Silent Hill 2 (2024)

Easily the darkest narrative I've seen in gaming. Silent Hill as a franchise was inaccessible to me as a kid, being on a console I didn't have and a rating my strict parents wouldn't allow me to play. It had this air of forbidden, potentially tainted fruit - something both tempting and yet likely corrupted simultaneously. I'm happy to say that my absurd expectations for the "greatest horror game of all time" were largely met, and Bloober Team have really made something exceptional here.

The devil is quite literally in the details; in the way James' finger rests on the trigger (no firearm training), or how his hands shake later in the game. In the off-kilter speech of Angela. The rust and ruin of the other side. The crackling static of the radio. It begins with nothing but the franchise's signature fog, a piano motif, and an overlook above the forested outskirts of town. By the time you reach the town proper, the slow descent has begun, and the tension ratchets higher and higher as you inexorably slide into the hell of Silent Hill's other side.

No subject is taboo - child abuse, domestic violence, and sexual assault are all confronted head-on, with very little to shield the audience from their horror. The content warning is long and detailed, to Bloober's credit. It's a truly full-on experience and one I'm glad I was prepared for. It's not hard to see why the game is still talked about nearly 25 years on, and how it spawned an endless legion of imitators; The Last Of Us surely could not exist without Silent Hill 2.

I was satisfied with my ending - one of eight available, though certainly my preferred version of events. The combat was meaty and frightening while never truly challenging, leading me to die a handful of times on normal difficulty. That may be for the best, as 20 hours is a looooong time to spend in near-constant muscle spasm. (Game length is a tough one to debate - 10hrs may have worked better for the original, but it would feel wrong to pay full AAA price for a 10hr game.)

ENDING SPOILERS:

In Water feels like the definitive end to the experience, though I think Maria and Stillness both have merit - the latter allowing for James to live his final moments in fantasy, and the former showing a selfish and remorseless James continue his life with little shame. The Leave ending, often cited as popular or even default, is psychotic: it absolves James of the murder of his wife, and even implies that her death was something of an assisted suicide (heads up, it definitely wasn't). This ending then suggests that this 'repentant killer' now be the guardian of Laura, the unexplained child who has taunted him throughout the game. That's all truly cooked, gang, even if James remains trapped in the loop. The only way the ending can hit with the necessary force is not to pull the punch - to have Mary say, "James, you made me happy," as his car sinks slowly into the depths of Toluca Lake. Fuck James.

Article (spoiler warning): The Good Ending by Wesley LeBlanc

“This guy is going through it [...] and James finally beats Pyramid Head by basically volunteering himself to die. The final thing for him is to just be like, ‘Alright, let me face this thing head on. And I just thought that was a really cool concept and it just rang true for me because I feel like a lot of the healing I’ve done in my life has been about having to look head-on at the thing that really scares me. And it inevitably takes away so much of its power when you finally do face it.”

Purser’s “Leave (Good Ending)” is about this confrontation, the “good ending” of Silent Hill 2, and how it left her feeling when she reached the credits.

Haven't play original, so this is my first experience with Silent Hill.

I thought the graphics, atmosphere and overall surreal and dreamy vibes were great. Enjoyed a lot of the slower moments exploring the town, and some sections were pretty darn scary (The prison section in particular).

The game did feel slightly too long. I enjoyed the combat a lot and the enemy types that existed were all really creepy, but overall there was not a ton of variety in enemy types. In the end combat started feeling a little too easy, especially with a very generous dodge mechanic. Definitely took a way from the scariness of many of the encounters by the end. I also had so many health packs that it barely mattered if I was hit. I finished the game with only 3 deaths in the end.

I was disappointed in the Prison area in this remake but what came right after was really excellent, so it softened the blow some. I love the rework of the Abstract Daddy fight. Truly harrowing to experience, even if a tad easy.

Following it up with a teaser of the start of the Labyrinth and then the scene with Maria? I could feel myself kind of shaking from the cocktail of emotions it all hit me with, haha. They totally nailed it. I'm sure I'll gush more about this in my eventual full review but just like in the original I love how unsettled that scene makes me feel. Like I care less about how she survived the incident earlier and moreso want to know what the fuck she really is, because she doesn't feel real (even having played the game before). It's the best kind of uncanny and they did a great job at recreating it.

This is surprisingly solid so far. And I say that as a big fan of the original that is definitely nitpicking the hell out of it silently as I play.

I do feel a bit weird complaining about a lot of a good thing, but Wood Side / Blue Creek Apartments just keep going and going. I'm nearing the 5 hour mark-- over halfway through the total playtime of my playthrough of the original last year-- and I'm still in the first major area somehow. It's making the pacing kind of odd to me but I also appreciate the new puzzles and corridors to explore.