Joyous news indeed, Silent Hill fans. Konami has finally announed announced a European release date for the fifth instalment of the Silent Hill franchise, Silent Hill: Homecomiing Homecoming.

The title will be released in Europe on February 27th next year, for both Xbox 360 and PS3.

Hey, better late than never, right?

Konami also announced that Wii fighter Castlevania: Judgement will also be released in Europe on February 27th… but nobody really cares about that, right? If we try to pretend it doesn’t exist, maybe it’ll vanish out of existence.

We can only hope.

Konami UK has sent out the very surprising news that the next instalment of Silent Hill, Homecoming has slipped to 2009 in Europe… despite already being on sale in the US.

The 360, PS3 and PC horror instalment was originally due out in Europe for Halloween – and hit North American shelves late last month. It’s currently down for release in Europe next February, 2009. No reason was given for the delay yet.

Homecoming, which has had its development moved over to US studio Double Helix from Japan, received average reviews from North American press, suggesting to some that the slip this side of the pond could be a quality issue.

More than likely though thanks to the many language spoken by our European cousins, is some problem with translation. Or it could be, they can’t be bothered.

The new release puts Silent Hill almost head-to-head with Capcom’s Resident Evil 5.I wish them good luck with that.