“In my restless dreams,
I see that town.
Silent Hill.
You promised me you'd take me
there again someday.
But you never did.
Well, I'm alone there now...
In our 'special place'...
Waiting for you...
Waiting for you to
come to see me.”
With the remake of this game being fresh in people’s minds and the spooky season upon us, it seems fitting that I finally tackle this horror masterpiece released in 2001. Silent Hill 2 is one of those games that I have owned for a decently long time but never get around to. I remember in the final days of having my PS2, I got a copy of this on the cheap (especially by today’s pricing), and played up to the first encounter with Pyramid Head and then stopped. Sadly, I gave my PS2 and that game to a friend of mine and they disappeared forever, which could be fitting for this game. Eventually, I was able to get a copy for the OG Xbox and I finally beat this game.
The story of Silent Hill 2 is one that's been analyzed to death and while I won't do too much of that, for the sake of spoilers, I will start with a quick synopsis. You play as James Sunderland, who has received a letter from his wife Mary that she is waiting for him in their special place, Silent Hill. The main problem? Mary has been dead for three years. James can't believe that this letter is from her, but he has been suffering since her death so he goes there to search for her, only to find a town engrossed in silence, fog and monsters. Over the course of the game, you explore this town and meet some rather interesting characters as you learn more about what is going on within the town and in James' own psyche as he hopes to find his dead wife. The story goes deeper from here, literally and metaphorically, as it becomes a psychological horror tale that sees James grappling with loss, guilt and even his own sanity in search of the answers he seeks and also doesn't seek. It is a beautifully crafted tale that lives up to all the praise it has gotten for over 20 years now.
Easily the best part of the game is the atmosphere. Silent Hill in this game evokes a town that was abandoned long ago with only traces of human life left, enraptured in a deep, dense fog that gives the player a sense of dread because you never know what is hidden deep within what the human eye cannot see. I'm an advocate of the best horror being what you don't see because your brains idea of scary cannot be replicated by any other person and SH 2 is the best example of that. You do end up seeing monsters and even other humans but that constant state of anxiety you feel going into the fog and not knowing if you'll ever come out hangs with you the entire experience. The same goes for when you enter any of the buildings. While there's no fog here, the blind corners and sheer darkness you navigate are able to keep that atmosphere going but in a different way that serves the game as you further progress.
The controls and gameplay fit right in with the Resident Evil clone style that was en vogue at the time. RE broke the mold in how to make horror work in a video game sense and EVERYONE copied it, Konami included. While Silent Hill has never properly been able to shed the "clone" tag, it is the one game from that era that was able to become its down distinct franchise and SH 2 is the prime reason as to why. Resident Evil is known for it's more action heavy gameplay, cryptic puzzles and violent gameplay. Silent Hill is more about exploration, character studies and minimal combat. This may be one of the easiest games I have ever played. It's almost a glorified walking sim with how little you get challenged. That sounds like a critique, I know, but I think it plays to the games strength. It allows you to experience the story without it being too much of a challenge.
I also have to talk about the music because it is a key factor to this game's success. Akira Yamaoka is the composer and has attained a legendary status to video game fans for this work on this series as well as games in the Contra, Gradius, and Rumble Roses series. He's also been the music director for Grasshopper Manufacture for almost 15 years, with credits on Shadows of the Damned, Lollipop Chainsaw and Killer is Dead. Needless to say, he has earned his status and this game is probably his masterpiece. While there isn't too much "music" per se, the sound design does a spectacular job of heightening the tension and giving you the shivers. Sounds like screams, footsteps, grinding noises, and other ambient noises are what's on display. The most I ever got scared playing this game is when you would get these sudden shifts in audio from light music and sound effects to dead silence. Then you would get these weird, disturbing sounds out of nowhere that you never find out the source of. This really adds to the horror factor of not being able to see what it is and your mind doing the rest of the work. Great stuff, Yamaoka!
Are there any negatives to this game? I have a few issues. You might think I do not like the tank controls, but au contraire! I actually do not mind them at all. It probably has to do with the minimal difficulty of the game itself, so being able to navigate with them is not that tough. My issues come more with the puzzles. I have not discussed them much, because I don't have too much to say about them. They are either way too easy or way too cryptic. Puzzles can be a hard thing to get right in games and Resident Evil also has this issue, but for this game they are a noticeable weak spot. Having to combine things in the inventory is a bit clunky as well and every time I take like five steps, I feel a need to open my map to make sure I don't get lost. The sense of direction in this game is not the best, but I can't tell if that is intentional or not.
Regardless of any shortcomings, the game really comes together and has multiple endings depending on what you do throughout the game. Each ending has its own implications for the events of the game, James' response to them, and his decisions to react to said events. Play the game to find out the endings for yourself, but there are two joke endings that are just incredible. The Xbox version (subtitled Restless Dreams) has a new sub story called Born From a Wish. You play as Maria before she meets James and you spend about an hour wandering about some new locales in a mostly forgettable story. It's no Separate Ways.
Overall, I highly recommend this game. I'm happy I finally decided to play this game and now I understand what all the praise is about. The game is a bit of slow burn at times, but it only took me 7 hours to beat it, so it's a breezy playthrough of an iconic horror game. I've been hearing great things about the remake and I would like to check it out when it gets an eventual Xbox Series release. Maybe I'll write a blog about my experience with the remake in a years time, who knows? Until next time, stay spoopy my dudes!