Hello again everyone, and welcome back to Silent Hill. We’ve been really busy here at Konami (and Climax!) making the game come together. (I haven’t actually had time to play any games for fun for a while… it’s getting really hard.)

An interesting aspect of this project is the differences between each console that the game is being released for. Silent Hill Homecoming was on Xbox360, PlayStation 3, and PC of course – but those are all fairly similar in their capabilities and the game wasn’t drastically different on any one of the three. Our goal with Shattered Memories is to provide the same core experience regardless of console, again, making sure the game isn’t drastically different regardless of which version you pick up.

However, Wii, PSP, and PlayStation 2 are all very different, so getting the game to work optimally on every system is a real challenge. Each game contains all the same events. The Psych Profile is just as expansive on the PSP as it is on the Wii. The most challenging part of this juggling act is our streaming world. Unlike other games in the series, and probably most other games in the genre, Shattered Memories never cuts away to a loading screen. Back in the old days, you’d press X to open a door and the screen would fade out and you’d see footprints or a loading icon. Then the next room would load. Then repeat. This isn’t just frustrating when you’re playing the game, but it also kills the mood. There’s nothing worse than having Yamaoka-san’s soundtrack creeping you out, running from a bloodthirsty nurse while desperately low on health, with your sanity wearing down from the incessant cacophonous noises… and having all that disappear for 15 seconds while the next corridor is shifted into memory.

So Climax came up with awesome tech that would eliminate the need to load the game room by room. Now Harry Mason is stuck in the horrific streets of Silent Hill with no 15-second pauses to save him. But that available memory is waaaay different from Wii to PS2 to PSP. Still, we committed early on to making sure you wouldn’t be staring at disembodied foot prints. It’s been a huge challenge – so we really hope you portable players appreciate it!

Another aspect we have to balance is graphics. Obviously the graphics capabilities of each system are very different too. Optimizing them is a lot more complicated than just pointing at level 3 and saying “tighten up those graphics.” A lot goes into 3D visuals. There are the polygon models that actually take up the 3D space, as well as the textures that lay on top of them to make those models look like people, or bikes, or trees, etc. So careful manipulation of these things is very important when moving between platforms. On some things, texture is the most important element, so you can eliminate some of the polygons or joints. On other elements, such as people, those moving parts of the model are really really important – so it might make more sense to tweak the textures (or more likely, to pull some unimportant textures so the characters can still look their best).

Thankfully, the least powerful of the three is the PSP. I say thankfully because even though it can’t push the same polygons or support as many textures as its big brothers, it’s also on a smaller screen with different resolution. This makes up for any technical shortcomings, and the graphics on PSP remain super sharp and just as creepy as you’ll see on your television.

Visuals aside, the other big difference is the controls. The Wii version was designed from the ground up to take advantage of all the Wii Remote’s unique features: motion control, rumble, convenient button placement, and the speaker. But we want PSP and PS2 to feel just as intuitive–and yet again, they’re both entirely different than each other and the Wii. This has been a bigger challenge than you might think. Harry Mason does a lot of things no Silent Hill character has done before–so we can’t just take the control schemes from Origins and SH3 and call it a day. It requires a lot of experimentation. Early on “run” was mapped to a button that felt pretty good for running. However, it also made it impossible to both run and glance behind at the same time–two functions that pretty much exist to be used in tandem. Oops! But after a lot of tweaking and button swapping, we have three unique control schemes that end up providing the same experience to the end user. It’s amazing how much thought goes into something as simple as accessing Harry’s cellphone.

Silent Hill is a mysterious place; maybe all of this will make sense one day!

-Tomm

source: SHSM Blog – Three Different Worlds | 06/01/2009