Developer: Wych Elm Games | Platform: PS5 |
Playtime: 17:55 | Platinum: 19:55
I'll admit a cool visual style is often enough for me to get interested in a game and with Silver Pines I thought it'd be something cool to play in the Halloween season. What I wasn't expecting was for it to be a phenomenal experience in nearly all of its facets and jump straight to my top 3 games of the year.
The story follows Private Investigator Red Walker who is visiting the (presumably) Mid Western American town of Silver Pines during a freak rain storm. He is looking for a musician, Eddie Velvet, though he cannot remember why it's so important - just that his life depends on it. Described as having Alan Wake and Twin Peak vibes, I fully agree but I also say this is a phenomenal Silent Hill game too.
Your main guidance comes from you employer, the mysterious Mr Jackson, a voice on the phone lines who keeps Walker in line. There is also a cast of strange characters who carry the strange vibes. Conversational but still distant in a lot of ways, dropping small tidbits about whats happening. Less approachable is the range of enemies and bosses - all of which are kind of bloated drowned zombie like things. They’re never given a name or an explanation but there is a fair range of them that require different strategies to deal with. Thankfully you have a range of melee weapons and ranged weapons to deal with them.
Despite the more fantastical aspects of the story and world, the game is fairly grounded in reality compared to other Metroidvanias – your upgrades aren’t going to be double jumps or freezing time. There’s some more banal items like a crank or fuses but the interesting ones are the various melee weapons – these operate both as weapons to use as well as ways of getting around – Crowbar for wooden planks, box cutter for tarps.
While being a Metroidvania, the game also doubles as a Survival Horror – this much I’ve mentioned already but it makes for an interesting change to other titles in the genre. I’ve not played very many at all (Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, Bloodstained) but they’re firmly fantasy – i.e. Swords and magic. Even your basic sword is going to be more effective than a broken baseball bat and a handgun with no ammo. There were more than a handful of occasions where I just had to cut my losses and run, try a new area to restock and begin anew. The game likes to play this little trick in which the areas you return to with your new weapons are some of the most enemy intensive in the whole game meaning you really have to commit to doing them or wait until you’ve got nothing else to do.
Puzzles also play a major part of the game, with almost every door requiring some kind of item or puzzle. I was quite proud of myself that I managed to solve every puzzle but I suppose if I could solve them all then they aren’t terribly difficult. There is a fair mix and each ‘Dungeon’ has a range of it’s own puzzles unique to the setting.
Your inventory is grid base ala Resident Evil 4 but also fairly small compared to the size of the items you collect. There are inventory upgrades but these are rare and hard to find. Thankfully the Camera and eventually the Flashlight occupy their own unique slots (though the torch does need batteries). Mementos also fill their own slots
Mementos are the charms/talismans of the game, giving the wearer extra benefits. There can only be one equipped at the start but that can be improved by finding special items in the world. Some Mementos that offer stronger effects also have a negative attached to them – more melee damage for less durability is one example but this only applies to some. Mementos that only offer a modest boost do not have the drawbacks allowing the player to decide how much they want to sacrifice for gain.
The game has three endings which are all interesting and have different parameters to unlock. They’re all cool but none will explain anything in great depth but the implications of which really enhance the story (Provided you are interested in more esoteric and interpretive stories and endings).
My review has not done the game justice really because it’s hard to describe how Silver Pines made me feel. It’s an atmospheric Metroidvania/Survival Horror masterpiece and one of the best games this year. A must play for fans of either genre or the thematic style.
