SIREN: Blood Curse

Siren is nothing new but is a short, spooky distraction.

It's got some wonky controls that make fairly routine gameplay tasks unnecessarily laborious, especially the annoying checkpoint system and map checking that removes you from the terror quite often.

Despite some shortcomings, Siren: Blood Curse is an enjoyably creepy adventure with some interesting gameplay mechanics.

The game’s faults intermittently make themselves known but are easy to ignore in such an engrossing and skilfully directed game. [Oct 2008, p.117]

In spite of its last-gen origins, these scares are 100-percent next-gen. [Nov 2008, p.89]

Strong survival horror game, but the controls could do better.

Mixing Japanese and more traditional, Western-style horror elements to eerie effect, Siren: Blood Curse delivers on its core promise to freak players out. But Sony's decision to deliver this game as a series of downloadable episodes is a frustrating head-scratcher, as the process of installing each of the 12 episodes on a Playstation 3 in two hour chunks -- even longer than it takes to play them -- is its own terror.

Survival-horror fans will probably enjoy Blood Curse’s clumsy mechanics and clichéd setting, especially at this price, but we’re not prepared to excuse it. The flagship title of episodic gaming on the PSN ought to know better.

For all its lack of innovation, there's an involving, if convoluted story here, and some commendably spooky moments.

The first half of the game is certainly an edge of your seat horror fest, it's only in the latter stages where the game starts to come undone with a plot that soon falls into Evil Dead 2 levels of hilarity.