If it’s not apparent by now, this PS3Hyper reviewer is a true and tested horror buff. So it’s not a surprise when I’ve decided to loosen my wallet and purchase Siren: New Translation (SNT) (Siren: Blood Curse in the US) – which is supposed to be a remake / extension / side story of the original Forbidden Siren on the PS2.

Truth to be told, I already had 2 disastrous experiences with the past Siren titles. They were too hard, too tedious and the crazy camera angles didn’t go down too well with my motion sickness. But positive reviews of SNT gave me some hope. So with a mixture of half-expectation and semi-bad feelings, I dived into this little cult classic…

Interesting Story-Telling

Plot-wide, SNT is pretty engaging and has quite a bit of a depth. You start off being told that an entire Japanese village disappeared overnight back in the 70s. Then, the game fast-forwards you to the present where a camera crew stumbles upon a sacrificial ritual at the location where the village is supposed to have been located. As the crew members watch, a young boy comes out of nowhere and saves the sacrificial victim. And before you know it, the sky starts raining blood, the locals turns zombie-like, and everything slides into chaos.

Without letting in too much, let’s just say the story of SNT is pretty much about uncovering the truth behind the disappearance of the village as well as the strange transformation of the locals. The story is told through the perspectives of several characters you control, which I must confess can get a bit confusing throughout as you struggle to draw the connections and patch the plot together. Still, by the end, you’ll discover the truth and everything’s good and well.

The story of SNT is perhaps the strongest point of this title, purely because it takes a different route from other more established survival-horror games which focus on the obvious (Resident Evil – Virus; Fatal Frame – Ghosts) to the near-worn out (Silent Hill – Haunted by Past). If you are a gamer propelled by story, you’ll rejoice because SNT is not unlike reading a pretty-good horror book, though it does take effort to piece the puzzle together due to the manner it is told… just so you know.

Village of the Dead

On gameplay, part of SNT can literally be compared to as a horror version of Metal Gear Solid. To me, SNT is first-and-foremost a stealth game though instead of soldiers, you’re now trying to sneak past zombie villagers. Most of the times, fighting your enemies won’t do you any good (in the long run) because they get revived after a while; and sometimes, you DON’T even get the chance to fight because some of the characters you control just CAN’T. This is the defining gameplay element of SNT because it makes the game hard and frustrating at times. On the one end, you might enjoy the challenge; but on the other, you might be cursing acid as the defenseless little girl you control at one stage get done in by a zombie for the 37th times.

That’s not to say you won’t be doing some sort of fighting in this game. In fact, you’re given a whole range of melee and firearm weapons for the characters than can wield them. The learning curve is gradual. In the beginning, you might be fighting, say, one puny zombie policeman. By the end, you may be fighting hordes of multiple zombie villagers lunging at you simultaneously. I can’t stress enough that stealth is still the way to go if you can, because your protagonists can only take a limited amount of punishment. After all, we’re not talking John Rambo here.

Like many modern survival-horror titles, SNT takes place mostly from a behind-the-shoulder camera angle made famous by Resident Evil 4. But for reasons I cannot fully explain, playing SNT is quite a punishing experience for people with motion sickness or just those generally who do not have good orientation. Perhaps it is the choppy nature of the camera, or maybe it’s just how dark this game is (as in the brightness level), I found myself easily-nauseated playing SNT and often lost for direction, especially during sharp turns. In the very first stage: I was running away from an enemy up a narrow, curving path. The next thing I knew, I was running BACK towards the approaching zombie. This seriously hampered my gameplay experience, to be frank.

This brings me to the subject of sight-jack. In a nutshell, sight-jacking is the ability to “see” from the eyes of your enemies, which is shown on a split-screen when you activate it. This allows you to determine the next movement of your enemies, and in judging what’s the best route to take. Now I’m sure this feature is of much use to many gamers out there; but for someone who’s already constantly disoriented and lost for directions, the last thing I needed was a split screen depicting a first-person view of, say, a wall. It just got too confusing for me after a while.

“For a Downloadable Game”…

On graphics, many gamers seem to agree that SNT is decent “for a downloadable game”. But since I’ve got my copy in the form of a BluRay Disc, I couldn’t help but judge SNT by the standard of other PS3 games sold off the counter. Make no mistake, the game looks ok. There’s a creepy yet somewhat harsh visual style throughout, and the bleeding faces of your enemies can scare the heck out of you in the middle of the night. The surroundings are pretty real if you don’t look too hard, and cut-scenes are enjoyable. Can the visual be realized on the PS2? I don’t think so. But does it utilize the full power of the PS3? My feeling is a resounding NO.

However, the semi-let down I got on the visual is saved by the sounds. If you ever wanted to hear what the sound of Japanese zombie’s like, this is the game to do it. In fact, some of the noises I heard sounded like the zombie conversing with each other in a strange, foreign and zombish dialect (I don’t know how they did that). It really does amplify the scare-factor to a great extent. As for the non-zombie characters, they are nicely voiced and most importantly, clear enough to be made out even without subtitles. This is another plus factor for SNT.

You Don’t Really Need to Replay This

As previously mentioned, the strength of SNT lies in its plot which means you probably won’t need or want to replay this after you uncover the story on the first run. For the perfectionists, you may try a rerun to get those hidden archive items which gives you additional information. Or how about giving yourself a greater challenge by playing SNT again on hard mode (Shudder… why would you want to do that?!). There’s often not a lot to offer in the replayability department for games such as these, and SNT epitomizes that to the max.

One for the Horror Fan

If you are a horror fan, there’s just no way you’re not getting this because seriously, how many horror PS3 titles do we get in a year? In addition, SNT has got a pretty good story, nice sounds, and enemy characters that are downright creepy and terrifying to look at. These are enough to make a pretty decent horror game for about a week of enjoyment.

But as a gamer, you’ll need to consider the hair-pulling difficulty of this game as this element will make or break your experience with SNT. Though much easier than the previous Siren titles, SNT is still hard enough to warrant dozens of retries in various stages, making you go through a process of trial-and-error that seems more like work than play. And if you’re motion-intolerance, be prepared to face some gut-wrenching dizziness ahead.

To sum it up, PS3Hyper gives Siren: Lost Translations a 3 out of 5 for about 10-15 blood-splattered hours of horrifying fun. If you are a motion-tolerance horror geek, this is definitely for you. If you’re just looking for some casual next-gen gaming, renting this would be the way to go.

Posted in Reviews on Thursday, November 20th, 2008 at 3:53 pm |
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