Signalis is old-school PlayStation-era horror at its best
-
Loading... - Thomas Thorn
- 31 Oct 2022
- 68 Views
- 0 Like
- 0 Comment
New Resident Evil games are great, but there’s still something about the slow, grimy, and mysterious older entries in the series. There’s a particular mood that comes from the steady pace, rough graphics, and convoluted puzzles that make PlayStation-era horror still stand out. And while developer Rose-Engine’s Signalis is a modern release, it channels some of the best parts of series like Silent Hill, Resident Evil, and Dino Crisis for classic scares.
Signalis puts you in the role of Elster, a sort of synthetic worker who, at the outset of the game, finds herself awakening on an empty, wrecked spaceship. Her memories are mostly gone, but she manages to make her way to an underground facility, knowing little more than she’s searching for someone. The rest of the game is a dozen hours of piecing together who Elster is as well as the truth behind the horrors of the facility she’s exploring.
%2Fcdn.vox-cdn.com%2Fuploads%2Fchorus_asset%2Ffile%2F24148465%2FVlovUIHw.png&w=828&q=75)
If you’ve played any of the aforementioned horror games, Signalis will feel instantly familiar, evoking long-lost days of gripping a gray PlayStation controller tightly while running from zombies. The third-person horror game has a steady pace to it; Elster thankfully doesn’t have the infamous Resident Evil tank controls, moving with more fluidity, but she still explores slowly, and aiming can be a struggle.
This, of course, makes it all the more terrifying when bloodthirsty synthetic machines are after you. Signalis isn’t technically a zombie game, but many of its enemies — the glitched-out remnants of an underground worker colony — can feel like the shambling undead. As a survival horror game, Signalis also has other genre staples, like a tiny inventory (you can only hold six items at a time), limited resources (I always need more shotgun shells), and oh so many doors that require cryptic keycards before you can proceed. That said, there are a few more modern touches, like less punishing save points and, my personal favorite, a map that’s packed with just the right amount of useful information. Read More...
