Deadly Premonition

Deadly Premonition can best be described as f’ing weird, which makes it a tough game to review. On the surface it’s an absolutely terrible game, but it also seems to be designed for a very specific type of gamer, who will absolutely love this game. The best way to describe this game is that this is what the end result would be if Suda 51 (Killer 7, No More Heroes, Flower Sun and Rain) made a game based on the Twin Peaks TV series, with a really tiny budget. If that description makes sense to you, you can understand why the game would be so weird.

To start at the beginning Deadly Premonition (Known as Red Seeds Profile) is a Japanese horror game mystery/horror game that was originally announced as Rainy Woods. After its initial showing the game was considered to be too similar to Twin Peaks, and the developer opted to change the game. Twin Peaks was a very influential TV series about an eccentric FBI agent who goes to a small town to investigate the murder of a young girl. The show focused on the investigation as well as all kinds of town drama involving the town’s citizens. The show also featured a supernatural element. Agent Cooper would often have dreams or premonitions involving a red room. The show was created by David Lynch who’s known for his strange and surreal movies.

Now, if they changed this game to make it LESS Twin Peaks, I’d love to see what the original was like. Because this game still feels 100% like that show. The story premise is exactly the same. The very unique eccentricities of the main character are the same. The setting is nearly identical, and even the music feels very similar.

Deadly Premonition follows an eccentric FBI profiler named Francis York, who visits the town of Greenvale to investigate the murder of a young girl. Anna seems to be the latest victim of a serial killer York has been hunting. York also has premonitions and dreams that guide him. These dreams often take place in a small forest filled with tree with red leaves. The game gives no introduction to Agent York’s second personality which he calls Zach. He constantly converses with Zack during the game, including in front of other people. At times the game changes from an investigative stage to a survival horror stage in which Zach takes control to traverse a dark alternate version of the world.

This world comprises the action part of the game. While in this dark world many humanoid monsters attack and a hooded man will chase York. You can kill the creatures using melee weapons that break over time, or firearms. The large hooded man you have to run and hide from. The hiding mechanics are similar to those in the Clock Tower or Siren series. You choose a spot to hide in, and hope he doesn’t find you.

One surprising thing about the combat is that your standard pistol, while weak, has unlimited ammo. The melee weapons are much stronger, but break after only 2-3 kills.

The investigation phase is the other half of the game. It involves traveling around the town and investigating scenes and talking to suspects. The town is very large, and an in-game clock keeps track of the time. You can smoke to advance time quickly which helps as it usually moves by quite slow. Missions are only available at certain times, and you have to make sure you rest and eat often to keep you hunger and tiredness gauges up.

To get around town you can hop into any cop car to drive around. The driving mechanics aren’t that bad, they are about on par with GTA which is a good or bad thing depending on if you’re used to driving in those games. Cars do take gas, which needs to be refilled at the gas station (that’s never open when you need it). And you go through gas VERY fast. If you car runs out you just have to get out. You can use a flare to call for help, but that’s about it, otherwise you have to walk til you find another car, and that sucks. It sucks because the town is HUGE, huge and empty. Everything is spread out so far apart; it takes forever to drive from one location to another. You also have to check the map constantly to see where you’re going, the map screen is terrible because you can barely zoom out of it. You have to scroll around to find your destination, and by the time you do you’ve completely lost where your current position is. It makes it near impossible to plan a route out.

The majority of story missions involve searching locations for clues. You need to find all the clues (usually 4) to understand what happened in the location. After you’ve found them all, you can perform a profiling scene which shows what happened. Then agent York drops some knowledge on everyone else around.

The game also contains a ton of side missions; you can complete driving time trials, search for collectable cards, or complete various missions that help you learn more about the townsfolk in the game.

Overall the scope of the game is huge. The game takes roughly 15-20 hours to complete! Which is pretty crazy for a horror game.

I don’t usually mention graphics but I have to in this case. They are bad. The character models don’t look too bad (but they’re not good either), but the textures you see around town are terrible; it really does look like a PS2 game.

You might think I would tell everyone to stay away from this game based on the review, but the truth is Deadly Premonition has a strange allure to it. It’s a bad game, no doubt about it, but somehow all those elements, actually add up to a pretty interesting and surreal experience. I could see fans of Twin Peaks getting quite a kick out of this game. Sure it’s a rip off, but there has never been ANYTHING else like Twin Peaks, and I think we’re due for a bit more like that. The $20 price tag also helps make this a game worth trying out. If you only crave AAA, or even B titles, stay away, but if you like to check out the games that fly under the radar, and don’t mind all the rough edges (and there are a lot), I suggest giving it a try.

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