The Chills of Ghost Hound

Last time I felt chills running up my spine was probably quite a while back - Silent Hill The Room was the most notable, especially as this was my introduction to the Silent Hill franchise. Now over a year or so later the Silent Hill franchise is getting a little tedious: the gameplay is the same and even the twisted plots tend to stick to the same formula and preference for emotional cruelty over fucked up cruelty that really does give shivers down your spine.

As you can probably guess, I rediscovered the delightful chills - that little indication you get that you are living in a truly peculiar world, even if it is entirely in your head. Episode 3 and 4 of Ghost Hound see the three main characters making their way to and around an abandoned hospital. This does sound like your standard haunt but the fear does not come from this preconception. The fear is borne entirely by the history of the abandoned town and hospital, within a dam that lacks water for most of the year for unknown reasons. Nobody knows where the water goes. As for the history, recounted through the rumours of schoolboys and girls, the hospital isn't an ordinary hospital. Prison cells in the basement. Not to mention those known to have perished, including Tarou's sister.

And when you see the little white feet in the corner of the screen as they are walking down a dark corridor...you do get those chills.

Ghost Hound even made a Silent Hill-esque corpse move like jelly.

Not so much a scary series though - a combination of Donnie Darko and Shinto. A peculiar and amazing combination. Hearing the fuzzy crackle of radio and then a minute later the beat of a drum reminds one of the melding of Far Eastern spiritualism and Western science. A feeling similarly exhibited in Japan before and after the war, a sea of confusion and hence, uneasiness.