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Title: Haunting Ground
Platform: Playstation 2
Publisher: Capcom
Difficulty: Medium
Review written by: Gamer122 (Steph)
Silence fills your ears as you lay half asleep. A nightmare forces you up but you wish you never opened your eyes. You find yourself in a cage located in what seems to be a slaughter house. The smell of rotten meat fills your nose as you try to hold back throwing up. A chill is sent down your spine as you gaze around the dim room. Your eyes adjust to the darkness and your heart leaps with hope as you notice that the lock on your cage is unlocked. You quickly break free and try to remember what had happened before you fell into this nightmare. A car crash? Why do scenes of a car crash fill your head?
As you stumble around the room, you hear a growl come from the shadows. As you squint, a figure is formed. There, in the darkness stands a white German Shepard. The dog sends a warning bark before leaping over you as you fall. It dashes up the steps. You pull yourself up and follow in hopes of finding someone to answer your questions.
Story line
Fiona Belli wakes to discover that she’s a prisoner. After wondering through an abandoned castle, she finds the maid, Daniella. Daniella is beautiful but quiet and odd. She doesn’t offer much help nor information. At times, she doesn’t even seem human but she isn’t the only one Fiona comes across. Debilitas is an ogre like creature who tends to the garden and for some reason chases after Fiona.
Fiona continues to try to remember what had happened before she woke up and still searches for answers. She runs into the mysterious man named Riccardo who is the owner of the castle. He informs Fiona that she is the sole survivor of the car crash and is the only heir to the Belli fortune. He tells her that she will become his bride.
Eager to escape, Fiona begins to frantically search for a way out. She stumbles upon Hewie, a white German Shepard. He’s tied to a tree and suffering from an embedded collar. She helps him and he returns the favor by saving her from Debilitas. The two then team up as they try to escape the castle alive.
Graphics
The small trailer before the menu and the cut scenes are absolutely gorgeous! The facial expressions are amazingly detailed. Character animation is smooth and crystal clear. The reason for this is simple. Capcom hired Robot to do the cut scenes. Robot is the same studio behind Onimusha 3. However, the cut scenes end and you see what the game is really like.
Here’s where the game first becomes disappointing. You think that Capcom would use Robot to do the whole game but you’re wrong. Very wrong! The actual game is dull and uninspiring. The environments gritty. Nothing is in real time. For some reason, it only seems that shades of brown, gray, and black are used for the environments.
The character animation during the game is lacking. There isn’t any facial expressions during game play. The character hair hardly moves when the character walks. The fur on Hewie doesn’t move either. At least the animation is smooth…at least until your leg or body goes through an open door…
Sound
Haunting Ground features a decent techno-like soundtrack. However, it just doesn’t fit the mood. Haunting Ground is suppose to be a survival horror game. The music should fill you with fear and rattle your nerves but it just doesn’t do that. The same song seems to be played through the whole game but it’s faint and hard to hear. You’ll quickly forget about it or ignore it. So it will have little to no effect on your emotions through out the game.
The sound effects are uninspiring. Footsteps don’t sound realistic. It’s hard to distinguish the difference between what type of surface you’re walking on. At least the voice acting is authentic. The British accents sound real. Plus the voices fit the character’s personality.
Gameplay
Haunting Ground consists of running and puzzle solving. Fiona isn’t much of a fighter. She has a kick and charge attack. She can throw special chemical mixes at enemies as well but 90% of the time, running solves the problem. Whenever she is being chased by Debilitas, panic mode will come into effect. Panic mode causes the screen becomes fuzzy. It disables the ability to enter the menu screen during the chase, makes her run wildly, and causes her to trip or run into walls. In order to get out of panic mode, just simply run far enough ahead for the effect to begin to wear off. Then either hide till the coast is clear or you can use lavender to calm her nerves. Then call upon Hewie to do the attacking.
As for the controls…
L1- crouching and switching sub screens
L2- not used
L3- not used
R1-Backstep and switch sub screens
R2- not used
R3- gives Hewie commands.
Square- Kick and tackle
Circle- check and cancel
Triangle- throw attack and set down
X- run and confirm
Left analog stick- move character and move cursor
Right analog stick- command Hewie
Through out the game, words like “Huh? What that?” and “Hide” (during a chase) will appear. This means that you either found something or you discovered a place to hide. Enemies aren’t very smart but if you continue to hide in the same exact place over and over again, you’ll be sniffed out and attacked. If you have the courage to fight, you can have Hewie do the dirty work. By pushing up on the right analog stick during fight mode, Hewie will attack the enemy and you can cheer him on. You can also have him charge himself up before an attack. Make sure to praise him whenever he does something right and scold him when he fails to obey.
The controls themselves aren’t confusing but yet, it’s difficult to jump into the game. The reason for this is the terrible camera angles. (Resident Evil’s old camera angles have nothing on this baby!) The camera doesn’t follow the character. Much like Resident Evil, it stays in one position till you leave the area. Plus it floats above you, giving you a bird’s eye view. This makes it even more difficult to see where you’re going.
As for the puzzles.. They consist of finding piece A here and finding piece B on the other side of the castle. Then combining them to unlock a door. Or maybe you’ll find a file and have to read it in order to find the big, colored word that might be a code.
Innovation
The panic mode (as mentioned before) isn’t necessarily new to video games but it’s unique and deserves to be recognized. However, it’s hard to tell if this is good or annoying. Also, through out the game, Fiona will have thoughts on events. A small melody will play to let you know that a new thought has entered her mind. You can then enter the menu screen to read her thoughts.
Replay Value
Medium. There’s a total of four different endings to Haunting Ground. There’s one to unlock and the other three are shown depending on how you approach events. There is also five unlock able costumes for Fiona and two for Hewie. Plus there’s a hard mode and extra scenes to unlock but is the game worth replaying? I think not.
The Good
The only redeemable parts of this game are: the story and the cut scenes. The suspense Haunting Ground has is enough to keep your interest. The cut scenes are beautiful but doesn’t make the game worth buying.
The Bad
Besides the dull graphics, terrible camera, and uncomfortable controls, another let down is the lack of enemies. Within three hours of game play, I ran into Debilitas once outside of a cut scene and one other enemy what is nothing more than a flying orb that makes a noise to attract other enemies.
Also, the game is linear. This means that everything is on a set path until you unlock the doors and solve the puzzles. In other words, you’ll run into a large amount of locked doors and blocked passage ways till you go to the location the game wants you to go to.
The bottom line is this… Haunting Ground is a huge disappointment. You’d think that a survival horror title from Capcom would be good. You’d think that after having Robot do the cut scenes, it would be good but you’re wrong. This is one game to pass up unless you enjoy disturbing love stories. The game is playable but far from being enjoyable. If you have a PS2 and want a horror fix, pick up a Resident Evil, Silent Hill, or Fatal Frame title instead.
Overall, i give this game a 4.5...out of 10
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