First and foremost I have to tell you that I haven’t played these games. Therefore you can totally Ignore my opinions and call me a dump bitch. But to my benefit I have watched tons of Silent Hill Let’s Plays from different players and done my research story wise. I haven’t gone to the Forums but that is only because I’m too lazy to do it. And there are some pretty damn clear explanations out there that do explain what is happening during the story.
This is not
a regular review and there are no spoilers. Let’s start.
Most of
people agree that Silent Hill 2 is the best in the series. I think everybody
agree that the first three are the best in the series. A lot of fans include
the fourth one in the best of list. As I haven’t actually played any of them my
opinion has a great disadvantage; there is no way I can ever feel the true
ambiance of the game. I do believe that I would agree with you if I had played
it and truly experienced the intense ambiance of the second game. But alas, I am a coward.
But in
other aspects Silent Hill 2, as great it is, it doesn’t quite press the same
buttons as Silent Hill 3. The third one in the series is totally different in
its feel to it but I find it to be more successful. Although the scares and the
gore is right there in your face it still very haunting and unsettling in its
feel.
The music
in the third one is superb. It is absolutely fantastic and definitely the best
one in the series. The music in the first boss is, in my humble opinion, the
best song in the whole Silent Hill history and I love listening to it in my
spare time. It is sounds like the last judgment day and tells us we are all
screwed.
To be fair
Silent Hill is not about creating a solid musical soundtrack but it is about
the silence and the unsettling background sounds. Well we all know that Silent
Hill does this fantastically in all of the games
As a woman
I relate to the protagonist most of the others but I bet the boys still can
relate to her. I think a lot of fans get attracted to her due to her spunk and
attitude. She is still quite the human but she doesn’t take any bs. Unlike the
other protagonists in the series she goes to hell head on and deals with it.
The storyline
is more in your face than in some other games. In the second game I found it a
bit too vague and hard to follow. Ok I had no clue what was going on and had to
read off game what was going on. Also I had to watch plenty of play throughs to
finally really understand what was going on. Yes I might’ve missed a lot of
story elements as I wasn’t the one doing the actual gamin -bit but the other
games didn’t require as much research. Ok the fourth one was even more
mystical. Call me stupid, call me slow but
it is very difficult hard to put things together when I’m shitting my pants.
Ok, so the
subtle things won’t translate to a watcher as well as to the player. Perhaps
that is why I find the gore and the absolutely hirendious monsters very
unseteling and scary. About half of the game is spent in the other world which
is done extremely well. I think it is the best other world in the whole series.
One of the
main themes in Silent Hill is the contrast between the ‘safe’ normal world and
the hellish otherworld. The other world is almost like one of the main
characters, it is one of the core elements of the whole series. You all know
this and love Silent Hill for that very reason; it is not only the living
humans that play a key role but also the whole town, your own surroundings gets
its own breath of life and does everything to haunt you. I guess the town in
the second game is worse, since it does have a will of its own. In the other
games it is the cult that brings the hell on earth which is less scary, in a
way.
So I love
the gore, I love the characters, I love the music and I love the storyline. But
there are some crucial elements that bring Silent Hill 3 down and for these
failings it is not the most popular one.
I suppose
as it took completely different interpretation from the predecessor, the fans were
a bit disappointed in the overview of the game. It was not as haunting and
psychological but more mainstreamly blood and darkness focused, it failed the
expectations. I thought it was more true to the original Silent Hill which
should point to its benefit. Then again, who says a game series should always
repeat the same pattern and the directors truly showed that it is not
necessary.
I feel like
Silent Hill 3 is made from two parts. The first part is where the game fails:
it is dragged out and in the end pointless. I suppose the developers wanted to
show how the world changes around the protagonist but they got ever excited.
Perhaps there are different little signs that point out what is to come but I
failed to see them. Expecially the third part of the first portion of the game seems
to me completely arbitrary.
Perhaps I
should’ve done some research about the development of the game. Maybe they run
out of money and time and therefore some bits were left out. That happens too
often in games and leaves them somewhat hollow.
So I
understand why people don’t regard Silent Hill 3 as the best one of the series
but it is that to me. When I think of Silent Hill games, I always think of the
third for it is what represents Hell the best. Nobody would survive in that
distorted world sane or wanting to survive it alive. For that I love the game
and grant it the greatest Silent Hill game -status. Although I know that it is not the
best :)
Pictures were stolen from Google
