It was a windy night. Trees were swaying and the moon was full. There was a window open downstairs, so the gust entered the house - which caused my bedroom door to creek. Glancing round my room I could see shadows cast by the neatly fitted spot lights above my head - these shadows just added to that scary night experience. The final straw was when I found out I was home alone - no parents or siblings - just me and my mind playing tricks on me, and whatever horrors lurked silently in the darkness. My heart hadn't beat this fast for a long while. The dog barked angrily downstairs - as if he'd seen something; he was probably barking at the door shaking due to the strong gale outside but at this point I was too shaky to go and find out.

As if things weren't bad enough, my spotlights blew. I was in near darkness - the only source of light I had was coming from the TV and computer monitor in the corner. I walked over to my TV only to see that copy of Silent Hill 4: The Room looking at me - sending subliminal messages through my head "play me, play me". I couldn't stop my hands from opening the case and inserting the disc into my console. My atmospheric room was about to be filled with more character and mood - Silent Hill 4 was on the television and there wasn't anything I could do about it!

Who am I kidding? It was a night like any other - wet and raining, with only a mild wind. No full moon, no cast shadows, no barking dog - because he was too lazy curled up in his basket, no subliminal messages and thankfully everybody was at home. The lights didn't go out, I had total control over my hands and there was no atmosphere in the room, yet. I independently turned off the lights, drew the curtains locked the door and cracked open a bottle of beer - because the game is for over 18's only, so it would be rude not to, right? However, after watching the deeply disturbing intro there was no time for alcohol - the game had trapped my attention, trapped me inside The Room.

That's where Silent Hill 4 is primarily based: in The Room, that's your room - or more specifically Henry's room, the character that you play throughout the game. It's not really a room though - maybe more of an apartment or a hotel room and we'd be disappointed if we booked into a hotel to find just one room. It's got all the common necessities that you'd expect; a living area with a kitchen in the corner, a bathroom, a spare room and a bedroom - all of which are covered in blood and cobweb-like-lines when you think that you've woken up. You start off playing in one of Henry's nightmares. He's been having nightmares for five consecutive nights now and each night they end the same way - with him discovering that he is trapped in his room with the doors bolted and the windows sealed shut. It feels like you're dreaming his dreams and it really does mess with your head - what if I'm just dreaming about typing this review? [Hang on, what if I'm just dreaming about editing it?! Aaaaaarggghhh! Freaked out Ed]

When Henry really wakes up his walls are white again but he's still trapped in his room. He tells us that ever since he's had these nightmares he cannot escape from The Room. The doors are chained with shackles and padlocks from the inside, which gets you wondering if there's anybody lurking in the room with him. After reading several distressing notes that are bound to play a part later on in the game, equipping yourself with a glass bottle and familiarising yourself with the room, you'll hear a bang. It came from the bathroom. You enter only to find that some vandal has blown a hole in your wall. This hole acts as a portal; you can crawl through it and you'll come out through a mysterious looking hole at the other side. Every time you find a new hole you can go through that - which leads you back to your room once again. So the hole in your room takes you back though the portal you've just come from.

But why would you want to back to your room? Well, for starters, it's the only place you can save your progress in the entire game. I must say, I'm always glad to get back into my cozy yet strange room after a good hour's fright for the save point alone. The room also acts as a space to store your junk and a place where you can relax (on the edge of your seat!) and recover health. You may also need to return to the room to uncover clues that have been left for you - or to trigger new events in the game. If you get stuck you can guarantee that the answer lies in your room - which changes for the worse as you progress - but I'll say no more on that matter.

Survival horror games have never been popular for the awkward viewpoints that you get stuck with. Up to press the Resident Evil series sparked a lot of bad feedback due to the camera and controls alone. For the most part, Silent Hill 4 is in the third person view - however, for some reason the view is in first person when you get into your room. Maybe it has something to do with the dream, because nobody has third person dreams, do they? It works quite well in your room, but if the whole game was in first person then it would be very disappointing. But there's no need to worry, because you don't often spend a huge amount of time in your room - unless you're too scared to leave.

You're probably only researching into Silent Hill 4 if you're a fan of the survival horror genre and trust me, this game will scare you. It scares you so much that your heart often feels bruised and you may receive some mental scars. Again, I don't want to spoil too much, but let me just say, after you've played Silent Hill 4 you'll never touch a dolly again. Your sisters will have an advantage over you; they'll show you a doll and you'll whimper like a baby. You may even suck your thumb. It's a visually disturbing experience but the audio also lends itself to give you the fight that you're looking for. I'll talk about audio and visuals later on, first let's talk monsters and creatures.

If you're comparing these creatures with those from Resident Evil, there's one main difference and that is that Silent Hill 4's creatures do not die! Maybe that's a slight exaggeration - because there are a few monsters that stay down, but not many. The ghoulish dog is one of the few that actually dies and the animation for this dog is amazing. They normally come in a pack and if you kill one, the rest feed on it. They have abnormally long tongues and are very scary if you get a few on your tail. My most recent encounter has no set name, but if you think of Resident Evil's most common character, give it the ability to float and fly, give it the gift of immorality and you've got a invincible flying zombie - scary stuff indeed. It's possible to stun these zombies of hell by giving them a good beating with one of the many weapons you find on your travels. Eventually this abominable fiend will fall on the floor and you think it's dead, but don't forget, this zombie never stays down! Kick his head and run, as you've got 10 to 20 seconds before it gets up again and if it catches you then you'll suffer a large health penalty.

The visuals are quite impressive, although they don't blow you away. Most of Silent Hill is dark; dark subways and dark forests, which at times look nice when the lighting effects are cleverly placed. However, when there are hardly any lights I found myself having to turn the brightness up on the TV! If your TV brightness doesn't quite cut it then you can always mess around with the contrast in the game as well. When you get close to certain monsters, the screen turns fuzzy and grainy. Granted, this lets you know that there's a nasty piece of work nearby, but it really looks bad. The first time the game went grainy I gave my TV a beating, only to then realise that it was the game alerting me to a monster. My poor old TV hasn't been the same since! [Sounds like a job for the RSPCTV to me! Ed] The thing I do like though is the old style 'movie flicker' that appears for a few seconds when you leave a portal. Sometimes it goes into black and white too, effects that make you wonder whether you're playing a dream or not… There's lots of gore in Silent Hill 4 too, so if you're squeamish I'd advise you to stay clear.

The audio is a mixed bag of sweets. You have those beautiful jelly babies and soft mints, but then there's those horrible parma violets that taste like washing up detergent. There's some really nice scene-setting, eerie music that runs through the game, with plenty of screams and other sound effects that add to the scare factor. That part of the audio is the jelly baby. The soft mints is the tearful and touching song that springs up from time to time, mainly in cut scenes. I don't want to say too much but you'll know what I'm talking about when you hear the music and see the full motion video. Touching stuff. Those darn parma violets ruin it though; the noise that some creatures make is horrendous. And there's a high-pitched noise than runs alongside the annoying grainy picture when you approach certain enemies, which sounds like a cheap ghost train noise commonly found in Blackpool.

Something that stands out from the crowd is the fighting system. It's very user friendly and is joyous to use. You have to hold down the button that puts you in a stance, ready for attacking with the equipped weapon, similar to Resident Evil. Then you just press another button to attack, but if you have a melee weapon equipped you can hold down the attack button for stronger attacks, which proves useful when hitting those giant wasps out of the sky! There's dozens of weapons to find and use too - some disposable and some that will last forever. A glass bottle breaks to become a sharp glass bottle that draws blood fast. The gold club is powerful but is useless after so many hits. The steel pipe is indestructible but a little on the weak side. These are just a few of the melee weapons that you'll find, not to mention the firearms.

I reach the conclusion now in two minds. If you compare this to Resident Evil then you're going to be disappointed. It has a good story, nice levels and disturbing, scary moments that you'd expect to see in a survival horror game - but it doesn't have Resident Evil's charm. If you're not expecting Resident Evil then I think you'll be impressed, particularly with the camera, which I found to be very good indeed. It will give you the scares you are looking for and a superb, if not a little weird, story, which should satisfy most people. It also has some mind-blowing puzzles that are bound to confuse even the brightest of scholars - it's evident that puzzles are one of Silent Hill's strong points. More disturbing than seeing a clown in your infant years, Silent Hill 4: The Room is the best of the series to date and if you have the guts then it's definitely worth a look.

Reviewed by Dexter Pearson for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).