Silent Hill 2

Silent Hill is one of the biggest names in the survival-horror genre, right up next to Resident Evil. Even in the early days of the PS1 it was a well known and respected game. People went mad for it, because it was a change from the overused yet familiar Resident Evil storyline.

When Silent Hill 2 came out, every Playstation magazine went mad for it. I can still remember it being declared the most terrifying games ever. The big mags stated that it had incredible graphics, edge-of-seat action, pant-wetting horror and a deep and involving story.
What with being, quite frankly, a wimp when it comes to this kind of thing I shunned the entire horror genre completely. The only scary game I had ever played in my life was Splatterhouse 2 on the Mega Drive, which was really more of a platform-meets-fighter. Even that gave me horrible nightmares, although to be fair I was only 5. However, since lately I have become more de-sensitized to horror in movies and the like, I figured it was about time I brought it into my everyday life as a computer games freak.

Trotting off to the local Cash Converters, I spotted about twenty Silent Hill 2 cases lined up next to each other. I was at this point about an inch away from pulling out, since the all-too-familiar shivers were going down my spine. But since the cases boasted to be a special DVD edition, I figured I might as well get it. Parting with a more-than-fair £7.50 I wandered off back to work, an excited and very happy chappy.
The box is actually one of the most impressive pieces of work I have ever seen. With a box set-style case, you slide out the game and DVD along with the instruction manual and some random sticker, which is apparently one in a set of four (in case anyone cares). The box itself has an interesting artwork on the front, and on the back next to the usual screenshots it claims to have revolutionary graphics and a truly gripping storyline. So many empty promises...

It starts off nicely enough. You need to select the game and "riddle" difficulty, which basically effects the various puzzles in the game. This put me off considerably, since if I wanted to solve literal riddles I would just search online. After that you get a very touching intro to the game, with an incredibly moving and immersive introduction to the storyline. You play as James Sunderland, a widower who receives a letter claiming to be from his deceased beloved Mary. It is in her handwriting, has her name on the front, and tells him she wants to meet him in their "special place". Being an obviously mentally torn man he sets off to find her, and so the tale begins.
The first thing you notice with the game is the atrocious controls. Boasting what they call "3-D controls", it is similar to the PS1 Grand Theft Auto games in that you move forward by pressing a button, and basically "steer" James left and right. It doesn't work, and is even harder to do that GTA because the forward button is... well, forward. It is next to impossible to walk, turn, and shoot at the same time, but they apparently foresaw this and as such you can change the controls to the more familiar "2-D controls" mode.

After you adapt to the controls and the incredibly harsh way that the camera moves, you wander along a long narrow cliff pathway. This is nothing more than a chance to get you used to walking and running, and is also a basic taster of the game to come. Indeed this is a spine-tingling part nice and early, with random wolf cries and rustling bushes to put you on edge. Just to really add to the atmosphere, there is a thick impenetrable fog and the first place you find yourself is a graveyard. And so, the game begins.
Now, this is all very well and good up to now. It is scary, but in a build-you-up kind of way. There are very few actual horrifying scenes, and almost no scenes make you jump in a BOO kind of way. Since I haven't actually played any survival horror games before I wasn't totally sure on what to expect, but it certainly wasn't this. With all the horror being purely psychological, it was a serious disappointment. Silent Hill is basically a huge lakeside town, minus the people. Left to turn derelict, and ridden with monsters, it is the place where the entire adventure is set. It is an impressive setting as well; almost all of the buildings can be explored, and you are armed with a map which is added to with every dead end and destroyed path you come across.

The story is surprisingly immersive, with a handful of twists thrown in here and there. Each character you meet in the wonderfully sinister town has their own reasons for being there, although more often than not you need to discover this for yourself. First up, you meet Angela, who is there to find her Mama. Her story is an interesting one, where her search becomes increasingly desperate and she becomes gradually more erratic and frantic, eventually contemplating suicide. Next up you meet Eddie, a clumsy and simple man, who is a seriously underused character. He has the most touching and violent story, and he is used really well with a clever mixture of emotion, confusion, and a sense of mystery. Following his descent into a hate-fuelled psychopath is enjoyable and touching, and out of all the side stories it is easily the best. Maria is a frequently used character. Looking, sounding, and with a name very similar to Mary, she follows you around for a large section of the game. Her reasons for being in the town are not bought up very often, although she does develop a real soft spot for James and Laura. Speaking of which, you have Laura, a typical 8 year old child as the final ingredient to the mixture of characters. You do not find out her reasons for being in Silent Hill until the very end, and at no point do you find out how she is getting from place to place without being attacked or even bothered by the creatures that patrol every street and every building (although I've later been informed that since she had no skeletons in the closet she was unable to interact with the creatures in any way). I thought she was a total waste of space in the game, adding nothing to the story and starting little more than a single boss-fight. I also LOATHED her voice acting, loathed it with every ounce of loathing I could muster. I hate child actors, it is a fact, and this proves why. With no emotion in the emotional scenes, and too much emotion in normal conversation, she gets grinding fast. However, despite nearly killing James and leading him and Maria into a near-death situation, she seems to get on well with the others and does lead into a bigger part late in the game.

With the exception of the latter, the people and their emotion are portrayed incredibly well. James himself has a fantastic voice actor in my opinion, and the others have obviously had a great deal of effort and thought poured into them. Interacting nicely with the environment, they really seem at home in the dark corridors and murky depths of the game. For a good example, at one point Angela throws a television at a baddie. It isn't animated in a choppy way, and it even breaks and stays broken which is not something you see very often. They are all given a beautifully crafted script as well: James regularly questions himself and tells people almost apologetically that he is unsure why he thinks Mary might be alive. You genuinely sympathize with him and everyone else in the game, and that is really positive.

The wonderful crafting of the game continues with the graphics. I mean, what can I say? Wow. Just... nothing can quite describe the sheer beauty of the game. Every single room and every single street has its own individual characteristics, be it an extra piece of mould here and there, or a broken piece of furniture thrown in for good measure. James and the other members of Silent Hill move smoothly and have very well animated facial features. The items and important things to do with the game are given a large view on the screen, with breathtaking images which even change when you do certain things. This is all very involving, and is a fantastic touch. The movies admittedly leave a lot to be desired, but they don't crop up very often. I'll leave it to you to decide if that's a good or bad thing. The final thing to really talk about is the fog. Ah yes, I am sure you will have read other reviews by now which have criticized the never ending, thick and blinding fog. Indeed, it is overused but the effect is incredible. It is genuinely spooky to see shadows of enemies appearing through the bleak grey curtain that hangs over the town. It has to be said, it is interesting how it disappears once Silent Hill turns to night, but then that is scary enough as it is. Having to rely on a circle emitted from a flashlight is very tough and is one of the best points in the game.

The audio in the game is almost equally impressive. With very little music, but full of terrifying sound effects it is genuinely scary. This is where most of the chill factor comes from. Armed with a radio that emits static whenever a monster is nearby, the noise is a haunting indication of the beasts that could be lurking behind each and every corner. The occasional drum beats that occur when you are near a potential threat are impressive... but are sometimes over used, lulling you into a state of nervous excitement when in reality nothing happens. Occasional and strange mechanical grindings can be heard, which you learn later comes from a particularly tough enemy and as such puts you on the edge of your seat whenever heard. Another nice touch is the change in footsteps when going from one surface to the next. Although this is rather common in games nowadays, it is done so well in Silent Hill 2 that it totally immerses you. The empty hollow sounds of the asphalt echoing down empty streets, the dull clunk of foot-on-wood in the abandoned apartments, and the snapping of broken glass all add depth and a sense of a real finished touch.

The bad guys, however, are the first disappointment. Ah, so you thought up to now I was being generous when looking at my low score for this game, weren't you? The enemies.... they just aren't varied enough. I mean it, with the exception of large cockroaches and the bosses they are all the same! They all take different amounts of damage, but chances are the only ones which will land a hit on you are the first ones you face, and that's only because they spray you with a brown fog of flesh dissolving acid! The bosses aren't anything special either. Since I was new to the genre let alone the series, I was playing in the easiest mode. The enemies are few and far between, and what you do see can be dispatched quickly and easily. Regardless, the instruction manual advises you to avoid unnecessary conflict. Hang on, what exactly is the point of a game with guns if you aren't meant to use them? It has to be said, they are right; you get no kind of score for killing enemies, until the end of the game and by this point you really couldn't care less. One more thing that annoys me is the fact that it is incredibly easy to kill the baddies. One boss needed 2 hits! Not even kidding! The first boss you face I do need to give a special mention though. Known only as the Pyramid Head, he is a massive mutant of a creature which drags a knife big enough to put a butcher to shame. The scraaaaaaaaape, scraaaaaaape of the blade on the concrete floors is enough to send a chill down your spine, and the truly horrific introduction to the beast is fantastic. Effectively trapped in a small cupboard, James frantically scrabble about for bullets to repel the monster as it searches a room for victims. Great introduction to a wonderfully designed monster, with a genuinely fantastic weapon. And it goes without saying, when you face him he's an awesome boss.

Next up is the length of the game. In three days flat I had completed the game on the easy difficulty. Alright, fair enough, lets try the hard mode right? Err.... no, wrong. The answer to the puzzles or "riddles" are nearly always the same, and regardless you already know the route you need to take. In any case, the game play isn't exactly exciting. It basically consists of finding your way out of labyrinth style buildings, finding various keys and activating certain events to move on to the next room. This gets incredibly mundane after a while, especially considering that most of the doors in the game are inaccessible or contain nothing of interest. Even worse, some of the puzzles are stupidly tricky and can take ages to figure out which means lots of running back and forth through empty rooms and corridors. Sometimes it gets so random and pointless it's funny. For a brief example, at one point you have to run down an insanely long flight of steps. Holding the Up button for over a minute is NOT my idea of fun. After this you have to jump down holes. Yeah, because we forgot the main character of this game suddenly wants to break his legs in a dungeon full of vicious man-eating cockroaches. The final straw to this particular scenario was walking out of a door to be back on ground level. Absurd.

So maybe that's a bit unfair, attacking the realism of the game. And it is, I suppose, but the fact that I got about 8 hours worth of confusing and unentertaining game time is a crushing thought, particularly from someone who has never played this type of game before. It really doesn't bode too well, does it? Especially with such slow and repetitive "action". Just to add insult to injury, the camera leaves a heck of a lot to be desired. Panning to a face on view when in corridors, and attempting weakly to follow action in boss fights and streets it is one of the biggest examples of camera-angles-gone-wrong. Switching it to be behind you is simple enough, but having to tap the L2 button every time you turn around gets boring and annoying fast.
But wait, there's more. Another disappointing factor (for me, at least) are the weapons. You have a grand selection of three types of weapons; bat, gun, and special (like large blades). You find them slowly, and each one has its own good and bad points. This sounds ok, but the fact is this: the shotgun, the third weapon you find, is the best weapon in the game. You get it early on as well, so searching for the others is pointless. I'm not even exaggerating when I say you'll only use the shotgun once you've found it since there's an abundance of shells you can find. The other items in your arsenal consist of the usual healing drinks, a flashlight, a radio, and some random items like pictures. They are helpful enough; indeed, the flashlight is used almost continuously, and adds another new depth to the game as each individual shadow dances across the walls and floors.

Now, back to the problems. With the game length the designers apparently managed to foresee a problem, and have used multiple endings. Good idea, most would think. Yeah, it would be, but frankly I don't want to sit through this game again. It was enough just playing it to test the harder levels before I wrote this review, I don't want to play it another three times for each secret ending. They also have the aforementioned difficulty levels. Pah! You know what the main differences are? The enemies have more health. Hmm, obvious one. They deal more damage. Obvious again. They heal and revive themselves though. What's up with that? This means after you empty clips on them, they get back up. A little bit silly really. There is also one more big difference that drive me mad; James falls over. Yep, he bangs into walls, meaning that if you are trying to flee a flock of enemies you are pretty much screwed, especially in the apartment buildings. Not really something I enjoyed. It stops being scary and just becomes mind numbingly irritating at this point.

So what more can I say? If you want a horror game that doesn't horrify, a game with guns that tells you not to shoot, a survival game where survival is all to easy, then go for it. I wouldn't recommend it. I have only given it a two star score because of the obvious effort that has gone into the visual and audio qualities of the game. My verdict? Gorgeous, but incredibly dull. It would be like sitting with Halle Berry for five hours while she talks about shoes. Survival horror? Well, there was certainly no worry of survival...