Silent Hill series, a review.

[Jick Magger]

Ughhhh, I hate the movies.
I mean, some assholes like to cream their pants about how it's the most faithfullest video game movie of all time because it kept some of the monsters and the transformation sequences were kinda similar to the first game's, but it also goes out of it's way to betray certain aspects as well.
The one that really ground my gears was changing Harry into a woman. Why would they do that?
What was the point?
Was it because it's unbelievable that a guy could get scared of this shit? Because I don't buy that.
And then they had the balls to complain about how they had to shoehorn Sean Bean into the story because they 'needed more men!' even though they had a perfectly male character that they could've used. That and I seriously would've loved to have seen Sean Bean as Harry Mason.
Failing that, they could've made the second film based around the basic premise of the second game; Sean Bean's character from the first film receiving a letter from the long disappeared heroine of the first film to go to Silent Hill.
Or use Aaron Eckhart,

I got a letter, the name on the envelope said 'Mary'
fuck if I know.
But of course, they go with another female protagonist. The really dull and boring one, at that.

 

[A user named cat]

You should know how hollywood rolls; women are more sympathetic then men, especially in horror movies. Right? RIGHT?

Despite that and the various other changes, I still really enjoyed the movie. Found it genuinely creepy. First time I watched it was around 4am, lights out, all alone, sound cranked up -- was pretty tense the whole time. So I could tell they did something right.

Plus the woman who they got to play Dahlia had an amazing voice, I wouldn't have even minded if they took a noir route and let her narrate throughout the film.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvVEqn1AniY

 

[Vibalist]

You guys are so edgy. Silent Hill 3 is a great game (probably the best in the series), and Heather is a great character. She's one of the only female protagonists I can think of in recent video games who isn't completely over-sexualized and actually has a personality aside from just being female, and for those reasons alone the makers of SH3 deserve a lot of credit.

 

[Kz3r0]

You guys are so edgy. Silent Hill 3 is a great game (probably the best in the series), and Heather is a great character. She's one of the only female protagonists I can think of in recent video games who isn't completely over-sexualized and actually has a personality aside from just being female, and for those reasons alone the makers of SH3 deserve a lot of credit.

While what you have said about Heater is true the third can't stand the comparison with the first two.

 

[ghostdog]

Has anyone played the last installment, Downpour? No PC release for this one.

 

[Vibalist]

You guys are so edgy. Silent Hill 3 is a great game (probably the best in the series), and Heather is a great character. She's one of the only female protagonists I can think of in recent video games who isn't completely over-sexualized and actually has a personality aside from just being female, and for those reasons alone the makers of SH3 deserve a lot of credit.

While what you have said about Heater is true the third can't stand the comparison with the first two.

Well, I disagree. For one I thought SH3 was a lot scarier than the second installment, due in large parts to the use of sounds. SH3 is much louder and throws much more creepy noise at you compared to SH2, which I almost thought was too quiet. Other than that it's pretty much every bit as good as the previous installments, so while I may have exaggerated a bit calling it the best of the series, I certainly don't see how it's any worse than the others. Just my two cents really.

 

[Kz3r0]

Well, I disagree. For one I thought SH3 was a lot scarier than the second installment, due in large parts to the use of sounds. SH3 is much louder and throws much more creepy noise at you compared to SH2, which I almost thought was too quiet. Other than that it's pretty much every bit as good as the previous installments, so while I may have exaggerated a bit calling it the best of the series, I certainly don't see how it's any worse than the others. Just my two cents really.

As others have already wrote the first two are very different games even if equals in terms of overall quality, the third only improvement is in better textures, but maybe I understood what you mean, the third admittedly had a sense of creepy anguish and loneliness different from the other two almost as they successfully managed to combine the atmosphere of the two previous games, in this case is easy to see the reason why you appreciate it.

 

[almondblight]

What games do you consider scary?

Clocktower (SNES).

 

[dnf]

Silent Hill 3 is the most scary SH by a great margin. Excelent enemies, Excelent Sound Design, good art design despite the linearity. I mean, just hear the sound of the nurses at brookhaven hospital, its fucking creepy:


Brookhaven hospital, the subway, the mall, the apartments, the sewers and the church is my favorite maps(ops thats almost all of them).

SH2 is indeed overrated. It have the best story, but the monster design is piss poor(i like Piramid Head and Door Daddy though), the game lacks some scares and the alternative silent hill is too much toned down. Actually, the OST is more scary than the game XD:

 

[ghostdog]

Bah, Silent Hill 1 is by far the scariest Silent Hill.

 

[knightley]

I enjoyed the first 3 and did not touch the rest.

 

[Borelli]

Silent Hill 1 was the first one i played, one of the earliest horror games i played ever, really made an impression on me (finished the school level 3 times), especially the prologue. Heck the intro music itself makes my hair stand on end. The ending is unsatisfactory though and voice acting is terrible - not so bad it's good just plain terrible, also the last boss fight is annoyingly hard because he kills you in 1 shot.

Silent Hill 2 first impressions were ... it uses the same mechanics of gameplay and fear as SH1, which would be a good thing if i didn't start playing SH2 right after the first one. What's that a fog? What's in there? A monster no kidding i would be scared more if nothing was in it. "Hey James we need to go to a hospital but don't worry it's a totally different hospital from the one in SH1". Similar thing happened with Amnesia, the game was scary but not that scary when you have just finished Penumbra.
My main gripes with it are that the first dungeon (yes i call Silent Hill levels dungeons deal with it) is an apartment building of no importance to anyone while in the first one you had a school and a reason to be in it (to find the daughter), the apartment building storywise serves the same purpose as the three key building at the start - as a roadblock, also the Pyramid Head is there but he is actually everywhere so it doesn't matter.
The secondary characters, the fat guy and the rape victim have no connections to main story whatsoever which is a disappointment although they do serve a purpose which is to tell you that what is happening to James is not unique to him. However the rest of the game was good so i can forgive this. The game has great facial animations which looks good even today i don't really see why they even used the CGI.

Haven't played the rest will try when i get into a horror mood. Not the rest actually, i'm only interested in 3 and 4 because i haven't heard that many good things about the others.
One of the sequels which have a subtitle instead of a number is like a remake of the first? Can anyone tell me how is it? The word remake itself doesn't bode well for me but i'm willing to give it a chance.

 

[Micmu]

Bah, Silent Hill 1 is by far the scariest Silent Hill.

I agree. And also by far the best.
And I played second first, then third and then the first.

 

[Konjad]

I enjoyed the first 3 and did not touch the rest.

I also played the 4th and Home-something which was fucking terrible and I uninstalled it after 3 hours, even though all the love for the series I had up to then!
If you feel like playing another SH ever, you can play 4th, although keeping in mind that it's worse than previous 3 games (still good, but worse), if Home-something indicates what other new Silent Hills are... then it's better to stay the fuck away. After playing these three boring hours with it I never touched any Silent Hill again.

 

[knightley]

Are the designers for all Silent Hill games the same?
You know, nowadays, it is all about franchise, nobody knows shit about who is behind a game.

 

[Multidirectional]

Designers for first four are the same.

 

[knightley]

Bah, Silent Hill 1 is by far the scariest Silent Hill.

I agree. And also by far the best.
And I played second first, then third and then the first.

Yeah all "tough" dudes I knew were wetting their pants while playing it at night with headphones. Then they decided to play it together and ended up wetting their pants together.

 

[ghostdog]

Designers for first four are the same.

That's not entirely correct. While "Team Silent" developed 1-4, one of the main developers of the first one left the team after its release and went to make the Siren series. Also I think that by SIlent Hill 4 the team had gone through various changes.

Of course the decrease in quality after the 4th one , when team silent got dismantled for good and the franchise was given to some worthless American devs, is painfully evident.

 

[zeitgeist]

Has anyone played the last installment, Downpour? No PC release for this one.

It doesn't even have Yamaoka anymore.

 

[dnf]

Bah, Silent Hill 1 is by far the scariest Silent Hill.

hard to quantify scariness so lets just leave it at that M:. SH3 was the last really good SH that i have played, so if i have to choose the best it would be SH3>SH1>SH2>SH4>SH:HC
I hold SH3 as equal with SH1, but with the improved sound and graphix i just need to choose SH3 as the better game.

i liked Homecoming in a spin-off kind of way, its just like SH: the beat-em-up.

 

[Vibalist]

Haven't played the rest will try when i get into a horror mood. Not the rest actually, i'm only interested in 3 and 4 because i haven't heard that many good things about the others.
One of the sequels which have a subtitle instead of a number is like a remake of the first? Can anyone tell me how is it? The word remake itself doesn't bode well for me but i'm willing to give it a chance.

It's called Shattered Memories, and it's in my opinion the only good Silent Hill game when not counting the ones Team Silent made. It's very different gameplay and graphics wise, but it still has lots of atmosphere and a pretty decent retelling of the story from the first one that isn't as much a remake as a re-imagining. One thing I also like about it is that you can't fight the monsters this time around (no more clunky combat mechanics, yay), so you're forced to run from them instead. I think this makes things even scarier.
Shattered Memories feels like it was made by people who got what the first four games were about.

 

[A user named cat]

It's a shame they flubbed the HD collection on ps3, would've been nice to have the first few games in one collection and in better resolution. I guess they're full of bugs though, from freezes and glitches, to the sound being screwed up. Not sure how they managed that.

I wonder just how bad Downpour is. You can get it pretty cheap now and there are next to no horror games on ps3, would like to have something to sit and play on my big screen without hooking my PC up to it.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Isn't Downpour the one that has Korn instead of Yamaoka?

Anyway, I got charmed and finished SH2. I also tried most of the other ones, though did not care for any of them.

SH2 was a really unique experience and one of the two games I'd consider good thanks to story, mood, music and presentation and despite the shitty gameplay. But the gameplay is indeed shitty so that's probably why I couldn't stomach anymore SH.

 

[dnf]

Would be good if they made a proper remake of SH1 instead of shitty Shattered Memories.

 

[Rahdulan]

Hijacking and reviving the thread, but Twin Perfect is at it again with their TRSHE videos. Now with more X chromosome and memories.

 

[Perkel]

When people talk about SH being scary they should be shot in head.

SH 1 is imo better than SH2 and i played it years after SH2 so no nostalgia factor.
Those games are not scary but are simply disturbing.

Either way SH1 tone, characters and so on are way better than SH2 ones and they create atmosphere really you can't find anywhere else in games
It is true that SH2 story is fucking amazing and is better than SH1 story but tone is completely different instead of feeling like you would drown instead you feel melancholy throughout game with touch of someone trying to strand you.

Either way SH2 is perfect sequel to SH1. IT shares some key elements but overall you could release SH2 named differently and it would stand on its own.

BTW

People you should try Silent Hill: Shatered Memories. It is imo 4th proper Silent Hill game and quality is slightly above SH3 imo. There are some retarded chase sequences but overall it is fucking amazing game.

Making of Silent Hill 2 is fucking amazing: