Review by: Jeff McAllister

Deadly Premonition was supposed to be released three years ago under the name ‘Rainy Woods’. While the title may have changed over the years, it is apparent not much else has. The game has major control issues, severely outdated graphics, and a shoddy map system and yet…Deadly Premonition somehow perseveres.

You are Francis York Morgan, an off the wall – and somewhat insane - FBI profiler sent to the town of Green Vale to help solve the murder of a young woman named Anna. Upon your arrival, you are immediately aware that there is strange goings on in the town. Right off the bat, you are assaulted by the Raincoat Killer, the axe wielding, over sized Jawa that is the mysterious, unspoken legend of the town, whispered to come out during rainfalls to murder those he comes across. Wait—it gets better.

You quickly meet up with George and Emily, the sheriff and deputy of the town, and soon after you meet the rest of the townsfolk, each of whom have their own wacky and weird traits, like the affluent, wheelchair bound Harry Stewart who wears a skull gasmask, and are all suspects of being the murderer.

Deadly Premonition is not what many people would consider a “good game”. It features quite the mixed bag of gameplay elements taken from other titles. It takes parts of Resident Evil, Silent Hill and then tosses in a bit from the 90’s television show Twin Peaks. When York is in combat, he cannot move and shoot at the same time ala Resident Evil and the town of Green Vale has two visages to experience, the regular town and a shadow version, much like how Silent Hill switches back and forth from reality.

When York isn’t trotting around on foot visiting the many establishments in town, most of which are only open during certain times of day, he is driving to the outskirts to visit the rural areas. The map that you use to get around is one of the worst to grace the back button. There is no option to set waypoints and the map turns to face the direction that York is facing, so it is turned different direction each time you pull it up, causing a simple routing plan to turn into a melon tweaking enigma.