Siren: Blood Curse

[ayush12ice]

Damn y did i start this thread, now they gonna get me

 

 

[HundredProofSam]

mods/admins

 

before moving a thread to the news section, please make sure the first post looks presentable rather than just three abbreviated words hyperlinked

 

 

 

peace

[ayush12ice]

now is it better???

[shaiTaaNi billi]

forbidden siren was scary...fatal frame is the scariest...

you can play any fatal frame game alone but not siren, this game is so twisted that without a proper walk through you can't even dream to finish it, hands down forbidden siren was the most innovative and scariest game of all time

[tushiq]

ITS GONNA BE GR8

[ayush12ice]

Demo Comin soon

 

google was not translating it

[Snake]

The demo of Siren: New translation is available since a few hours on the japanese PSN store, and KurowaSan from the NeoGAF forum recorded this nice video, showing a dark and rather frightening game.

 

 

http://gamersyde.com/news_6374_en.html

[TAG]

The demo of Siren: New translation is available since a few hours on the japanese PSN store, and KurowaSan from the NeoGAF forum recorded this nice video, showing a dark and rather frightening game.

http://gamersyde.com/news_6374_en.html

The demo is up on the HK store as well.. in case someone has trouble with japanese menu... its about 570 MB.

 

Damn its a creepy game (and I scare easy!).. on top of that all the menus/hints/instructions are in japanese... even though the game is in english.

 

But it looks really good!

[lastAvenger]

I have downloaded about 80% of this game. Seeing this thread reminded me of completing the pending download. Got it from HK store btw

[Snake]

impressions zarur dalana!!

[Achieved_Nirvana]

Yippee!! English version confirmed!!

 

Siren Calls Out to Europe

 

Sony Computer Entertainment confirmed the UK version of the game at this week's PlayStation Day, and the first trailer for the game (which is simply a version of a previous Japanese trailer -- the game focuses on American TV reporters rather than the original Siren's Japanese cast, and so even the Japanese edition is all in English) is now available on the UK version of the PlayStation Store. The game will be given a retitling in the UK -- it will now be known as Siren: Blood Curse -- but release plans outside of this are not available yet.

 

Courtesy: IGN

[Achieved_Nirvana]

Can some moderator or adminstrator move this thread to the 'Games' section, rename it 'Siren: Blood Curse' and add the link to the 'All games in one' thread?

[MarketTantrik]

We will, if the creator edits the opening post and makes it in conformance with the opening posts of other game threads,

[ayush12ice]

is it ne better??

[Achieved_Nirvana]

^ Much. Thanks, man.

Oh, Markettantrik?

[MarketTantrik]

^^ Yeah yeah yeah

[MarketTantrik]

English Launch Trailer

 

http://www.strategyinformer.com/ps3/sirenb...ovie/24010.html

[Viv]

WOW.....just......wow......

[Ne0]

English Launch Trailer

 

http://www.strategyinformer.com/ps3/sirenb...ovie/24010.html

 

thats one scary trailer

[Achieved_Nirvana]

Siren: Blood Curse Preview

 

UK, June 9, 2008 - With Friday 13 mere days away and enough horror games out in the upcoming months to satiate even the most demanding masochist, now's the perfect opportunity to celebrate a genre that seemed close to rattling its last wheezing breath not 12 months ago. And what better place to start than with Siren? Previously known as Forbidden Siren in European territories, it was a series that simultaneously celebrated and eschewed nearly eight years of Japanese survival horror clichés and gameplay conventions.

 

Straight from the mind of Keiichirô Toyama, director of the original Silent Hill game – which, in itself, offered a seismic shift in our perceptions of survival horror, from high camp thrills and visceral shocks to something far more cerebral and psychologically unsettling – Siren gathered elements from practically every genre example before it and spun each disparate strand into something both instantly familiar yet almost unfathomably unique. Siren adopted Silent Hill's non-linear approach to storytelling (not to mention that all-pervasive fog and constant drone of air raid sirens), Clock Tower's cat-and-mouse survival ethic and Fatal Frame's fundamental fascination with traditional Japanese folklore. Rejecting the traditional model of direct engagement with enemies, instead focussing on observation and avoidance – vital thanks to overpowered, invincible enemies – Siren was an ambitious, fascinating if endlessly infuriating survival horror experience.

 

An equally patience-stretching PS2 sequel later, Sony is set to reinvigorate the franchise on PS3 with Siren: Blood Curse. While the latter PS2 game delivered much of the same, Blood Curse offers some notable additions and alterations to the overall gameplay experience. This time around, Siren is hitting a PlayStation console in episodic format, and the new format has had a significant impact on some of the series' more testing aspects. We've given Blood Curse's first three episodes a thorough play-through and impressions are certainly positive, especially given past entries' innumerable flaws.

 

Structurally, Blood Curse offers a more linear experience than its forebears, eschewing an often incomprehensible fragmented narrative tree in favour of a more direct timeline. Each episode (which, from evidence, lasts around 30 minutes – disregarding the incredibly swift introductory episode 1) follows events in chronological order, although chapters still switch between different characters, tracking their actions as they run parallel to – and intersect - other stories. It's a subtle but sensible shift which serves to create a far more satisfying narrative – Blood Curse is instantly more accessible without losing any of the series' innate mystery and, perhaps more importantly, perfectly designed to function as episodic content. Fans who prefer putting some work into a plot (which we're not going to spoil even slightly here) shouldn't despair though – as before, Siren sports a vast item archive offering plenty of otherwise untouched back-story, filling in many gaps. It's more varied this time too, with video recording cross-referenced to listenable phone messages and personal letters linked to incomplete TV scripts.

 

As with Atari's upcoming Alone in the Dark, each episode begins with a recap of previous events and narrative threads culminating in a cliffhanger, followed by a quick 'Next time…' style teaser. It's an ideal approach and has the added advantage of breaking up what's always been a mentally exhausting gameplay style. As always in Siren, your main survival tool is your Sightjack ability, letting you tap into the minds of surrounding characters – whether friends or foes the Shibitos – in order to witness events through their eyes. In practice this means progressing through levels until you're alerted to enemies in your vicinity (either by an audible heartbeat or vibrating pad if you're lucky enough to own a DualShock 3) then scanning the area to track them down.

 

Sightjack has undergone a few refinements this time around and works infinitely better as a result. There's less focus on the somewhat painstaking Sightjack 'tuning' in Blood Curse – it's now possible to easily scan and switch between all nearby jackable creatures using the shoulder buttons – and Siren's previous stop-start gameplay feels much smoother as a result. Most significantly, Sightjack now employs a splitscreen viewpoint – once you've located the Shibito you want to track, you can lock onto them – and the action plays out with your character's over-the-shoulder viewpoint running alongside the Sightjacked Shibito's first-person perspective. Stand still and the Shibito's viewpoint fills more of the screen, start moving and your view will dominate. It's a subtle upgrade but makes the world of difference in terms of gameplay – you're now able to react in real-time to a Shibito's movements, adjusting your position and rethinking your strategies on-the-fly. It radically ups previous games' exhaustingly pedestrian pace and alleviates much of their infuriating trial and error gameplay – it's now much harder to stray into the path of an unseen foe and, if you do, it's easier to react to their advances.

 

 

In fact, so far, Blood Curse seems much more forgiving all-round and that's a very good thing in our eyes. Although enemies will still reanimate eventually once you've taken them out, thanks to the omnipresent, mysterious red rain, they're much easier to knock unconscious and they'll stay down longer too. Whereas previous Siren games often felt like an exercise in frustration, you're given much more of a fighting chance here. That's not to say that Blood Curse loses any of the series' trademark tension, as evading and escaping the Shibito still requires patience and observation, surveying your surroundings through the eyes of others in order to assess your best possible chances of escape. You'll still find yourself unarmed and vulnerable most of the time, with the disorientating camera shifts and garbled hysteria of the Shibito adding to the suffocating atmosphere; it just feels fairer.

 

It's also more focussed, with the previously mentioned accessibility at the forefront of Blood Curse's upgrades. Objectives are frequently and clearly relayed, each new goal accompanied by a much-welcome checkpoint save, and an overhauled map system means completing tasks is never as daunting as in previous games. Maps are now displayed in full 3D, offering the option to rotate, adjust and scrutinise the enivornment as desired, objectives are clearly marked and all points of interest are labelled and defined. Plus, at long last, you can view your current position in relation to your surroundings. Sure, it might be tough to get excited about a decent map in 2008 but fans of previous Siren games will know how shockingly bad they were at offering decent tools for assistance and these long overdue updates eradicate much that frustrated before.

 

Speaking of objectives, there's now a more even balance between Siren's mentally draining open-area escape objectives and linear puzzle-based missions. Without giving too much away, environmental objects appear to play a greater role in the latter, often requiring judicial use of Sightjacking to accurately time certain crucial events. Generally these areas emphasise lateral thinking over patient observation – proceeding by pushing an object onto a Shibito as it passes below or setting traps behind other preoccupied enemies, for instance. One segment tasked us with coaxing a Shibito nurse from her hospital office by switching on a nearby machine. As she passed by to investigate, we squeezed through a gap in the curtains behind her to run to freedom. Again, these sections – and the very small handful of run-and-gun segments – offer a much needed change of pace and offer the perfect break from Siren's innately stressful non-linear Sightjack portions.

 

Finally, Blood Curse features a handful of aesthetic but no less notable upgrades too. If you've played earlier entries in the series, you'll be more than aware of Sony Europe's decision to cast English voice actors in the role of Siren's leads. While the quality of acting was more than passable, accents sat incongruously with the obviously Japanese digital cast and the effect was routinely jarring, to the point of wrenching you out of the experience every time someone opened their mouth. Blood Curse sensibly rectifies any such issues by incorporating a cast of both American and Japanese characters. Despite some very early blips, the quality of the voice cast is consistently good and it helps that US characters speak in English while their Japanese comrades are voiced in their native tongue with subtitles. What's more, there's more of a connect between character models and dialogue this time around, thanks to the fully rendered polygon faces. True, there was something fundamentally eerie about previous entries' use of digitised faces superimposed on character models but we reckon this more traditional approach is ultimately more effective.

 

In fact, the only area perhaps likely to disappoint old-timers is on the graphical front. While characters are undoubtedly more detailed and better animated than their earlier counterparts, environments and effects rarely improve on their PS2 predecessors. While there's plenty of detail in interiors, textures are noticeably low-quality throughout – presumably as a concession to the limitations of online distribution – and scenery is fairly rudimentarily constructed. That said, use of light and shadow is infinitely superior to earlier games and most quibbles with visual quality are offset by some sterling design and direction. It might not be the best looking PS3 title but it's undeniably eerie and oppressively atmospheric.

 

Ultimately, the latter might be the biggest failing of Siren: Blood Curse. For all its much-welcome improvements to accessibility – most of which quash all major criticisms of previous titles – Blood Curse is still an incredibly overwhelming and utterly gruelling survival horror experience. Although questions still remain regarding Sony's exact plans for online distribution, if you're a fan of the genre - regardless of your feelings toward previous Siren titles - there looks to be plenty to recommend, thanks to this latest entry's refined gameplay mechanics. That said, Blood Curse remains one of the last bastions of the traditional survival horror genre. If your notion of horror games is dark corridors, loud noises and enormous f-off guns, you might want to ask yourself if your patience and, more importantly, your nerves, are up to it before signing on.

 

 

From IGN