I literally already predicted this from the shitty white goblet in the trailer and the notion of the students tripping balls or being drugged against their will just like the events of SH1. But unlike SILENT HILL its an entirely different concept and its like saying the mistaken barbed wire motif from the movie in these dogshit monster designs and fog carryovers make it connected. No you're just doing free damage control. If you read Higurashi you'd know hes just redoing concepts he already did down to the friend group itself. The way the town suffered in SH1 from drug epidemic was a parallel to the literal fucking Cocaine epidemic and general crooked American and Jap drug trade. Just because there's a substance like white claudia and fog won't make this a worthy silent hill entry.
People keep saying that there's no connection to the other Silent Hill titles but that's not true, it's actually a pretty big part of the plotline in NG+.
It's the pills. The pills are made with the seeds from a flower non-native to Japan, brought over from overseas in the 1770s. At Shu's house these flowers bloom around a pond in his backyard, these flowers are white trumpets. White trumpet flowers that bloom around bodies of water are known as White Claudia in Silent Hill, they are a mild hallucinogetic with the main draw being euphoria. It's sold to visiting tourists, etc etc etc
In the plot, the day Hinako is informed of her arranged marriage, Shu gives Hinako a box of these pills to help with her tension headaches. In the Coming Home to Roost ending, Hinako becomes addicted to these pills, she self-medicates to deal with her circumstances. When she's in her mid-20s, on her wedding day, she ODs on these and beats the shit out of everyone at the wedding reception (while wearing a wedding dress, no less. Yass kween slay!) with a metal pipe in drug-induced psychosis before stumbling home and killing her parents.
Look at the final boss. None of the monsters have a necessary Fracis Bacon distortion to them which is a missed opportunity. Even 4 had that without the artist.
There is no SILENT HILL without Francis Bacon monsters and environment design to suit them. The environment and otherworld is as much a character as the main cast.
I can't believe most fans still don't notice but just Psych Horror is not the main draw and of SILENT HILL. It isn't the defining factor. The defining factors are the art, music which Akira can't do right anymore (sh soundtracks have been shit and 4 was his last decent work), characters, themes and story. The extra layer is the cult. Yes, SILENT HILL absolutely needs the cult aspect to work. It defined even 2 even though it's not the main focus. Pyamid Head wouldn't EXIST without the historical society painting. Which was resembling the CULT executioners performing a ritual in red hoods.
This is what separates the games from anything else. There's really nothing like it in terms of using Francis Bacon and numerous horror works as a backdrop for aesthetics while meaningfully tying it to characters.
Silent Hill nowadays would have a basic bitch concept of an alcoholic having actual beer monsters form instead of monsters symbolic of the suffering, desparation and temptation they go through. Beyond that they don't understand how Monsters are even made.
White Claudia influenced aspects of the Hellish otherworld look and feel in 1 and its why there are so many bottles around the segments, with the main theme being Alessa's torment and nightmare seeping into reality as described more clearly in the novelization. In 1 there are 3 layers to the town. Reality, the dream, and Alessa's Nightmare (the otherworld). They overlap.
2 follows a similar idea but with reality itself being a distorted dream or nightmare, with the otherworld being more unique to James and overlaps with Eddie and Angela's delusions.
3 has Heather in a similar role to Alessa in 1, finally carrying the cult's God and as a result reality CAN SHIFT at any moment, making the journey Hell for her. 3 begins with a dream sequence like 1 did but doesn't have much meaning in the game vs the novel.
Most of 4 IS in a dream. A unique dream too, from a dead man who completed a taboo ritual to begin his final ritual and resurrection. Reality itself bends to his will and his victims haunt his dreamscape. The gamrplay sucks but the premise is one to write home about in terms of how it was initially a spinoff but meaningfully tied to the cult and expanded it with the orphanage in the final game. The Otherworld functions as the repeat levels, harder and also with tougher and bloodier grotesque enemies just like the first 3 games. (though in 2 it was just the nurses who visibly got more fucked up in the otherworld).
There is no meaningful transition anymore in the games especially since their influence is polluted with 2006 era Silent Hill logic. Reality shifts without cause other than a retarded Phenomenon now.
There are no bloodier/tougher enemies by the end to spice things up and make a use for the resources you collect. There is no survival horror, there is no horror influence that MAKES a silent hill game what they were. It's gone.
Is it the ship of theseus if they don't even utilize the original parts or is it a pale, botched imitation that resembles another ship instead?
The characters are hardcore stereotypes and the game begins with a typical abusive Jap alcoholic father who beats his wife and daughter. We could have had a unique cast like SIREN 1, with so many diverse outcasts, religious people, teachers and students in the story to fully show off 1960s Japan.
Instead we get basic bitch elements and instead of cutscenes to introduce the characters properly we get story journals like an action adventure game or rpg character bio. This is not SILENT HILL already. Why do you have a journal when SH games always establish characters first and foremost? Laziness. Heather was so expressive, even 4's dull opening cast had more expression than this game does with Cynthia's "favor". The UI is shittier than SH2 remake with no option to turn off the retarded red vignette at low health despite them having low health animations. It's a game for kids, or "everyone", not for adults like us.
If you need a character bio in a "horror" game you've already failed storywise.
Aside from SIREN 1 and 2, BAROQUE is probably the closest in feel to SILENT HILL games may ever get.
![LinkinParkxNaruto[AMV]](http://uploads.kiwifarms.st/data/avatars/l/61/61177.jpg?1699571951){kind=avatar}
of Silent Hill, unaware that all the shitty non-Konami SH games are made by people who think like they do. They're the fucking worst.
![:\](/styles/custom/emotes/svg/chris-confused.svg "Confused :\")