While playing through Alan Wake, I found myself constantly comparing it to fellow horror-genre game Silent Hill, and I wasn't sure why at first. They look nothing alike. One's Western-developed while the other was born in Japan. Alan Wake more resembles a psychological thriller mini-series you might see on TV while Silent Hill has sick, monstrous freaks that only the most demented minds could dream up.

Is it the small-town setting? The constant fog? The flashlights? Well...yes, but it's a bit more complicated than that. So to help you understand what you'll be getting yourself into with this May 18th release, let me compare Alan Wake to the Silent Hill series on a wide variety of levels, from the seemingly insignificant to overall design philosophies....

The setting

On a superficial front, yes...both games feature plenty of fog, darkness (that you must pierce with a flashlight), and small, isolated towns where bad things can happen that the rest of the world seems oblivious to.

In Alan Wake, however, the flashlight serves a gameplay purpose. The evil-infected locals (the "Taken") are draped in a shroud of darkness. Burning this away with a concentrated light source can remove their arcane protection, so you can shoot 'em with regular ol' lead.

Both towns also go through transformations that make players go, "Oh f***." In Alan Wake's Bright Falls, the scenery gets blurry, as if you were in a living nightmare, and an ominous, almost stifling wall of noise drowns you in uneasiness and tension -- not unlike Silent Hill's air-raid sirens. Silent Hill morphing into an industrial hell, however, is epic and way more intense and nerve-wracking. You know you're in trouble when that quiet town flips the uh-oh switch.

The feeling of helplessness

Alan Wake isn't Resident Evil. In that series, you're usually playing a cop of some sort, armed with military-grade weapons, like (snicker) triple-barreled shotguns and rocket launchers.

In both Alan Wake and Silent Hill, however, you're an Average Joe with Average-Joe guns. Psychologically, both games make you feel more vulnerable, which puts you on an edge that Resident Evil lost a long time ago. Alan Wake does cheat a little bit, though. Because the Taken are vulnerable to bright light, "common" items like flare guns and flash bangs act as super-explosive weapons that can take out a cluster of baddies at a time.

But...at the same time, the game is smart about not letting you amass too large an arsenal, which could change the mood from vulnerable to Rambo (again, like in the more recent Resident Evils). Periodically, story circumstances will strip you of all your weapons, leaving you with nothing or having to find them all again. Some gamers won't like that, to be sure, but it helps maintain the sense of danger throughout the game when most players normally start feeling like badasses.

The story

Similar to Silent Hill 2, Alan Wake has you searching for a loved one who may or may not be alive...and it might all be in your head anyways. Both titles similarly f*** with your head on the psychological front. What's real? What's not? Are you a victim of the supernatural? Or are you just crazy?

Alan Wake does an incredible job in this department, however, thanks to one collectible: manuscript pages from a book the protagonist author may or may not be writing (there's that ambiguity again) and inadvertently turning into a deadly reality. These sheets provide a glimpse of events surrounding you, even those to come. Knowing that something bad's about to happen and that you won't be able to stop it is incredibly scary.

It's not really fair to compare the two games, as they truly are very different experiences that will leave you with totally different emotions. But if you're a Silent Hill fan who appreciates the series for more than its grotesque masses of flesh, sexy (?) undead nurses, and demon babies -- if you truly understand what makes Silent Hill stick with you long after you leave it -- then you understand why Alan Wake is this summer's must-play horror adventure. Don't miss it -- and look for my full review in the next issue of EGM.