The story set up that no one cares about is that our male lead Eric has been having nightmares about a girl falling off of a steam boat, drowning in the rivers of Silent Hill. He wakes up in the hotel that's made a number of appearances in the series, only to be thoroughly confused by the newly creeping fog. Some of his shitty friends gone missing and the only way to remedy the situation is to shoot stuff. The obligatory little girl who looks just like some dead kid is also present, constantly running away from our heroes.

The shooting? Top notch. Pull the trigger and things die. Headshots make for a satisfying "POOM!" sound and cause things to fall down faster.

The voice acting, though. Oh God. It's thirty shades of awful. Lines like "Ew. It's smells moldy!" followed by "Better than the smell of blood!" will either leave you in stitches or slightly pissy. Every single interaction and line of dialog is just abysmal, almost impossible to have been read worse.

One more negative is the transporting of the console games' worst elements—constant door handle checking. You're presented with the option of going left, right or straight now and then, something that will inevitably lead to a key finding detour when some random door won't open. Not fun, since the game moves at a sluggish pace.

Despite the negatives, Silent Hill: The Arcade is a great light gun shooter. Many of the areas are lifted from various games, including Brookhaven Hospital and the Silent Hill Mall, so you'll feel right at home. You'll face mid-level bosses and end-of-level bosses that don't really put up a fight, and the game isn't much of a challenge, so if you get your hands on it, you'll most likely get your money's worth.

It's not much to look at, nor does it do anything outstanding in terms of bringing real scares to the genre, but it's fun. The game has been out for some time now, but playing it in an Akihabara arcade this week was my first experience. If you have an arcade that may carry the game, keep your eyes peeled. It's worth the trip (if just for all the cheesy dialog).

We've been cautiously looking forward to Konami's arcade spin-off Silent Hill: The Arcade since it was first announced, but haven't seen too much in the way of non-Japanese coverage. The kids at Arcade Heroes got their hands on the game at a UK testing location, nabbing over ten minutes of gameplay video and the machine's attract mode. How's it look? B-grade, for sure. This is molasses-slow House of the Dead 2 era stuff here, but should at least keep uberfans (present!) of the series distracted for an hour or so. More video and brief impressions below.

Silent Hill: The Arcade - UK Location Test Videos [Arcade Heroes]

However, resident Japanese newshound "duckroll" way over at NeoGAF says this Silent Hill Arcade is a "new Gun Shooting game from Konami." With just a few hours to go before the show opens, news is sure to creep out soon. We'll keep you updated.

UPDATE: It's official as the logo for the game has appeared on the official Konami AOU 2007 page. Michael McWhertor