Reviews - Sirdownloadsalot

Whether or not you're going to like Alchemilla depends on your enjoyment of past SH games, and horror games as a whole.

Unfortunately due to this being a limited project with few team members, the mod includes no weapons, enemies or NPC's. But Alchemilla quickly shows that this is not a deal breaker. The atmosphere is possibly the thickest I've ever seen in a Silent Hill game. The level and sound design contribute to an overall unnerving and borderline terrifying experience that leaves you constantly at the edge of your seat, but never gives relief. The environments themselves are creative and unique, but still stay true to the original series. Despite the lack of enemies, it is still possible to die from the environment and several puzzles. Due to this and the uncertainty of what's going to happen next, even moving forward to a new area is harrowing.

The puzzles are expertly done, mimicking Silent Hills past riddles and logic puzzles to an almost perfect T. The only thing that lets this down is a few issues with translation, as this is a Russian mod. Fortunately, the English translation is still good enough to never leave the player stuck or unsure how to proceed with puzzle hints.

This mod almost includes voice acting from the main protagonist. Usually a voice over can make or break a mod depending on it's quality, so fortunately the main characters voice is well acted and intensely emotional at points. But this does leave me wishing he had more interaction and lines with other people rather then just talking to himself and, by proxy, the player.

Alchemilla is clearly a hugely ambitious project made with lots of love from a fan of the SH series, and despite the problems faced in production still holds a bright candle to the first 3 games (Perhaps even more so then Homecoming). Despite not meeting the developers original goals and expectations, Alchemilla lands on it's feet and delivers a haunting, lonely, grim and morbid story.

Speaking of story, an important aspect of the SH series, Alchemilla's story is short and linear but still interesting enough to push the player forward. But due to the lonely nature of the game, it's not able to evolve very far beyond a few steps. Unlike past SH's, Alchemilla does not have multiple endings, and the one it does have is (without wishing to spoil anything) not exactly a happy one. It seems to come out of no where as well, with little build up or pay off. Again, this is most likely to the limitations faced by the developer.

If you enjoyed the combat, monsters and NPC interaction of the SH series, Aclehmilla may let you down. But if you enjoyed the intense atmosphere, disturbing imagery and complex puzzles, then this may be perfect for you. Alchemilla is a loving tribute that's short and sweet, built from sweat, blood and tears. It definitely deserves a play-through.

While the textures and visual design are neat and polished, almost everything else isn't. The mechanics are buggy and often lead to repeated frustration. The mapping is also very, very questionable. (The glass around the elevators aren't supported by anything, lazy geometry in certain places, and even the use of textures that don't fit into the game at all, like a placeholder "GlaDOS shutdown" down.) The 3d skybox is also very clunky, it would benefit from using the same method as Valve's maps (Building the outside area around the playing field), rather then trying to do this as a shortcut. For instance, you can see bits of the elevator shaft hovering in the skybox, and props like cubes look much too large when viewed through the 3d skybox.

The puzzles are interesting, and the concept is solid, but it's so very unpolished that it ends up looking really, really lazy. There isn't much of a story, and what little there is just serves to confused and befuddle Portal 2's original story with out of character scenes.

If it were cleaned up a little, and the story was either altogether deleted/rewritten, it would get a much higher score. As it stands it's a 1 hour, interesting little brain teaser, but don't be suprised if it leaves a sour taste in your mouth.