My Favourite Game - Interview: Tom Francis on Heat Signature

Interview: Tom Francis on Heat Signature

Explicit content warning

11/24/15 • 18 min

My Favourite Game

In space, no one can hear you sneak.

Previous Episode

Silent Hill 2, by Carli Velocci

Hello. We’re back after a two-week period. And so begins the second part of Season 3 of My Favourite Game.

And it begins tonight by looking back at possibly one of the best horror games ever, if not the best horror game ever. Let’s be real here: Silent Hill as a series is in a state of flux. After several games of an underwhelming nature, the series seemed to spark back to life in the biggest and best possible way with P.T., which would be revealed to be a teaser for Kojima and Del Toro’s Silent Hills.

That spark has since been extinguished, however. Earlier this year, Konami removed P.T. from the PS Store and even delisted it so if players end up deleting their original copy, they could no longer download it again. That came on the heels of confirmation that Silent Hills was canned amidst growing turmoil between publisher (Konami) and its biggest name (Kojima). Although not official as yet, reports suggest Kojima left Konami in October, though the latter insist right now he is taking a holiday.

But with P.T.’s growing legacy as not only a short demo but perhaps a game in its own right, it’s perhaps a little easier nowadays to remember Silent Hill’s glory days. Especially in the era of Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill 3.

Tonight, My Favourite Game returns with a look back on Silent Hill 2 with Mobile Nations editor Carli Velocci. Discussed at length, James Sutherland as a protagonist and his mental well-being through the game as well as perverse ambitions, the tone and nature of the game, the relationship between James & fellow central character Maria and how Pyramid Head may have ended up helped the player instead of being the game’s primary antagonist.

You can listen to it below.

Next Episode

Deus Ex, by Tom Francis

If there was a game that let players come up with and combine different kinds of playstyles, it was Deus Ex. At least certainly, the Ion Storm-made stealth title was the first well-known game – at least from my era of games – that let players mix and match on the fly.

Tom Francis, former PC Gamer writer and now indie game dev behind Gunpoint and Heat Signature, is a massive fan of these systems and also likes to break them down to a T.

It also sees Tom go into detail about those systems as well as the other aspects of what made the game tick for him, why the demo for Deus Ex: Invisible War got him the gig at PC Gamer and more.

You can listen to it below.