Review #219: Haunting Ground

 Give me that Azoth!

 Haunting Ground is a Survival Horror game that borrows more from Clock Tower than Capcom's own Resident Evil franchise. It's a rarely talked about game, and a game that has risen in price, though luckily not as high as Rule of Rose.

 The game pits you as Fiona, a youth that finds herself in a mansion inhabited by some odd fellows, after waking up from a car crash. Eventually Fiona finds Hewie, a dog, and both of them become unlikely allies as they attempt to escape the premise. The story is alrightish, but it's the characters that really stand out. The game features 5 different 'stalkers', enemies that populate the mansion and will attempt to kill Fiona, and most of them are pretty creepy and have their own motives, quirks, attacks and music. Fiona is a bit bland, displaying little more than fear throughout the whole ordeal, but the supporting cast make up for her. All that said, I felt the initial half of the game is a bit stronger and scarier than the latter half, since it starts getting a bit more... wizardry, so to speak.

 The game nails the atmosphere right on the head. Music is creepy and foreboding, and the sound design is excellent, it's hard not to feel unnerved when you hear other steps besides your own, due to the impending arrival of a stalker. The imagery is very bleak as well, with a very grey color palette, but in this game, it works. All that said, this is a Japanese game, so they just had to go full Japan with the fanservice. Fiona's breasts will bounce everywhere with even the smallest step, which looks ridiculous and can sometimes break immersion, I just couldn't help but laugh at how dumb it looks. Plus, the game tends to focus on her breasts during cut-scenes, which is hard not to notice, and almost every unlockable costume offers some sort of fanservice. It's the only blemish to the otherwise phenomenal atmosphere the game can create.

  Gameplay is pretty straightforward, you have to explore the Mansion and find items in order to solve puzzles, simple. Some puzzles involve Hewie, who can enter holes that Fiona cannot, or having him stand on platforms. Hewie is controlled with the Right analog stick, you depending on where you tilt it, you can praise him, scold him, tell him to stay in place, order him to attack or follow you. Issuing commands is very simple, though it can get some time getting used to it, for instance, if you tell Hewie to stop before he stops himself, when ordering him to stand on a platform, he will eventually move, which frustrated me to no end and I had to learn that the hard way during a certain end-game puzzle. Speaking of puzzles, there were a couple that were perplexing, to say the least. Off the top of my head, there was this one puzzle... You come across a room that has a torch on a wall, and flammable crates nearby, and eventually you'll come across a Candlestick, that the description happens to mention it being 'unlit'. Logic would dictate that you'd have to use the candlestick on a torch in order to make the crates explode. Wrong. You have to wander around until you trigger the Stalker, and then, with the candlestick in your possession, walk below the torch, so that Fiona will finally decide to light that candlestick and make the crates explode.

 If that was all there was to the game, it'd be pretty easy, but you'll have to deal with the different stalkers. You will randomly come across them, or sometimes get into a cutscene that'll trigger their apperance. Regardless, Fiona by herself, can only use a weak kick, a tackle(That consumes stamina) or throw special, limited, items that you can find. Your main source of damage will be Hewie, but he too can get hurt, and eventually knocked out. Stalkers also scare Fiona, and if she gets too scared she'll enter 'Panic Mode', which makes her run by herself, and won't let you enter the sub menu to equip or use items, plus, the screen gets very blurry. Combat, is more often than not, the last thing you'll want to do, instead, you'll want to run away and either hide from the Stalker until it goes away, or outrun them through the different rooms in the Mansions. You also have to keep in mind that Fiona has stamina, and eventually she will slow down to a walk, so you have to mind where you are going. To be honest, I only died once or twice to the Stalkers, and only to the third one at that, outrunning the Stalkers was pretty easy.... which means that eventually I came to think of these chases as a bit of a nuisance. I just wanted to finish the damn puzzle, but if a Stalker is close by, you can't use items or trigger switches, which made me more annoyed than anything else. Maybe it was just me, but the chases didn't really scare me, the moments before the chase did, and the fact that they'd sometimes appear before I could solve the puzzle after figuring it out annoyed me more than anything.

 The game looks gorgeous, animation is smooth and character models are gorgeous. The Mansion itself houses a ton of different, creepy areas. There's few enemies, but the first two stalkers and the second-to-last are amazing, amazing in the scary way, I enjoyed their quirks and what not. The other two are alright, but can't match these other three. The music, while not particularly memorable, is scary and fits the mood of the game perfectly, and so do the many different sound effects. Everything just works together to make a very scary game. Oh, and loading times are almost 0, which is amazing.

 I liked Haunting Ground. Survival Horror is not a genre I'm particularly fond of(Which is weird since I love everything horror), but I really grew to love the game. There's a few things I don't agree with, like the fan service, some of the puzzles or the direction the game takes after the second Stalker, but none of those really turned me away.
 8.5 out of 10.