think that based on your actions you could awaken a version similar to their original form in personality and such. Personally, I think sexy Cybil is the closest to her original incarnation... that or the brown haired one. Her role seems very similar to the one she had in SH1, while Dahlia's isn't (at least from what I can see). I could see it going either way with Lisa.

[Arsonist]

Ah! Win! Tomm sounds like an awesome guy. The interview really got me even more hyped about the game.

Also, I bet Lisa will be the friendly barkeep people have been mentioning.

[Enika]

This sounds really cool! I'm getting more and more excited for this game by the minute! Thank you to Tomm and Sam for doing this, and thank you a TON, Vixx, for setting this up! I'm so pumped right now, haha

[Whitney]

Thank you guys so much for answering all those fan questions you guys sound like you really know what you are doing! After reading the interview I'm even more excited (I didn't think that was possible!) for this game. Every aspect so far seems to exceed my expectations, the smart AI, the focus on exploration and the replay value seems off the charts! If the game is as good as it sounds it might become my new favorite installment

BTW I laughed out loud when I read Sam's joke on the GBA Silent Hill being his favorite, since I've been playing it like a madwoman!!

[DrainDeimos]

In another thread somebody suggested that we might get our own "Nowhere". THAT would be cool.

Silent Hill was never about combat though, and, honestly, the combat sucks in the older ones. Silent Hill tried to get more combat intensive in Homecoming, which was a noble pursuit, and I did enjoy the combat, but it caused a lot of long, frustrating battles (damn needlers). Resident Evil tried to go the same rout and now that series is more like action horror, not survival horror. Silent Hill would be deeply cheapened if that happened. I'm not saying that I don't like combat in my games, I own God of War 1 and 2. I'm just saying that I'm glad that they took some of the focus off of combat before it got out of hand. In an interview I read somewhere, the producers likened Silent Hill to a nightmare. You don't fight in nightmares (typically), you flee! and that's part of the fear.

Did you enjoy the Silent Hill movie? There wasn't any combat in that (besides shooting PH's arm and stabbin a dude) and it still retained the essence of Silent Hill. I'n fact, the way the Raw Shocks attack in the walkthrough resembles the Grey Children scene in the movie quite a bit.

And the throwing-the-monster-off mechanic present in the walkthrough seemed to take the place of direct combat, so it seems defense and evasion based, not just evasion, and that's good.

That was me with the Nowhere speculation

I feel exactly the same as you about the combat situation. I can't describe how disappointed I am in Resident Evil and the general trend to change survival horror into action horror. Like you, it's not because I don't like action games but because I know that empowering the player too much can kill the horror experience. And because I like variety in gaming. Good for Konami for not making another "me too" game.

They seem to be refining and changing the game. While it appears that many of the paradigms are unchanged the objective seems a little different. We still have a form of puzzles and exploration but it is no longer a scary narrative driven by combat based survival. Instead the developers seem to be creating a game that evaluates a player's personality and behavior in a very frightening and helpless situation. The game isn't a traditional exploration/combat system, it's the psyche profile and that's a good thing.

We don't need every horror game to turn into RE4. RE and SH are the most well known and influential titles in the survival horror genre and I'm glad that Konami has decided to take a counter position to Capcom's terrible mistakes.

To the people who don't like that combat has been omitted: With the current trends in survival horror being changed into action horror, it is necessary for someone to take a more extreme approach from the other side. People need to remember what survival horror is all about. We can thank Konami for being there to remind us.

Also, thank you very much Vixx for landing such a great interview. It would seem that this is the place to be for SH news.

[rm2kking]

I think sexy Cybil is the closest to her original incarnation...

I agree. It looks just like her and follows the hinted attraction between them (Cybil and Harry) that the first game had.

[alone in the town]

I'm ever the more stoked for this game.

Big thanks to Mr. Hulett.

I wish I'd asked him why he leaves an extra 'm' on his name.