Silent Hill: Origins is to be the fifth installment in the Silent Hill survival horror series, developed and published by Konami and Climax Studios for the Sony PlayStation Portable. It is scheduled to be released in North America in November 2007. The title is a prequel, intended to explain the series's eponymous town's backstory. The protagonist of Origins will be Travis O'Grady, a trucker who has been described by the game's producers as having a "troubled past" which the player will have to resolve during the course of the game.
O'Grady is driving through Silent Hill when his truck is stopped
by what appears to be an apparition of Alessa Gillespie. He follows her to a burning house, where he rescues a severely burned girl presumed to be Alessa herself. He later attempts to find the girl in a hospital, but instead is confronted by nurse monsters. The game will be a prequel to the first Silent Hill game, and the characters Alessa, Dahlia, Lisa Garland and Dr. Kaufmann are confirmed to appear.
Previews for Silent Hill: Origins released in 2006 showed an altered third-person camera system inspired by the gameplay of Resident Evil 4, although the producer William Oertel took note to state "we're not going FPS." Oertel also noted on the game's theme "We recognized that Silent Hill 2 was great in going into the psychological aspects, and we really want to imbue that in Origins too."
At this time, it was estimated that a third of the game would be spent in familiar locations, with two thirds in new locations, such as an asylum and butcher's store. There was also a plan to introduce a "barricade" feature that would allow the player to block off areas with nearby objects.