(This is going to be a very long post, which I apologise for. Feel free to jump to the last paragraph for a TLDR kind of wrap up)

Yes, the infamous HD Collection, arguably the worst way to play Silent Hill 2 and 3, and for many one of the worst ports in the history of video games.

A quick preface in the way of justification, then. As a survival horror fan, the complete absence of the Silent Hill franchise from my playthroughs was something that had been nagging me for a while. I never crossed paths with the series and was starting college when Silent Hill 2 came out, a period of my life when I was barely playing games. Well over a decade went by before I returned to gaming, and I eventually started wanting to give the SH titles a go because of their GOAT status among horror fans. I didn’t really have that many options though. I don't play on my Mac, don’t have much patience to mess around with emulation, and never owned a Playstation, so really Xbox was my only practical choice, both financially and time wise. Since I play on the Series S, the Restless Dreams version of SH2 was not an option, so I decided to try the HD Collection go for lack of a better alternative. I figured ‘hey, perhaps these opinions are mostly fuelled by nostalgia, I mean how bad can these ports be?’ Because I have zero past connection to the franchise, I was able to look at it fresh, with no baggage, under a 2022 light.

With that out of the way, here are my thoughts for the Silent Hill 2 and 3 versions in the HD package.

Silent Hill 2

Considering this is such a maligned port, perhaps the fact that I liked this game as much as I did is a testament to the original’s unrelenting quality. Having seen some playhrough footage on both the original and the enhanced PC versions, I’m well aware of the undeniable visual differences and how lacking the HD Collection is in comparison, especially when it comes to things like fog and lighting. Yet I still really, truly enjoyed my time with it. The whole game feels like a David Lynch nightmare, a haunting, surreal blend of dreamlike visuals, sounds, voices. That part didn’t get lost in translation. The overall atmosphere is so overpowering that it bursts its way even through its issues. It's incredible to me how certain things in the game are still able to induce anxiety in the player all these years after release. Everything feels so strange and unsafe in SH2, from the unnervingly floaty dialogue and voice acting, to the repetitive, droning, unsettling music that fully seeps into your psyche, to the creatively grotesque monster design. I’m not sure if that’s the case, but all aspects in the game, whether they’re executed more or less effectively, seem absolutely deliberate, designed with brutal intention to serve its atmosphere. This gives SH2 a charisma and presentation that’s hard to replicate even today, over 20 years later.

Atmosphere is certainly the game’s biggest strength, but there are other things SH2 does particularly well, such as narrative, level design and puzzle solving. From a distance, the story didn’t hit me as hard as I’m sure it did most people back then, which makes sense, since decades of exposure to SH2-inspired games diluted its impact on me. That's not to say it isn’t worth experiencing. It still is, today, and the best thing I can say about it is that, all these years later, parts of it still leave room for surprise, wonder, sadness and interpretations. But even if I hadn't liked it, the storytelling aspect has such a unique surreal vibe from start to finish that I would’ve still loved just tagging along for the ride. The level design and puzzles are two other things SH2 does very well, and both gave me serious Resident Evil vibes in how rooms interconnect and solutions are naturally found or inferred from exploration. Finally, I absolutely love the detail of James looking at things you can interact with. It’s a small thing, but one that really immerses you in the game and feels way ahead of its time.

There were also aspects I didn't really like. The most contentious is probably the 'other side’ of the music. I couldn’t really relate to a lot (not all) of the less eerie, almost ‘feel-good’ songs you hear in some of the cutscenes. It was such a clear contrast with the rest of the soundtrack that it took away some the edge and almost felt out of place at times (this is likely a very ‘me' thing though). Another aspect I was surprised by was how much this game feels like horror and how little if feels like survival horror. There is no inventory limitation, enemies on normal are dead easy, encounters and boss battles can be quite repetitive (though this was par for the course back then I suppose), and you get such an insane amount of resources that ammo and health are never a problem. These, along with the (expectedly) unremarkable gameplay, makes the game great to be in but not necessarily great to play in the literal sense. I think I died once in my entire playthough, and that one time happened because I was careless. At no point after the initial couple of hours did I feel my character was at risk. This doesn't have to be negative, but it was still noticeable.

So with all that said, yes, there are clear technical issues with this port (poor fog, overall darker picture, sound distortion and slight syncing problems). But none of this affects the game in a way that prevents most of its strengths from stepping forward. My experience with this game is easy enough to encapsulate: atmosphere (aesthetic, visuals and sound), narrative and puzzle solving, in that order, are the outstanding pillars of Silent Hill 2. Nothing else is particularly noteworthy here, and that's okay, because nothing else needs to be. It is an experience that, even through what’s considered the worst possible way to enjoy it, still manages to be incredibly enjoyable nonetheless. 8.5/10

Silent Hill 3

This one doesn’t feel as good to talk about as the one before. From the very first moment, when you notice you don’t actually get the option to use the original voices, it was easy to realise this wouldn’t be a port on the level of SH2. Coming at it with zero nostalgia for the original voice acting, since I had never heard them before, it’s not that the new voices are terrible as such, but a couple of them feel really off - Heather, for example, sounds a lot older than she is supposed to be. If the voice acting was the only issue with this port, however, I’d gladly take it. The problem is that it’s just one of several. Technically, SH3 is a bit of a mess: it’s buggy, it has sound issues, camera angles often feel like a nuisance, and it's pathetically dark in a way that seriously hinders gameplay even if you crank the brightness all the way up (it was especially annoying in those moments when I failed to see a hole in the ground and fell to my death). I’m also fairly convinced there’s a glitch that made it impossible for me to kill slurpers. At times these issues were barely there, which actually made for a really cool experience. But their presence was frequent enough to cause frustration and taint the good game underneath.

Technical blunders aside though, I still think there’s a stark difference in quality when compared to its predecessor. Simply put: SH2 is a better game. Watching the intro immediately made this feel like a much less tense game from the get go, which got further cemented every time the particular brand of horror-free, somewhat ‘cheesy' music blasted through most of the cutscenes. The game leans into this, giving you a gun and throwing you into the action very quickly, thus removing any chance for tension buildup. Like SH2, 3 tries to instil this dreamlike quality into its world, but it continuously falls short where the previous game excelled, failing to deliver a similar vibe. It is ‘louder’ and more in-your-face than what came before, which doesn't feel like a perfect fit in this type of game. The story is not on par with what we saw in the Sunderland narrative either, it feels a lot more ‘gamey’ and less interesting as a result, even as it tries to build off of SH1's story. Couple highlights aside, level design is another minus, and the subway level in particular is one of the worst in recent memory. There's also a pacing problem, with a first half that is less interesting and more drawn out than it should be when compared to the second. To cap it all off, the final boss is quite underwhelming, devolving into a long, repetitive slog where you do the same thing over and over until you deplete its HP.

This sounds like harsh criticism, but there were also things that I really enjoyed and in fact felt were better explored when compared to SH2. The main one is how SH3 actually delivers more on the ‘survival' horror front. Resource scarcity actually exists this time around, and enemies are a lot harder. There’s a weird moment where you simply stop finding as many resources all of a sudden, but this was done well to the point where I wondered if I would have enough stuff for some of the showdowns. Alongside this, even though the game isn't able to do it consistently, some of its imagery manages to crawl under your skin, especially in the second act, with a couple of genuinely eerie moments, both in visual tone and voice delivery.

All things considered, though I’m sure I would have definitely enjoyed it more in its original state, Silent Hill 3 just doesn’t do as many things as well as its predecessor does. Maybe I’ll learn to appreciate it more as times goes by, but as it stands, the bigger, better lean on the survival aspect of horror in terms of resource management, the higher enemy difficulty, an overall strong second half and a few unsettling scenes aren’t quite enough for me to consider it a masterpiece, with or without the HD Collection’s technical mishaps. 7/10

So this is my (long) take on the Silent Hill HD Collection. I have to say, considering everything I had read and heard online, I thought I would have a terrible time with these ports. But the truth is I didn’t. Free from the nostalgia chains that we’re all tied to one way or another, and without any previous consequential knowledge of the franchise, I really enjoyed 2 and had a decent enough time with 3. So if, like me, you somehow managed to never play these games before, you’re curious about them, and you feel the HD Collection is the only practical way for you to access them, my advice would be to block out the noise and try them for yourself. There is certainly a lot to enjoy here, and I for one am happy I got to experience it, even in a lesser variant.