henke on 20/10/2022 at 06:59
Konami is apparently ready to get back into the games business. No not pachinko games, VIDEO games! With a whooping THREE new Silent Hill games, at least one of these has to turn out good, right?
First off, SH2 remake by Bloober Team, which is causing a lot of consternation on twitter. Personally, I think it'll be fine. Yeah yeah The Medium sucked, but Observer and Blair Witch were good. Not great, good. Bloober provides good craftsmanship, and with SH2 they already have a solid blueprint to work from. I think it'll be fine. IT'LL BE FINE I TELL YA EVERYONE CALM DOWN
[video=youtube;1WEw7jec_mc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WEw7jec_mc[/video]
Second, Silent Hill: Townfall, by No Code. Their previous game Stories Untold was good. This'll likely be a similarly minimalist short horror game. Could be good.
[video=youtube;bpqRBsXP6M0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpqRBsXP6M0[/video]
Lastly, Silent Hill f. This one looks the most intriguing, and quite freaky.
[video=youtube;v3r7QnKutko]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3r7QnKutko[/video]
I should disclaim that the only Silent Hill I've played was SH2 and I merely thought it was "very good" and not "one of the greatest games ever" so I am a FAKE FAN and should not be listened to.
Sulphur on 20/10/2022 at 08:09
You know, you'd think it'd be hard to fuck up Silent Hill 2 given that it's already right there. But somehow, they managed to misread the intent of the game right from its opening moment by making James be a sweaty and nervous wreck in that rest stop. The entire point of that opening was that he was supposed to be pensive and quizzical over what he thought was happening, not immediately suffering from a goddamn coronary at the idea of it.
Looks great, has all the subtlety of a hammer to the face. Bloober, same as they ever were.
f and Townfall look way more interesting to me. I was mixed on Observation, but No Code have great potential as a dev house.
Thirith on 20/10/2022 at 09:00
I've only played Silent Hill 3 and some of that Wii game (which seemed cool enough, no pun intended, but I just didn't continue at the time for some reason). It'd be a shame to play SH2 first in a version stripped of nuance and subtlety, so I'm hoping that your initial impression won't be symptomatic of the whole game, Sulphur.
A Silent Hill by the team that did Stories Untold sounds potentially fascinating. I'm definitely there for that.
henke on 20/10/2022 at 09:16
Quote Posted by Sulphur
You know, you'd think it'd be hard to fuck up Silent Hill 2 given that it's already right there. But somehow, they managed to misread the intent of the game right from its opening moment by making James be a sweaty and nervous wreck in that rest stop. The entire point of that opening was that he was supposed to be pensive and quizzical over what he thought was happening, not immediately suffering from a goddamn coronary at the idea of it.
Good point! I didn't think about it, but that does seem like it should be a scene from the middle of the game, rather than the start. Hmm, I wonder if this is an indication they're adding new content set
before start of the original game? So James would've already seen some shit by the time he gets to the rest stop?
Starker on 20/10/2022 at 09:16
With James's character all you need to know about him at the beginning is what he tells Angela when she warns him the town is dangerous. "No, I believe you. It's just... I guess I really don't care if it's dangerous or not. I'm going to town either way."
Sigh... I'm already dreading how they will massacre my boy.
Sulphur on 20/10/2022 at 09:36
Quote Posted by henke
Good point! I didn't think about it, but that does seem like it should be a scene from the middle of the game, rather than the start. Hmm, I wonder if this is an indication they're adding new content set
before start of the original game? So James would've already seen some shit by the time he gets to the rest stop?
It really shouldn't be necessary, because the structure of the game necessitates that you know very little about James from the outset so he can, at least initially, function as a quasi-surrogate for you, the player. It's one of the very smart things SH2 does, so changing it around would be making things unnecessarily difficult for you as the developer. And Starker makes a very good point about the same thing.
@Thirith, if you're a fan of horror games, and I know you are, please consider getting yourself a copy of the original SH2 and install the enhanced edition mod from (
https://enhanced.townofsilenthill.com/SH2/) here. Its age makes it creaky in the gameplay department, but I'd say it's a game that still looks good and is worth some irritation anyway because of the overall experience. Or, failing the PC release route, the PS2 version emulates very well these days if you're up for some spelunking into that side of town.
I have very little faith in Bloober pulling this off, because their idea of horror tends to lie on the shallow end of the spectrum where jump scares and tedious environmental navigation reign. It's not an invalid approach (if done right, anyway), but it's definitely not the same ethos that SH was born from.
ZylonBane on 20/10/2022 at 12:24
Quote Posted by Sulphur
I have very little faith in Bloober pulling this off, because their idea of horror tends to lie on the shallow end of the spectrum where jump scares and tedious environmental navigation reign.
90% of SH2 is tedious environmental navigation, so it's not like they can make SH2 much worse in that regard.
Sulphur on 20/10/2022 at 13:03
You never disappoint, Zeebs. One could argue that all survival horror has tedious navigation built in as a genre requirement, but a key difference is Bloober has rarely had 'survival' as part of their genre template, so instead of tension informing the clunkiness, you get endless repetitive sequences to trudge through with some stock crying baby and scream sound effects thrown in for good measure.
ZylonBane on 20/10/2022 at 13:50
Right, yeah, you're still describing SH2.
Sulphur on 20/10/2022 at 13:58
Sure. And System Shock 2's just a series of blocked paths and inventory management in the way of having a cyberspace dance-off with Shodan. To each their own.