Silent Hill

Overview

"In my restless dreams,
I see that town.
Silent Hill.
You promised you'd take me
there again someday.
But you never did.

Well I'm alone there now...
In our 'special place'...
Waiting for you."  

Silent Hill is the town where most of the Silent Hill games (as well as the Silent Hill movie) take place. This city is said to have been a sacred place at one point, but terrible events in its past ruined and degraded it, reducing it to something evil and corrupt. Rather than simply being inhabited by horrid creatures, however, the Silent Hill games give the impression that the player is fighting the town itself, as opposed to just the entities in it. Generally, the creatures in every Silent Hill game are different in appearance and qualities, and reflect aspects of the player's character (their unconscious, memories, fears, desires, etc.) This prompts the idea that the town has a sort of intelligence, and that it crafts what the characters see and the horrors they face based on their inner self. Therefore, every person would experience a different Silent Hill.

The player's experience in Silent Hill is typically divided into three sections. The first is the normal town, where the residents go about their daily affairs. This version is not accessible to the player at any point, but rather depicted in the storyline before the game begins. The second phase is the fog-covered town, which focuses on building tension and atmosphere and where monsters creep around covertly. The third is the "Otherworld," a deformed version of the real Silent Hill, a hellish mirror image of the original town. This is the origin of the creatures that plague the player. There have been cases of the dimensions collapsing into each other, causing a confusing, irrational space called "Nowhere."

It also seems that the power of Silent Hill is growing. In Silent Hill 4: The Room, Henry Townshend is taken in by Silent Hill's power, even though he lives in South Ashfield, a town reportedly half a day's drive away. Similarly, in Silent Hill 3 Heather is taken into the Otherworld in a mall far from Silent Hill.

Location

Not much is known about the town itself; even the location is disputed, since a lot of conflicting information has been presented. In the guide it is stated as being set in New England, but Silent Hill is located near Toluca Lake, and the only real lake of that name is in California. In the Japanese release of Silent Hill 4, an address is given to a strip club visited in previous game which is located in Maine.