Silent Hill

[Marc]

Having played it only once in 2004 (and reloading saves to get the various endings), I distinctly recall feeling 4's story didn't justify the overall low quality of the game. The aspects of 4 which people remember fondly are the same reasons for my longstanding disappointment: The cool stuff deserved to be in a better game.

I remember when "5"/Homecoming was being advertised, and people responded to its clear attempt at emulating RE4 with "Well, it can't help but be better than The Room!." I played through all of Homecoming; and remember having that "oh...no" moment of realization that the game was a turd during the opening Jacob's Ladder "homage" and, subsequently, just how terrible the game felt to control when navigating the first area. It's also the single most egregious and ridiculous retcon of the preceding installments' overarching plot; with the Order now apparently having been founded by two families who have to sacrifice their firstborn (with the Shepherds conspicuously absent in all preceding lore), the Shepherd's Glenn otherworld is somehow the product of Alex not being sacrificed (rather than being uniquely constrained to Alessa and the botched "birth of god" ritual cursing the area of Silent Hill, specifically), and the mandate that Pyramid Head be forced into the story as some mainstay of the series for branding purposes. And who can forget half of the town map being "My House."

And though it's been mentioned ad nauseam: The game being combat-focused due to playing a soldier who is revealed in a twist to have never been a soldier somehow remains the worst instance of the narrative crutch the franchise is most-associated with: "I'm guilty of something, and forgot what it was." It's even worse than The Message; which smugly includes the National Suicide Prevention Hotline and the platitude of "reaching out" as the resolution to its story which only occurs because the National Suicide Prevention Hotline and reaching out not working is what sets the events of the game's "story" in motion (self-absorbed cunt can't even jump off a building right).

Man, am I looking forward to this pile of shit with "Silent Hill 2" written in it with someone's shitty finger.

 

[GeorgeFloydFentanylStash]

Please do it. All four games are worth playing at least once.

2 is among my favorite games. So i’ll have to check out 3 and 4.

 

[Brain Problems]

4 just has a simple, mostly cohesive and thought-out story with a good villain, great visuals, and neat gimmick/twist with the apartment. I think if they hadn't fucked up and made people double back in a shameless attempt to extend the game length rather than just come up with more original locations (and maybe had you double back on like one or two spots), and tightened some of the other questionable design choices, people would call it one of the greats without question.

The fact that it's still so superior to the western garbage that they shat out afterward says a lot.

 

[Marc]

It isn't just that they forced you to replay the first half of the game - It's that the second half of the game adds insult to injury by being an escort mission. 2 subverted the escort mission trope by having it serve the thematic purpose of James using it to punish himself, and using it sparingly. 4 straight up used it and the backtracking as a pair of crutches to pad out the second half of the game by slowing it until all momentum was lost. Cool moments such as the big Eileen head and Walter chasing you with guns and chainsaws weren't enough to distract me from what a slog you could tell the game was going to be up to the boss fight ending (which itself is crappy; because the good ending is dependent upon finishing it within the time limit).

The first half of my 4 playthrough was "This is spooky and cool." The second half was repeated sighs of "Am I at the end, yet? I need to make sure to save before the last room; because I don't want to replay any of this bullshit." Finishing Homecoming made me wish I had replayed 4, instead of wasting my time slogging through a series of rooms just to hear new Yamaoka tracks.

 

[Brain Problems]

It isn't just that they forced you to replay the first half of the game - It's that the second half of the game adds insult to injury by being an escort mission. 2 subverted the escort mission trope by having it serve the thematic purpose of James using it to punish himself, and using it sparingly. 4 straight up used it and the backtracking as a pair of crutches to pad out the second half of the game by slowing it until all momentum was lost. Cool moments such as the big Eileen head and Walter chasing you with guns and chainsaws weren't enough to distract me from what a slog you could tell the game was going to be up to the boss fight ending (which itself is crappy; because the good ending is dependent upon finishing it within the time limit).

The first half of my 4 playthrough was "This is spooky and cool." The second half was repeated sighs of "Am I at the end, yet? I need to make sure to save before the last room; because I don't want to replay any of this bullshit." Finishing Homecoming made me wish I had replayed 4, instead of wasting my time slogging through a series of rooms just to hear new Yamaoka tracks.

The escort stuff sucked I agree but at least Eileen was invincible and (depending on your actions) either healable without an issue before the final fight or whatever, here's your ending. The added thematic stuff of her sounding crazier the more beat up/possessed she gets is a nice treat. That's the issue with 4, so many great ideas

Spoiler

I still think about how brilliant the hidden apartment room is

but so many half-baked/poor game design choices that kneecap what would otherwise be a a Great game.

 

[Action Orange]

The escort stuff sucked I agree but at least Eileen was invincible and (depending on your actions) either healable without an issue before the final fight or whatever, here's your ending.

if you're talking about the "heal Eileen with the holy candles right before the final boss" trick, that shit is actually a straight up urban legend, as I found out the hard way on my first SH4 run. The holy candles only heal her temporarily, and going into the final boss resets her possession level automatically.

In general, the way the game handles Eileen is so incredibly stupid. The only way to actually heal Eileen's posession level is to do room transitions over and over without her getting damaged, and that only heals a tiny amount(the amount that room transitions heal even goes down as the game progresses!). It takes forever! I've included a short youtube video where someone did a bunch of testing to figure this cryptic shit out.

SH4 has some good ideas, true, but that game seems to actively want me to hate it.

 

[Lone MacReady II]

Silent hill 4 has the best story in the entire series when not counting silent hill 2. It doesn’t get enough credit for that.

Walter is a very interesting villain (actually referenced in SH2). The deeper you dig into his story, the more you learn about him the more you realize he may just be possessed by Valtiel, and the majority of the evil shit that "he" does isn't actually his fault. He was basically like a more twisted male version of Alessa. A "back up plan" that Dahlia created.

 

[Metatron]

In SH4, I love that your apartment, supposed to be your safe haven, gets more and more corrupted and haunted as the game goes on.

However, the ghosts were obnoxiously annoying, and the fact that you had to escort Eileen throughout the second half of the game made the experience rather frustrating.

Also, lol, she doesn't even acknowledge her big ol' head in that one room. Laughed out loud at the eyes when you taser her head.

 

[Marc]

The deeper you dig into his story, the more you learn about him the more you realize he may just be possessed by Valtiel, and the majority of the evil shit that "he" does isn't actually his fault. He was basically like a more twisted male version of Alessa. A "back up plan" that Dahlia created.

This smells of headcanon. I haven't played the game since 2004 - But it smells of headcanon.

 

[Soycast Guy]

Walter is a very interesting villain (actually referenced in SH2). The deeper you dig into his story, the more you learn about him the more you realize he may just be possessed by Valtiel, and the majority of the evil shit that "he" does isn't actually his fault. He was basically like a more twisted male version of Alessa. A "back up plan" that Dahlia created.

He was also circumcised, apparently.

 

[Marc]

Many such cases.

 

[Nameless One]

I forgive SH4 due to its art direction even without Masahiro Ito. It would have been a learning experience for team silent if they weren't disbanded, oh well. I enjoy the way it opened up on Dreams and Nightmares in Silent Hill. I enjoy the way Henry is probably already dead but in a way that isn't so pretentious and handwavy. I'd love for them to have made a game where you play AS a psychic or candidate like Walter or Alessa and make it really fucked up and disturbing. While the level reuse is lazy I think they are my favorite otherworld looks in the series and it makes me wonder about the Texas Chainsaw 1974 and Jacob's Ladder (car chase daytime scene) inspired game with emphasis on shadows they were going to make for the PS3 and 360 era, and then the other game that'd reuse or repurpose SH3's original script.

 

[Brain Problems]

if you're talking about the "heal Eileen with the holy candles right before the final boss" trick, that shit is actually a straight up urban legend, as I found out the hard way on my first SH4 run. The holy candles only heal her temporarily, and going into the final boss resets her possession level automatically.

In general, the way the game handles Eileen is so incredibly stupid. The only way to actually heal Eileen's posession level is to do room transitions over and over without her getting damaged, and that only heals a tiny amount(the amount that room transitions heal even goes down as the game progresses!). It takes forever! I've included a short youtube video where someone did a bunch of testing to figure this cryptic shit out.

SH4 has some good ideas, true, but that game seems to actively want me to hate it.

Interesting. I've played it several times (all on PC, mostly when it came out initially) and I can tell you 100% that I had an Eileen looking like she paid the coal toll right before the boss-fight , dropped the candle in the apartment lobby area, started the fight, and halleluiah, she was back to normal during the walk to the garbage disposal. Unsure if it was a bug or what but it happened and that's all I can say.

Curiously in the world of remakes 4 is a better candidate for it just because it's got a fairly washed out colour palette, tons of janky combat (exploiting max charge wind-up attacks carried me through), and a story that isn't as easy to badly fuck up with Modern Messages, beyond the typical character assassination we've grown to expect.

 

[Marc]

Curiously in the world of remakes 4 is a better candidate

The thing is, modern cash-grab remakes aren't done on the basis of improving anything but quarterly earnings: Crapcom, for example, passed over the RE installment most needing a do-over (Code Veronica) just to sell people the thirteenth version of 4. They even rushed the remake of 3 (cutting content from the original and bundling it with a shit online versus game no one wanted or played to justify the $60 price) just to get to 4.

All Konami knows about Silent Hill is that Pyramid Head is a merchandising mascot for one of the IPs they own; and "debuted" in 2. The only way we're getting a remake of the Room is if Konami can be tricked into thinking Pyramid Head is in it, or if fans remake it in a new engine and keep their fucking mouths shut about their ambitions until after the finished product has been released as a torrent.

 

[Lone MacReady II]

The thing is, modern cash-grab remakes aren't done on the basis of improving anything but quarterly earnings: Crapcom, for example, passed over the RE installment most needing a do-over (Code Veronica) just to sell people the thirteenth version of 4. They even rushed the remake of 3 (cutting content from the original and bundling it with a shit online versus game no one wanted or played to justify the $60 price) just to get to 4.

RE3make absolutely shitting the bed and poisoning my mood is what made me not buy 4. Which is a shame because after RE2make I feel like I finally "got" the appeal of survival horror, conserving ammo and having fun unlocking rooms and exploring the map... but when I finished 3 in a few hours, felt underwhelmed as fuck, then learned about the sheer bevy of content cut from the game I just got disgusted with the whole thing. Capcom is gonna have to work a miracle to get me to buy another one of their "remakes". I have a feeling RE5make (if they even dare to make it) will not only have cut content, but will include a suspiciously high number of new White zombies injected into the sub-saharan hordes of wakanda.

 

[CowPox]

Horror should be role playing not action based games etc.

 

[Action Orange]

Interesting. I've played it several times (all on PC, mostly when it came out initially) and I can tell you 100% that I had an Eileen looking like she paid the coal toll right before the boss-fight , dropped the candle in the apartment lobby area, started the fight, and halleluiah, she was back to normal during the walk to the garbage disposal. Unsure if it was a bug or what but it happened and that's all I can say.

Perhaps the pc version works differently in that regard. Hell, for all I know the ps2 version might be the bugged one. I'm not sure about the version differences between ps2, pc, and xbox. Wouldnt surprise me if there were a bunch of little differences like that that aren't well documented. It does seem like buggy behavior that the candles in the ps2 version heal Eileen, but only temporarily. The only use they have on ps2 is for apartment cleansing. Regardless of what's going on, it's a crying damn shame that sh4 was so rushed. You think you hate gaming execs enough, but you really dont.

 

[Wot Zit Too Yah0996]

Silent hill 4 has the best story in the entire series when not counting silent hill 2. It doesn’t get enough credit for that.

3 and 4 are my favourites. 2 was alright. Eddie is actually more frightening than Pyramid Head, who is overrated. The very first game had the best monster designs to me, but I couldn't get into the game's story all that much.

 

[Nameless One]

Horror should be role playing not action based games etc.

Truth nuke.

 

[GenociderSyo]

Truth nuke.
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That was one of the best games of its time. Especially when it got recalled cause the disks were defectice and would explode in higher rppm cdroms.

Luckily the pc crowd wasnt in contorl when it got the steam treatment.