After the first three games came out and became instant classics the series took a bit of a dip with three quite flawed entries. I think Homecoming gets a little more abuse than it deserves (I definitely like it more than The Room and Origins), but still, the dip in quality was noticeable. Then along came Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. The developers weren't afraid to experiment and pursue their own vision, and the result was a bold new direction for the series, a startlingly original and effective game, and in my opinion the best horror game of the console generation (it was nice to see a horror game this generation that wasn't just a glorified shooter with jump scares). Then along comes Downpour. The original press was bad, Game Informer (bleh) called it mediocre and ign gave it a 4.5 so I went in with some trepidation, but all my worries have been blown out of the water. Aside of some underwhelming graphics and occasional tech issues (though they aren't nearly as bad on the 360) this is an excellent game that took a lot of what worked about Shattered Memories and added in a huge, surprisingly open world with a great sense of exploration and wonder. If I remember correctly ign mostly just whined about the combat mechanics, though I find them serviceable (though definitely not excellent, not that I'd want them to be as a fan of Shattered Memories' chase seqences). I suspect the reviewers complaining about combat never figured out there's a lock on button. Anyway, I can safely say that in my mind Silent Hill has made a complete recovery after its years in the wilderness. I think Silent Hill has been the most innovative horror series this gen, and I think it's a shame more people aren't getting behind it.

Agreed. You know to ignore the review when it's from IGN. SH 2 is one of my favorite games ever and even though I don't feel that this game holds a candle to it in almost every category, I still had a good time with it and think that it's flaws don't hold it back from being a good game. Also, if they mostly whined about the combat in a silent hill game, all credibility goes out the window. And the soundtrack is actually decent aside from the Korn song and whatever the other song is that plays in the credits along with it. I just wish the songs were more common and louder as the game is quiet unless you listen to a radio.

What I like about the last two Silent Hills is a move to more Lynchian mystery and adult horror over fleshy rusty bloody industrial chung chung. Not that it's bad at all, but it's been done and there are other people doing that specific thing better. But no one is doing that investigation into aberrant behavior or the sad stuff we tend to ignore or gloss over because it's uncomfortable. Shattered Memories is maybe the best investigation into complicated grief I've ever seen.

@Brodehouse said:

What I like about the last two Silent Hills is a move to more Lynchian mystery and adult horror over fleshy rusty bloody industrial chung chung. Not that it's bad at all, but it's been done and there are other people doing that specific thing better. But no one is doing that investigation into aberrant behavior or the sad stuff we tend to ignore or gloss over because it's uncomfortable. Shattered Memories is maybe the best investigation into complicated grief I've ever seen.

Agreed. I found what was happening in the woods and the brothel in Shattered Memories as frightening as any monster. After the first four games that "Twin Peaks-esque" storytelling atmosphere was gone, and Origins and Homecoming were merely aping that which was lost. The new people in charge needed to follow their own muse and I'm glad they did. It's interesting you note the last two games as still being Lynchian. I find myself agreeing with this, but more in terms of an exploration of Lynch's themes than his storytelling style.

I'm looking forward to this game, after reading Mikel Reparaz's review on GamesRadar. He gave it a 7, noting one of the positives as how scary the game is. I took those two points as all I needed to jump over the fence and buy it.

@Brodehouse: Wait. Who else is doing what Silent Hill has done at all, let alone better? I feel like Silent Hill pretty much still stands alone in the kind of game they provide. If there are others out there I would love to know.

@solarisdeschain: Just curious what you enjoyed about Homecoming more than The Room or Origins. Both of those other games have their quirks but to me are infinitely more playable and enjoyable than Homecoming. The Room missed out on the classic Silent Hill town adventuring but it made up for it slightly by just taking you directly to the large buildings that you ended up thoroughly exploring and solving puzzles. Origins had a pretty decent mix of both and was awesome for a portable game. For me, Homecoming showed glimpses of brilliance, especially the opening in the hospital but quickly devolved into awfulness for me. Maybe I am being overly harsh, but the environments in that game were just so lacking in design. I'm really just interested in how you feel Homecoming deserves a spot in this series over The Room and Origins.

I must be one of the few people that legitimately enjoyed homecoming, I never saw what was so broken about it.

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

@dezvous: I walked away from The Room really conflicted. Parts of it were absolutely brilliant. A lot of the series highlights are in The Room, especially the Water Prison, the story, the villain, and the big giant head. But then other parts I thought were so broken as to render the game almost unplayable. Like the first person stuff later on in the game, the ghosts, when invincible Walter chases you around with a gun, Subway world, etc. I applaud Konami for taking chances with 4, but a lot of the ideas didn't work.

Origins is my least favorite. It was starting to feel rote and stale to me at that point, and Travis was a boring protagonist with unconvincing psychological trauma shoe-horned into the story just for an excuse to further explore (and in my opinion mostly just cheapen) the mythology of the first game.

Homecoming I felt had more fluid controls and a better camera system (though the camera system was still flawed), and there were some really imaginative parts (the boss fights and the Hell Descent hospital level consisting of barely connected platforms and grates stick out the most). The story, along with Origins, is in the bottom two, and although some things were predictable, I liked the way the two different aspects of the story (the personal, psychological aspect and the Order plotline) fit together. I felt it meshed much better than Origins. And I know a lot of people hated the combat system but I liked it. There was a bit of a curve but it's just about timing, and by the end of the game I'd mastered it. I also liked how comparably seamless the world is.

I've still actually never played a Silent Hill game. When I was a kid my buddy use to play them and I would be scared shitless just watching.

@allworkandlowpay: By obtuse do you mean "I didn't get it?"

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

SH2 and 3 had subpar graphics? I'm not a fan of the series but even I have to seriously question that statement. I remember seeing screens of those two games in magazines and being blown away.

People shit on Silent Hill 4 a lot which is mind blowing to me. I think it's better than the first SH and SH3.

I consider Downpour to be a solid entry; it's certainly not as good as the first four, but it's better than the last few. The combat is problematic not simply because the mechanics behind it are poor, but because they're poorly implemented. The camera tends to throw a shit-fit in tight spaces, and the lock-on is often spotty. It isn't a problem for most of the game, as combat is infrequent, but towards the end, when combat becomes too frequent, it really shows its flaws.

As mentioned, the fourth game gets shit on rather frequently, but I thin it's quite good. Like Silent Hill 2 before it, it kept the themes and took some chances; that it is so divisive among fans suggests that it isn't a bad game, but a game that not every fan wanted. Origins was bland, but it was also a portable game, so the lack of depth is to be expected. Homecoming was boring in much the same way; it tried far too hard to be like a Silent Hill game and never developed its own identity (not to mention the horrendous controls, stemming from a failure to include standard options). Shattered Memories was complete shit. It took several big risks, but each of them failed to add anything meaningful; the absence of threat in the world kills tension, the "puzzles" were piss-easy, the psych-quiz nonsense was a shoddy gimmick, and the controls were easily the worst of the series (Wii). The "twist" was also a complete misfire. Silent Hill is at its best when it doesn't try desperately hard to combine heavy-handed foreshadowing with an insistence on surprise; anyone with a modicum of narrative sensibility could see the plot turn coming from the beginning. The key is to write a strong narrative that doesn't depend on twists - if its organic and well-executed, it won't matter if the player knows where the story is going. I appreciate that they tried a completely different take on the series, but they forgot that "horror" and "game" were rather core components; holding forward from a starting position to the end credits while adding the occasional waggle might make for a decent virtual tour, but it makes for a really listless game.

While Downpour is being largely ignored and will probably fail commercially, it's by no means a bad game. That being said, even with proper marketing and attention, it isn't strong enough to revitalize the series. I don't think sequels can help (even when they're enjoyable) at this point. The franchise doesn't need an iteration so much as a spiritual successor of sorts. A proper survival horror game with distinct vision and the resources to pull that vision off would be quite welcome. Most of the horror games in this generation have been action-centric shooters (with the partial exception of Condemned) or low-budget cash grabs. Konami's approach of repeating the same tactics (low-budget, no polish, no significant investment) is just going to bury the series even more.

@partypajamas said:

Agreed. You know to ignore the review when it's from IGN. SH 2 is one of my favorite games ever and even though I don't feel that this game holds a candle to it in almost every category, I still had a good time with it and think that it's flaws don't hold it back from being a good game. Also, if they mostly whined about the combat in a silent hill game, all credibility goes out the window. And the soundtrack is actually decent aside from the Korn song and whatever the other song is that plays in the credits along with it. I just wish the songs were more common and louder as the game is quiet unless you listen to a radio.

About that: I always understood (and accepted) that combat in horror games was fundamentally broken and terrible. Rather than get pissy about it, I've come to accept it as a necessary aspect of a horror game, in which you aren't a gun-toting murder junkie racking up points. Now I just focus on whether or not the game has a good narrative. IMO, horror games are 'guided experiences', namely you're there for the story and atmosphere, not the award-winning gameplay. People who put combat over story or on par, such as that IGN review, seem backwards and out of touch. Same thing with Shattered Memories - first I hear (from GB) how amazing the story is, then I hear (from other sources) how it's a muddled mess gameplay-wise. It's getting really hard to judge based on reviews now.

Honestly, Silent Hill has been declining in terms of quality after the release of 4: The Room, when the original Team Silent disbanded. The newer games after 4 had their moments but they weren't as good as they should be. Western developers don't understand true horror. They don't know how to handle Silent Hill games. They tend to focus more on gameplay and graphics than on story and actual horror. Silent Hill is all about disturbing moments and horrific scenes and Origins, Homecoming, and Shattered Memories are not scary at all.

I still need to play Downpour but from what I've seen and heard, it's an ok game and nothing special. The only way to revitalize the Silent Hill franchise is for Konami to create a brand new division dedicated to only making Silent Hill games and not outsiders. I trust only the Japanese to work on scary games.

@solarisdeschain: Interesting. Maybe I never got the hang of the combat in Homecoming, I always felt like it was absolutely broken. I think it was the scythe head type monsters in the police station (I think? my memory is really hazy) where I became infuriated with them. I also never really cared to. I'll give you that the controls worked fine besides the combat and I actually think the graphics look better than Downpour in a lot of ways. But I feel while the graphics and lighting may have looked better it lacked a lot of detail in its environments, or I guess I should say interesting details. Most of it was bland. The transformations in Homecoming looked incredible though. That's the other thing, I hated the underground type parts in that game, they were so linear and ugly compared to the regular town stuff and I felt like the split between otherworldy stuff and good old Silent Hill was a bad balance. The story never connected with me either but I don't think much of that matters. I remember the junkyard and what little I saw of that town was pretty cool. I've said it multiple times, Silent Hill for me is mostly environment and atmosphere and Homecoming dropped the ball for me. I love me some locked doors.

I can't argue with your points about Origins, for me it was just a really fun way to get some Silent Hill atmosphere into my PSP and it looked damn good. Plus I remember the puzzles being pretty good too. All in all I think Origins is a pretty good Silent Hill game as far as the game part goes. Exploration, backtracking, puzzle solving, it has all the staples of the series. But it's severely lacking in the story department and like you said Travis is a pretty poor main character. Although now that I think of it, that game had some pretty cool moments at the end in that hotel or apartment or whatever it was. I remember being in between a whole bunch of rooms and looking through holes in the wall, crazy stuff.

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

I take it you're not a fan then huh? I can see where you're coming from, I absolutely can but it's kind of obvious I tend to disagree.

I for one don't think those original games had issues with the combat and there's a very specific reason why. They didn't have to have a better combat system. All those first games are filled with slow plodding enemies, they didn't require fast responsive combat. The combat was exactly what it needed to be at the bare minimum without causing frustration. I never had any issues with the combat in those games and I never played those on easy, normal or even hard was fine. In downpour and some other games though you don't have that. They have fast moving monsters but the combat remains slow and unresponsive, that's where we run into some problems.

The camera issue is an interesting one. In 1-3 you really just have to surrender yourself to the camera when you're doing the playing of the game and use the look button to check out your surroundings every so often. Other than that though, the camera angles were designed for specific situations, causing claustrophobia or sometimes centering your vision around a particularly dark void. The camera angles were very deliberate in those early games and proved to create a great sense of dread and tension, something you don't really see anymore. If you always have to be in control I could get where you're coming from but the "poor" camera control is not without its reasons. I can't say I have any complaints with it. But I also have the ability to wrap my head around the apparently insane complexity of the other survival horror games... Resident Evil.

It's funny, I tried to get my cousin into those original RE and SH games when he was younger but he could not get himself past the controls and camera angles. I just told him to put himself into the shoes of the character on screen you know, take into account where he's facing, his left corresponds to left on the controller etc.. After a bit it's just second nature, especially when you realize you can just slide along walls hahah, I think that's pretty key to traversing those games. He just could not get the hang of it and thought I was crazy. Cut to about 8 years later and he all of a sudden along with a friend of his decided to pick up all those games again. Don't know what it did it but he is a freaking enormous Silent Hill and Resident Evil fan now. In particular Silent Hill 2, easy to understand why. I wonder what changed for him to have such an abrupt new feeling on the games. I feel like he must have developed an appreciation for what they were trying to achieve instead of trying to fight the games for control that would have potentially ruined an immersion and tension that the developers were aiming for.

I love the absolutely strange voice acting in these games. In another other game the voice acting would be awful, but in many ways, it so perfectly sets the tone for these games. Just hearing these people speak is eerie, like Angela...

The graphics though I just have to completely disagree with you on. Silent Hill 2 was way ahead of its time. It always cracked me up when people made a big deal about dynamic lighting and shadows in Doom 3. Silent Hill 2 was doing that on a home console 3 years before that PC game! All the games had great textures and detailed environments too. Made partially possible by the short draw distance what with both fog and darkness.

The story is something difficult to defend, they're more about what you take away from them than anything else. You're right, a lot of times they could definitely be described as overly cryptic, but that just lends itself to the mystery of Silent Hill. I'm not really in search of answers with this series...

@Vitor:

Really? I remember, especially with SH1, looking at the screenshots and thinking how underwhelming the graphics were compared to Resident Evil 2 or Metal Gear Solid.

@solarisdeschain:

Obtuse might be the wrong word, but it's late and I'm tired. I understood the stories in Silent Hill, I actually wrote quite a lot of fan fiction that delved deep into the mythos. That said, said story and mythos were hardly accessible in the series. SH1 especially relied a little too heavily on that Lynchian styled storytelling which left a lot for you to "figure out" in your head. When you unravel it all, you find it's actually a pretty flat, almost generic horror story.

@dezvous:

It's actually one of my favorite series. I just think it's put on a pedestal that it may not necessarily deserve. It's a heavily imperfect series, and should be treated as such.

@dezvous: Read what I said closer. In terms of the fleshy monsters rusty walls aesthetic, there are others doing that now and better. But no one is really doing this Lynchian style of focus on aberrant behavior, memory gaps, and full on strangeness. The last two Silent Hill games produced by Tomm Hullet have become less horrifying, but far more strange.

@allworkandlowpay: You need to look again. Silent Hill 1 did some absolutely incredible things with lighting that I didn't even know a Playstation 1 was capable of. Silent Hill 2 itself was a showpiece.

@Psykhophear: The Japanese are not magically delicious and know 'true horror' better than others. And Downpour is a full on modern day clone of old survival horror. The only thing missing is the tank controls.

@dezvous: The combat in Homecoming is black-and-white; either you know the timing or exploit that lets you kill the monster without being touched, or it's going to be a miserable day. Nurses and dogs need to be rushed with the knife and stunlocked until they die, needlers you have to wait for a very specific sound they make and then dodge and heavy attack. The scythe monsters you meet in the TV station can be stunlocked if you use the fire axe's heavy attack at a very specific distance, and then just keep hitting them with it until they die. If they come in a group of two, you need to use the shotgun on one quick and then switch to the fire axe. The smog chest monsters, just stay away and use the pistol. (If you can't tell, I got the full 1000 points in Homecoming. It was my first S-Rank XD)

@allworkandlowpay: Obviously the things you deem imperfect others find very nearly perfect. It has faults, but heavily imperfect doesn't seem close to describing it. The series as a whole? Sure, but 1-3 like we were talking about, I don't think so. Also, comparing the graphics to Resident Evil 2 is crazy since they use pre-rendered backgrounds and MGS doesn't have dynamic lighting like Silent Hill does. Dynamic lighting takes an incredible toll on performance, even without dynamic shadows. Environment dynamic lighting wouldn't be possible in RE either because of those pre-rendered backgrounds.

@Brodehouse: No, I got what you said, I can't think of anything that does fleshy monsters and a Silent Hill style rusty walls aesthetic. I'm not being difficult, I would love to know what you're thinking of. That's interesting about the Homecoming combat... it also seems kind of bad. Did they intend for that kind of thing, I noticed you talked about exploits? Props to you for getting the 1000 points though.

@Brodehouse said:

What I like about the last two Silent Hills is a move to more Lynchian mystery and adult horror over fleshy rusty bloody industrial chung chung. Not that it's bad at all, but it's been done and there are other people doing that specific thing better. But no one is doing that investigation into aberrant behavior or the sad stuff we tend to ignore or gloss over because it's uncomfortable. Shattered Memories is maybe the best investigation into complicated grief I've ever seen.

You just sold me on Downpour with the word Lynchian. I must now play this game. Thank you.

@Psykhophear said:

Honestly, Silent Hill has been declining in terms of quality after the release of 4: The Room, when the original Team Silent disbanded. The newer games after 4 had their moments but they weren't as good as they should be. Western developers don't understand true horror. They don't know how to handle Silent Hill games. They tend to focus more on gameplay and graphics than on story and actual horror. Silent Hill is all about disturbing moments and horrific scenes and Origins, Homecoming, and Shattered Memories are not scary at all.

I still need to play Downpour but from what I've seen and heard, it's an ok game and nothing special. The only way to revitalize the Silent Hill franchise is for Konami to create a brand new division dedicated to only making Silent Hill games and not outsiders. I trust only the Japanese to work on scary games.

I hate this dumb meme that somehow won't die despite being completely 100% wrong. There was no "original" Team Silent that disbanded. Team Silent was just a name given to the developers Konami assigned to work on each project, they were never the same people. The only person that worked on all four of the first four games was Akira Yamaoka.

@solarisdeschain said:

@Psykhophear said:

Honestly, Silent Hill has been declining in terms of quality after the release of 4: The Room, when the original Team Silent disbanded. The newer games after 4 had their moments but they weren't as good as they should be. Western developers don't understand true horror. They don't know how to handle Silent Hill games. They tend to focus more on gameplay and graphics than on story and actual horror. Silent Hill is all about disturbing moments and horrific scenes and Origins, Homecoming, and Shattered Memories are not scary at all.

I still need to play Downpour but from what I've seen and heard, it's an ok game and nothing special. The only way to revitalize the Silent Hill franchise is for Konami to create a brand new division dedicated to only making Silent Hill games and not outsiders. I trust only the Japanese to work on scary games.

I hate this dumb meme that somehow won't die despite being completely 100% wrong. There was no "original" Team Silent that disbanded. Team Silent was just a name given to the developers Konami assigned to work on each project, they were never the same people. The only person that worked on all four of the first four games was Akira Yamaoka.

I have to disagree with you on that. It's true that Akira Yamaoka was heavily involved with Silent Hill from the very beginning but there were other Konami employees that were just as involved as Yamaoka as well like Masahiro Ito (Art Director of SH 2 & 3 and creator of Pyramid Head), Takayoshi Sato (CGI Creator of 1 & 2), Hiroyuki Owaku (Scenario Writer of 2 & 3) and many more. They may only had contributed one or two games in the original tetralogy series but Silent Hill wouldn't be what it is today if it weren't for the collaboration of these creative personnel. Akira only handled the sound and music, not the visual part of it but even so, he and the other members played an important role as the guiding vision to Silent Hill.

Majority of the criticisms mention the same thing; the new Silent Hill games are bad story-wise and gameplay-wise but the music is terrific. That says a lot. If one of the writers were to stick with Akira after 4: The Room, the sequels might've turned out differently.

It's just like Resident Evil and Ninja Gaiden. The first few games are instant classics but when creators Shinji Mikami and Tomonobu Itagaki left their respective franchises, the sequels hit a few snags (eg. Resident Evil 5 and Ninja Gaiden 3) and met with mixed reception. Thankfully, the people who worked on the previous games are still involved with the series and have since managed to keep the heart and soul of Resident Evil and Ninja Gaiden intact.

Like I said before, Konami should really consider working on new Silent Hill games internally from now on. Some of the original Team Silent members are still with the company. They should regroup, get some new and trustworthy employees and become the new Team Silent.

Yeah Solaris, you seem to be on a crusade to get rid of the Team Silent moniker but it exists for a reason. There is a significant cross over between those original games to warrant the use of the Team Silent name that refers to both the developers who worked on those games and an inherent quality lost since everyone left. I don't know what you gain by having people no longer refer to Team Silent, and in case you didn't notice, he never said all the people from those original games worked on every game.

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

yea, those games had incredible graphics when they came out. i dunno where you're going with that statement

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

You're a moron

@xaLieNxGrEyx said:

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

You're a moron

pot meet kettle.

@fuzzypumpkin said:

@allworkandlowpay said:

Silent Hill lives in a weird nebulous void of unwarranted fandom and nostalgia. SH1-3 the controls sucked, the camera control was miserable, the actor was horrendous, the combat was broken, the graphics were sub-par and the stories were poorly translated and often laughably obtuse.

And yet it's everybodies favorite staple horror series.

yea, those games had incredible graphics when they came out. i dunno where you're going with that statement

I'm not saying the graphics were bad, but they weren't really that great. Silent Hill 2 definitely looked good, as did 3, but other games at the time looked better (hence sub par.) Silent Hill 1, I still stand by my statement, looked horrid. You can keep the lighting, give me textures that aren't muddy and a view distance beyond two feet. Resident Evil 2 and Metal Gear Solid, both games that preceded this game, looked FAR better.

@allworkandlowpay:

So you admit you're a moron?

As you should Silent Hill 2 is one of the greatest games ever made, there's nothing wrong with its design and it's still very playable today.

It also has one of the best story's in gaming and if you just don't get it you just don't get it. Don't come in here saying it's "nostalgia" it';s nothing of the sort.

I would get into every reason why you're wrong but it's just not worth it. If that's how you feel go play Halo or something, SH2 is designed to perfection and every aspect of that design was intentional. There's nothing wrong with the camera angles, your radio warns you when there's enemies near, and the combat is fully functional and works to create tension.

It's as good as the day it was released, and it will forever be one of the best games of all time. If it's something you don't want to accept maybe psychological horror isn't your ally, or maybe Silent Hill just isn't your thing.

Saying SH2 is poor with today's standards is ignorant and silly and you should feel bad, and yes, it's more ignorant than me calling out your opinion. Good day to you sir.

@xaLieNxGrEyx said:

@allworkandlowpay:

So you admit you're a moron?

As you should Silent Hill 2 is one of the greatest games ever made, there's nothing wrong with its design and it's still very playable today.

It also has one of the best story's in gaming and if you just don't get it you just don't get it. Don't come in here saying it's "nostalgia" it';s nothing of the sort.

I would get into every reason why you're wrong but it's just not worth it. If that's how you feel go play Halo or something, SH2 is designed to perfection and every aspect of that design was intentional. There's nothing wrong with the camera angles, your radio warns you when there's enemies near, and the combat is fully functional and works to create tension.

It's as good as the day it was released, and it will forever be one of the best games of all time. If it's something you don't want to accept maybe psychological horror isn't your ally, or maybe Silent Hill just isn't your thing.

Saying SH2 is poor with today's standards is ignorant and silly and you should feel bad, and yes, it's more ignorant than me calling out your opinion. Good day to you sir.

No, I'm saying you are a moron, calling another person a moron.

There is also plenty wrong with Silent Hill 2. It's story is hardly one of the best stories out there in the medium, it was great for it's time, but it really wasn't that special when you look at the grand scope of it. It's really "easy" to get, once you unravel all the unnecessarily convoluted storytelling. It is nostalgia, and you are blinding by it. But I'd expect nothing less.

It's also plagued with design problems. Every Silent Hill game was. Hell, all you have to do is look at most of the critical reception at the time to see that. That common issues that still plague the series today was present in SH2 - horrid voice acting, clunky controls, boring and clumsy combat, etc. The same things the series excels at today were present as well - excellent atmosphere, unique storytelling and oppressively immersive sound design.

Also, btw, Silent Hill is my favorite horror series, I've played all of them, I've written countless fan-fictions at one point that delve deep into the mythos. I've dived into literally hundreds of hours into finding every little piece of information about the world. I even helped collaborate on an expansive timeline at one point in the past. The series is still mired in many technical flaws.

Also, you are moron.

anyone play the hd collection? how's the new voice acting?

@allworkandlowpay:

The pot calling the kettle black implies that both party's are "black" which in this case makes both of us "morons"

congrats

@killacam said:

anyone play the hd collection? how's the new voice acting?

Seems fine. But I've only been playing with the new voices so I can't make a good comparison. They allow you to change to new voices or old voice whenever you start up the game so you can always switch back if you don't like it.

@xaLieNxGrEyx said:

@allworkandlowpay:

The pot calling the kettle black implies that both party's are "black" which in this case makes both of us "morons"

congrats

Actually no:

The phrase "The pot calling the kettle black" is an idiom used to accuse a person guilty of the very thing of which they accuse another. This may or may not be hypocritical or a contradiction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pot_calling_the_kettle_black

congrats.

So the HD Collection seems like a bit of a bummer... First of all, the new voices for SH2 don't actually sound half bad. I'm not sure if I'm okay with them because the original voices are still on the disc and that's what I play with anyways but I didn't find them too offensive at all. On the other hand, Silent Hill 3's Heather does not sound good at all. I really loved her original voice acting, now she sounds like the kind of girl I would detest.

Shattered Memories is a brilliant game, and I'm sad that a lot of Silent Hill fans regard it as crap. I don't get the hate for it, other than them expecting/wanting it to be just like Silent Hill 1, when it is clearly not meant to be.

@Seroth said:

Shattered Memories is a brilliant game, and I'm sad that a lot of Silent Hill fans regard it as crap. I don't get the hate for it, other than them expecting/wanting it to be just like Silent Hill 1, when it is clearly not meant to be.

I think Shattered Memories was one of the best games they've made so far.

Do you need to play any previous games to understand and enjoy Downpour?

Think other Japanese survival horror games are more underrated but hard for me to think it's underrated when SH2 & Shattered Memories are the only ones I thought were good at gameplay & horror. Something about most of the others just didn't work for me (only played a bit of SH1 so not counting that one at good or bad).

@allworkandlowpay said:

@xaLieNxGrEyx said:

@allworkandlowpay:

The pot calling the kettle black implies that both party's are "black" which in this case makes both of us "morons"

congrats

Actually no:

The phrase "The pot calling the kettle black" is an idiom used to accuse a person guilty of the very thing of which they accuse another. This may or may not be hypocritical or a contradiction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pot_calling_the_kettle_black

congrats.

Edit: Never mind. I totally misread what you were saying.

Sorry.

@Soapy86 said:

Do you need to play any previous games to understand and enjoy Downpour?

Doesn't seem like it. Most SH games are pretty self contained stories to begin with. SH3 is kind of a sequel to 1 I suppose. But I never played 1 and understood everything that happened in 3 just fine. Well, as much as it is possible to decipher a Silent Hill game... they're a little obtuse sometimes.

@TentPole said:

@allworkandlowpay said:

@xaLieNxGrEyx said:

@allworkandlowpay:

The pot calling the kettle black implies that both party's are "black" which in this case makes both of us "morons"

congrats

Actually no:

The phrase "The pot calling the kettle black" is an idiom used to accuse a person guilty of the very thing of which they accuse another. This may or may not be hypocritical or a contradiction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pot_calling_the_kettle_black

congrats.

Edit: Never mind. I totally misread what you were saying.

Sorry.

You were right, it's a saying used to accuse to guilty party's

I just want to jump in and voice my genuine love for Homecoming. I thought the story was pretty great. I don't know if spoilers are acceptable here, but there's a point with a major decision with your mother that I truly agonized over and emotionally invested in. I also found the combat quite serviceable for a series that largely emphasizes running away.

@Brodehouse This was one of my earlier and definitely one of my proudest (of few) S-ranks, so I feel you there bro. :)