Yeah, that game goes much better with Halloween. (I'm going to stop dragging this joke out now.) You know, I probably don't mention it enough, but there might be spoilers for the game in here, if you care. Not spoilers like ruining the ending, but some cool scenes potentially.
As I played this on the Xbox, this is actually the "director's cut" version of the game, which I suppose would mean something if I had experience playing the original, PS2 version to compare it to. In this game you play as two sisters, Mio and Mayu, who get lost in the forest, and come across an old village in the mist. You can't find your way back, so you have to venture through the village, and figure out what's going on before you can get out. You won't have been playing too long before you come across a camera, which you take. Oh joy, now I can take photos of rotting Japanese houses! Whee!
Then the ghost attacks. Then you find out you have to fend off the ghost. . . with the camera. Good luck with that. See, this "Camera Obscura" has special properties which can hurt, and ultimately exorcise, ghosts. Of course, you've got to time it right, let them get in range, and have a bit of luck, but that's part of the terror. Even though we're talking about ghosts, I would have felt a lot better with a gun.
Shortly after you first few confrontations with ghosties, Mayu vanishes abruptly, which is quite the trick. She and Mio are sisters, twins, except Mayu walks with a limp from a fall she took when she was younger. And she seems especially spiritually attuned. So every so often, you briefly play as Mayu, following these crimson butterflies until you reach a particular destination. Then you go back to controlling Mio and have to track your oddball sis down. It becomes quickly apparent that you and your sis are connected to this village in some way, to it's past, and it's not a pleasant connection. Don't believe me? Check out this screenshot of what looks a lot like Mayu, after she vanished the first time (yes, she keeps getting separated from you).
Yes, those are dead, horribly mutilated bodies. This game has that creepy atmosphere down. It was like playing the orphanage/insane asylum level of Thief: Deadly Shadows, only it just keeps going. There's the point where your locked in a room, and a box in the corner slowly, slowly opens, and a ghost practically drags itself out, and shambles slowly in your direction, head lowered. And it's only vulnerable in the brief moment where it lifts its head to look at you.
Or there's the ghost child, and her ghost doll, that float around you, attacking from the floor, the ceiling, everywhere, constantly asking (in one of those creepy, high-pitched, monotone voices the kids are so good at): 'Why did you kill?' I never did manage to defeat those little monsters.
There's ghosts with no eyes, ghosts that rise from the water, priest ghosts, ghosts with spears, ghosts with scythes, huge, dark spirits unaffected by the Camera Obscura, and not only can you never be entirely sure when you'll stumble across a ghost, once you have, you can never be sure just where they'll attack from next. Oh, and don't forget the Spirit Radio. You find that, too, and as you progress you'll find these stones that belonged to various people. Put them in the radio, and listen to creepy, scratchy voices tell you something that you'll have to decipher to figure out where to go next!
I believe this game made the hair on my head rise so much, it actually left my scalp. I ought to sue the game makers for causing my baldness. Ah, that's too much work.
Man, give me zombie villagers with chainsaws any day.
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