Clock Tower

Human Entertainment - 1995 - SNES

Clock Tower is a true survival horror game that actually pre-dates Resident Evil and was released on the SNES in 1995. This game is not to be confused with the 1996 PS1 game Clock Tower 2 which was released in the U.S. simply as Clock Tower because the original SNES game never made it outside of Japan. So the Clock Tower series has the old Final Fantasy numbering problem where no one really knows which game you're actually talking about until you clarify with the year or system. I think we should all just universally agree to use the Japanese numbering for these games to minimize the amount of unnecessary confusion. 

It actually surprised me that the original Clock Tower was never released outside of Japan because on the surface at least, it seems like a very American styled game. You play as the very American-sounding "Jennifer Simpson" who is a young teenage girl and an orphan. In the beginning of the game, Jennifer and a few of her friends are sent to live at the "The Clock Tower" which is a giant old mansion owned by the wealthy Barrows family. Shortly after arriving, Jennifer finds herself separated from her friends and can her distant screams from somewhere in the mansion. She eventually encounters "Scissorman" - a short boy with a deformed face who wields a gigantic pair of hedge clippers. Scissorman is a villian who is totally straight out of all of the American slasher films that gained popularity in the 80s. Even Clock Tower's opening music sounds remarkably similar to Michael Myers' theme song from Halloween. 

Mechanically, Clock Tower is a blend of Survival Horror and a Point and Click adventure game. You move a cursor around the screen with the SNES d-pad and can interact with items or objects by pressing the "A" button. Moving Jennifer around the screen is done in a similar fashion. I know Clock Tower is nearly 20 years old now, but there were a few things about this game that really felt outdated. Actually, moving Jennifer is actually one of the first things I noticed that really irked me. WHY IS HER MOVE SPEED SO SLOW????? Out of curiosity, I went back and timed how long it takes Jennifer to cross the the main lobby from one end to the other. It literally takes 36 seconds. Think about how long that is. Even once I figured out that you can double tap A to run (why would I not ALWAYS want my character to run??), it still takes 13 seconds. Too slow!! Even in 1995, players had to have gotten fed up with this.

Each encounter with Scissorman is resolved by running away from him; there is no combat in the game. Scissorman usually shows up randomly while you're exploring the mansion or trying to solve puzzles, but some of his appearances are triggered by certain actions. The puzzle solving in Clock Tower is not really a strong suit, but the game does build tension somewhat effectively. Like any good horror game, there is a fair amount of suspense when Scissorman ISN'T around, because you're not sure when he'll appear next. But when he does appear, dealing with him is really more of an annoyance than a terror. Moving Jennifer around often felt unresponsive and even when Scissorman killed me, the game just took me right back to where I was before I died. So really death in Clock Tower is just kind of a mild annoyance. I felt that this game could have benefited from knowing that the player's enemies are always the most scary when you can't see them. The best parts of Clock Tower were when Scissorman was nowhere around. Like Alfred Hitchcock said, "There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it". 

Summary:

I can't really whole-heartedly recommend this game unless you're a huge fan of classic horror games or classic point and click games and can overlook this game's faults. I'm afraid it really hasn't aged that well. It does suspense somewhat well, but everything else will feel very old. I could see how this game would have had its place back in 1995 with like young kids staying up late and playing this at a sleepover with the lights off or something like that. I've heard subsequent titles in this series improved on the formula of the original, so maybe I'll check one of them out eventually. If you do decide to go back to the original, I'd advise doing so on an emulator that has a "speed up" feature. Seriously, that walk animation...