It’s not often that a new survival horror game comes along that truly captures the atmosphere and tense survival mechanics of Silent Hill or Resident Evil. More often than not, they take a run-and-hide approach akin to Outlast and Amnesia – those “hide in a closet simulators” that seem to have oversaturated the market. But there is one game that released in October 2022 that managed to capture that forgotten PS1 era survival horror feeling perfectly, with throwbacks and references for good measure, and a strikingly familiar CRT visual style to boot. This is a true successor to a bygone era as we enter the sci-fi survival horror of SIGNALIS.
Like Harry Mason waking up after crashing into the hazy, horror strewn streets of a foggy Silent Hill, SIGNALIS opens to our amnesiac android protagonist emerging from a cryosleep chamber. It doesn’t take long before we’re placed in control of the Replika unit, Elster, in search of her missing partner, Ariane, with only a photograph as a clue to figure out what’s happening. Flashes of cryptic, forgotten memories and sequences with static-overlays and music cues at key moments throughout the narrative offer a cryptic story left for us to piece together, increasingly creating a sense of the esoteric dread and horrifying psychological mystery presented in Elster’s provocative journey, confronted with equally cryptic puzzles, labyrinthine exploration and adequately frigid combat against disturbing, distorted enemies.
While it has a very distinctive visual style, there’s no doubt the structure of SIGNALIS echoes that of Silent Hill: comparisons are simply unavoidable, though that doesn’t detract from it in any way. Enemies function more like obstacles in explorable rooms, the map is made up of locked doors in need of keys and passcodes, or otherwise inoperable for inexplicable reasons; the classic “shit gets rusty, doors are locked” meme. Exploration is rewarded with items, some of which can be combined to make more useful ones, and save rooms serve as moments of respite from the otherwise grungy, inhospitable environment. Thankfully attention to detail means each room is memorable – a rare contrast to other sci-fi horror in which abandoned starships and stations are decorated with varying shades of drab monotone grey and… the same drab monotone grey.
In this sense, the first thing that will strike you about SIGNALIS will no doubt be the uncanny PlayStation aesthetic and top-down 2.5D perspective, which seamlessly transports us back to the look and feel of classic fifth generation consoles we associate so closely with the style the game is trying to evoke. Both in terms of visuals and sound design, SIGNALIS captures the era perfectly, but it is the core gameplay that really elevates it above current gen horror titles.
The term “survival horror” in recent years has often been tacked onto games that take it to mean running away and hiding from monsters and “spooky” creatures in tight, claustrophobic locations, and while this can offer a thrilling experience as far as a cheap horror flick is concerned, more often than not it becomes overly repetitive, stale, frustrating, and uninspired as game after game incorporate the same mechanics, ideas, even settings. It’s a far cry from how the progenitors of the genre, Silent Hill and Resident Evil, successfully created a true sense of dread that are admired, if rarely recreated, even now. This was achieved through camera placements that evoked the feeling of someone or something watching from the rafters as you explored the Spencer Mansion; limited ammo and supplies that forced you to think tactfully about when you should use up resources or run; and music cues that managed to envelop you in the atmosphere while keeping you on edge and susceptible to manipulations that don’t necessarily rely on the same boring jump scares that have become an overly relied upon staple of horror as a whole.
These are things SIGNALIS does very well, with analogue monitor menu systems, and glitchy CRT static overlays that sell a retro vision of the future aesthetic that pairs well with its dark, oppressive atmospheric pixel art. You even have the ability to examine objects you pick up akin to Resident Evil (an item might conceal a hidden switch or another key item), and an inventory management system which requires players to make crucial decisions whether to ignore items on the floor, use or dispose of them to make space, or scurry back to a storage box. While this may seem tedious to some, fundamentally slowing progress and pacing, it’s this tactical thought provoking gameplay that has been missing from the genre.
Likewise, the hide-and-seek style frequently adopted in recent horror games seems to have neglected another overlooked genre staple: puzzles. SIGNALIS has a heavy focus on puzzles – and exploration – to progress to new areas, the solutions to which can be found by exploring and interacting with the environment. Searching dark corridors and dingy rooms for obtuse keys to move through suspicious doors recalls Silent Hill in a way that has been missing in AAA titles, though while they likewise have obscure solutions which are rewarding to solve, they can at times be a little too obscure. At their best, they’re very hands-on manual puzzles that require some back and forth to solve, or have you discovering subtle clues to literary or mathematical problems littered throughout the map. This helps to enrich the narrative by adding more integral, interactive context to the environment itself, adding a sense of scope, subtlety and tight-woven, interconnectivity matched by pacing that creates a sense of suspense and dread as you tread cautiously from corridor to corridor.
Tank control options are available for apologists like myself, though admittedly they don’t work quite as well here. Tank controls serve a purpose in fixed camera situations where “forward” can shift depending on where the next camera angle is fixated; by having it as a dedicated direction on a D-Pad, “up” is always forward relative to the character rather than the camera. But when SIGNALIS makes use of a top down perspective, this functionality is less important, though an appreciated addition nonetheless.
Combat mechanics remain from the classic titles and work similarly, where Elster is rooted to the spot when aiming her weapon, swivelling to aim around her at incoming enemies. It’s a slow, clunky style that suits the slow pacing of the game and can effectively create a sense of panic and challenge that make you question whether it’s worth the ammo or space to make a break for it. True to the survival horrors of old, weapons include a standard pistol and shotgun, as well as a more powerful revolver and machine gun, though with very limited ammo and inventory space. So choose your weapon load-out wisely. In addition, a melee option can give you a little distance to make a dash to safety, as well as a last-ditch, one-use-only close quarters defence item.
The enemies of the game – infected androids – have a classic Romero zombie quality to them, doubling as bullet sponges prone to reactivation. In other words, if you see a corpse, don’t be too certain it’s as dead as you hope. Even the ones you gun down have a chance at making a comeback, making for some truly shocking moments: like Resident Evil Remake, the only way to prevent this is to burn the corpses, though again you have to judge when it’s worth the time or resources. It’s a great way to keep even simple enemies feel intrinsically threatening and persistent, while forcing you to reconsider strategies as new enemies and boss fights are introduced. Some enemies even function as straight up puzzles more than combat encounters which is yet another level SIGNALIS is able to reinvent familiar survival horror elements, showing how it is designed with survival horror enthusiasts in mind.
The story dives into themes of trans-humanism, exploitation, and feverishly makes you question the reality around you through its brand of psychological horror. The presentation of trans-humanism with guttural visuals and gory environments make the disillusionment from reality and false-realities a distressingly existential experience by the end, while presenting though a lens of cosmic horror that exceeds the level of sci-fi horror storytelling we are typically presented with. Additionally, there are multiple endings which are achieved more so by your behaviour and interaction through the story, as opposed to fulfilling specific requirements, implicitly linked to the psychological, symbolic threads that heighten the experience.
Where horror games from AAA developers lately have largely consisted of remakes of classics, or subpar, misguided attempts to recapture the magic, indie developers persistently show their passionate fan appreciation for the games that inspired them in the first place. With a game like SIGNALIS, it just goes to show that indie developers are able to take classic genres and ideas, show how they understand them – in some cases better than the bigger developers – and make something new and exciting for likeminded fans. SIGNALIS is an indie love letter to the survival horror genre that fills a void for classic PS1 horror Konami and Capcom have sadly moved away from and easily one of the most fulfilling, cryptic horror experiences you can have right now.
