Scarily close for comfort.
Hollowbody’s familiar magic doesn’t lie in otherworldly places.
It lies in the rubble of the ordinary.
The same block of flats you explore here sits on the skyline of every city in the country.
Is that why Hollowbody unsettles me more than I’d like to admit?
Is that why poking around abandoned flats and canvassing empty streets leaves me so on edge?
I’ve always had a penchant for horror set against the humdrum.
Put me in an H.R.
Drop me into a haunted semi-detached, though?
The whole Britishness of Hollowbody’s set pieces ratchets this up even further, too.
I do know that.
It makes it so much worse.
The more you explore, the bleaker it gets, too.
Some people are alone.
Some people lie side by side.
Some died slowly and painfully.
Some hurried death along.
Others got together and sought refuge at church, but death came for them anyway.
They still sit on the pews they died on, their faces obscured by dirty sheets.
Of course, world-building like this isn’t novel in gaming.
Plenty of games of all sizes and scope have done it before.
And this brings us to Hollowbody’s main issue.
Because without Silent Hill, I don’t think we’d ever have Hollowbody.
Some story moments are faintly reminiscent of ones that have come before it; others feel directly inspired.
One particularly surprising segment looks to have been pulled directly from (the sadly much-maligned) Silent Hill 4.
It made me question where the line between inspiration ends and imitation begins.
It might not be original, but I am very, very glad Hollowbody exists.
