Konami Working on New Silent Hill For PS3/360/PC

[Rombie]

I'll assume that is a mixture of aesthetics, gameplay, and technical feedback. Fairly easy production role. I assume Kojima will be listed as Exec Producer as well.

[Carnivol]

^ I doubt that they're running the same engine as Jericho based on the media released.

Going by the media released, I'd say quite the contrary. If you doctored out the guns of Jericho and Gabriel from the Lords of Shadow shots, you probably couldn't even tell which one's which. If Lords of Shadow is not using the Jericho engine, it's surely recycling massive amounts of it and/or updating it.

I don't know what problem you had with the game, but with provided the game doesn't require an install for every chapter like MGS4 did, I think they did well with the visuals and enviroments.

To quote Wayne on this one, it pretty much felt like a "PS2HD" game. It performed like a typical PS2 game, it looked like a last gen game (w/creepy rubber shaders appled, in lack of a better term) and it animated like a last gen game (and in general the engine appears to've been such a mess that Konami's probably never ever gonna use it for anything ever again.)

Considering other developers working on the PS3 have shared so much (check the thanks credits for the Uncharted titles and God of War 3), I'm sure they're happy having someone working with them that has a completed PS3 title that looked good (still probably in the top 5).

I dunno if I'd put MGS4 in my Top 5 on the PS3 (no matter which way I twist or turn it). If it'd even make it to my top 10, then the system would still be in dire need of some proper action (or maybe it still is... when I think about it, I'm actually having a hard time thinking up a top 10 on the fly).

The thing with companies sharing assets and stuff seems to mostly happen whenever people work directly (and exclusively) with Sony. Thus Sony probably has some sort of ownership and say when it comes to their tech - allowing Sony to ultimately decide whether or not it's appropriate to share assets between non-related studios (most companies that aren't console manufacturers or license out their tech seem to be pretty reluctant to share stuff with others.)


Also, I bet the builds sent to Japan every now and then are just for mere QA/Feedback testing. Most studios who outsource stuff to overseas companies does it like that (have builds sent to them on a bi-weekly basis, allowing some local project manager take a quick look + throw them at their own internal QA team for some quick focus/feedback testing). Bet that, for some reason, someone at Konami felt it'd be a clever idea to use it as a chance to ninja in a chance to slap Kojima's name on it while they're at it, since Kojima's probably a bigger name amongst the target audience than Konami is (sadly).


But, yeah, this is most certainly just MercurySteam's project and Kojima Production's certainly just acting as a brand/label of sorts. Probably not too different from your everyday celebrity endorsement of something such as cereal products.

[Rombie]

Going by the media released, I'd say quite the contrary. If you doctored out the guns of Jericho and Gabriel from the Lords of Shadow shots, you probably couldn't even tell which one's which. If Lords of Shadow is not using the Jericho engine, it's surely recycling massive amounts of it and/or updating it.

Personally I'm not convinced entirely, but I'll concede the chances of it recycling some of it. At the very least I'm happy it's not made up of only the shades of color Jericho was ;)

To quote Wayne on this one, it pretty much felt like a "PS2HD" game. It performed like a typical PS2 game, it looked like a last gen game (w/creepy rubber shaders appled, in lack of a better term) and it animated like a last gen game (and in general the engine appears to've been such a mess that Konami's probably never ever gonna use it for anything ever again.)

I'm not sure if I entirely agree or disagree. While I concur the shaders weren't a good touch and I wasn't a fan of the characters in general for the most part, the environments and environmental effects were some of the best looking of the PS3 up until that point. Numerous games still being released now are still lacking some of the effects work it had. Animation was a mixed bag on the ingame, but the mo-cap and animation work for the cutscenes was first rate - which probably made the ingame look worse sadly.

As for the engine, it's fairly moot of a point for KojiPro. I'm struggling to, with the exceptions of re-released titles with extras, ever recall them reusing a game engine outside of the portable titles. They tend to always work on a new engine regardless of previous platform development. They just take technical knowledge across and work from there. MGS3's engine was entirely different from MGS2 (a point made fairly clear by their test render of a forest in the MGS2 engine). Outside of as well I think the whole thing is developed around how Kojima sees MGS working, which is why the same team developing something like ZOE turns out entirely different in animation, visuals, and the like. I'm keen to see what they can do with something that isn't Metal Gear myself.

The thing with companies sharing assets and stuff seems to mostly happen whenever people work directly (and exclusively) with Sony. Thus Sony probably has some sort of ownership and say when it comes to their tech - allowing Sony to ultimately decide whether or not it's appropriate to share assets between non-related studios (most companies that aren't console manufacturers or license out their tech seem to be pretty reluctant to share stuff with others.)

Also, I bet the builds sent to Japan every now and then are just for mere QA/Feedback testing. Most studios who outsource stuff to overseas companies does it like that (have builds sent to them on a bi-weekly basis, allowing some local project manager take a quick look + throw them at their own internal QA team for some quick focus/feedback testing). Bet that, for some reason, someone at Konami felt it'd be a clever idea to use it as a chance to ninja in a chance to slap Kojima's name on it while they're at it, since Kojima's probably a bigger name amongst the target audience than Konami is (sadly).

Maybe if this was like 12 years ago. Sony doesn't support that sort of thing like they once did, sharing of information and development tools. Most of the cross sharing anyway that I mentioned was happening for the most part at a free and open discussion level. Some of the studios mentioned in those thanks weren't even Sony's own devs.

Considering also that regardless of MercurySteam's placement on making the title, they are being funded and employed by Konami to actually make the game, well I don't think either of us can be fully wrong or fully right about exactly what sort of work KojiPro is doing on the game.

As for the fact they've slapped KojiPro onto it, you're probably right, but I get personally the feeling knowing how much Konami invests itself (for right or wrong) into Kojima's team - I kinda get the idea that they might want to be more than just a label or a figurehead for this project.

At the end of the day I guess we just don't agree on this, but in any case I'll take it as a good case study of a Western Developer with a Konami team overseeing their work at any capacity, and wonder if Konami is planning on trying to do this with Silent Hill.

[Branden_Lucero]

i'm a nut. i don't give a fuck who makes it, i'll end up buying it. but i'm not buying it at $60. i'll wait for a loooooong price drop to like $10 instead. i bought homecoming for ps3, i was so impatient to play it that i ended up renting it on 360. i got all 1000 gamescore in it before i took it back and i haven't bothered to open the ps3 version. if i would have known that, i would have just bought it way later for cheap.

[aris13]

Sweet mother of god.


Silent Hill will be a FPS

According to Gamasutra, Vatra Games is developing a mysterious FPS in their new Czech studio founded by the ex members of Illusion Softworks. This new FPS is a new Silent Hill for Konami.

[Darkmoon]

So...

Whose with me that we go grab the poisoned kool-aid now? Then we take that stuff to Konami and make them gargle the stuff until we find a non-stupid person to make a proper Silent Hill.

I'm surprised that news didn't come with a picture of the newest development team juggling kittens above a pirahana tank and occasionally hurling a furry bundle into a mincer or something. Jeez.

[GuardhouseMusic]

Watch as the series goes from no combat whatsoever to a fucking slew of it as implied by the genre.

People are weird.

[Mr_Zombie]

Watch as the series goes from no combat whatsoever to a fucking slew of it as implied by the genre.

Not always; the Penumbra series is also a first-person shooter, but from what I've played and heard, there's very little actual fighting and shooting in that game.

[GuardhouseMusic]

Not always; the Penumbra series is also a first-person shooter, but from what I've played and heard, there's very little actual fighting and shooting in that game.

You're right. Mirror's Edge is another example of something that isn't primarily shooter or combat.

I dunno, I want to keep an open mind but the idea of SH being a first person shooter raises all sorts of alarms.

[Rombie]

If it's true... well it's not the first time...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpqDEeArpMk

Hopefully it'll be better than this. But I doubt it.

[Canas Renvall]

I'm pretty sure I just died a little bit. Well, my expectation level just went from 60% to about 10%... Looks like my next horror fix'll be the Mikami/Suda/Yamaoka game.

[riderkid]

lost memories says it might be a remake of silent hill 2...great frist my mom now this

[A-J]

an FPS remake of SH2 ?

could they try and fuck over their fanbase any harder ?

[Canas Renvall]

^ Oh please don't say that, it'll only bring bad things upon us...