Silent Hill 2 is the peak of horror games

[Lotus Victoria]

Greetings, champions. Good to see you all.

So, I've been playing a lot of atmospheric horror-like games. I'm a sucker for any media that can create an incredible, believable atmosphere - thus, my favourite PC games are Deus Ex and Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines.

I'm currently playing Silent Hill 2 - because I've heard a lot of things about it. I finished Silent Hill 4 before, and never got that much into the franchise, mainly because of the controls. But as I grow older, I'm starting to ignore such things in the name of the greater experience. And boy, oh boy. What an incredible game.

What separates Silent Hill 2 from other horror games is the various themes that it depicts - depression, rape, murder, suicide, etc. But they're all integrated into the story in a very subtle way - if you don't pay attention to the story and symbolism, you'll likely miss some, if not all, of the most interesting aspects of it. The characters are not charismatic, but they're very realistic, and their stories depict what horrors they've must have suffered and why they are attracted to Silent Hill.

Story aside, the game creates an incredible opressive atmosphere - You can defend yourself (pretty easily, in fact) - but you'll always feel opressed, no matter how powerful your weapon at hand is. This contradicts current horror games, that force you to run, run, and run. The use of sounds, ambient noise and other things contribute to this amazing feeling that you're just a small worm with no chance of leaving the city.

The music in this game is so...Ugh! I want to hug Akira Yamaoka - what a talented man! Most of the music on horror games are either violin noises or long strings of piano/other instruments (Take this one as an example) - and that usually does the job pretty well. But nothing, nothing compares to the hellish sounds of Silent Hill 2. The franchise is well known for having amazing songs, but I'm dead serious - When something like this can make you feel terrified and empty at the same time, while still being a memorable song, you know that you've hit the top of the genre.

So, I've been thinking: We got a bunch of great horror games nowadays. The obligatory Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Outlast, Alien: Isolation, and recently, Resident Evil 7 are some good examples - They're all great games, 9/10 material. But...they lack something. Either is complexity, atmosphere or a good story, these games just focus on scaring you - and hey, that's great! That's what a horror game should do it's player. But...

I still think that Silent Hill 2 is the peak of horror games. The story is intelligent, creepy, disturbing and subtle, the voice acting is purposefully bad (you can read that on some interviews) to make you feel unconfortable, the music is creepy, memorable and frightening, the characters are complex, and very real, and the atmosphere hits all the freaking notes, both with it's symbolism, and with the presentation.

To end my topic - As I've said before, I'm still finishing Silent Hill 2, and maybe you must be thinking "well, you're still hyped for it, so that's why you think that it is the peak of horror games" - but no. I've heard a lot of praise for Silent Hill 2, and that's why I'm playing it - to confirm if it's true or not, and I'm happy to say that it is indeed true. Silent Hill 2, for me and many other people, is the peak of horror games, and it'll probably never be surpassed. An horror game should try to achieve more things than just the scare factor, and this game does that pretty fucking well.

TL/DR: Silent Hill 2 is great because of stuff. If you like horror games, play it. If you like great stories, play it. If you like great atmospheres, play it. If you like all three, you probably have already played it.

[lawow74]

Silent Hill 2 is what cemented the franchise and defined it in ways the others just haven't been able to live up to, IME. Calling it the peak of all horror games might be a stretch, but it's definitely a defining game in the genre, and at least IMO the best of its series ever made.

[dope_danny]

I've been playing the Silent Hill games since the first came out and i was far too young to be playing it and SH2 is fantastic, but its also part of the reason the series went to shit. The story of Silent Hill is a very clear story about a spirit place inspired by 'thinnies' from the works of Stephen King (because they had to pull in the draw distance so far to get the engine to run they decided to call it fog) and in the town exists a drug peddling cult.
A woman in the cult happens to have a daughter with psychic powers, they try a ritual to use her to birth their god into the world but in a psychic outcry the girl starts a fire and burns the house down. Then shes kept barely alive, suffering from 4th degree burns in a secret hospital basement where she is losing her mind, splits her soul in two so some part of her can escape and find peace and also stop the ritual occurring again and succumbs to a coma.
THEN the guy who found and raised her other half comes close enough when driving down a highway years later for her halves to recombine, the cult starts the rituals again and harry looks for a daughter who no longer exists and discovers that in that time Alessa lost her mind and her childish nightmare interpretations of what happened to her are using the towns own power to twist it like oil in a puddle of water and her nightmares are overwriting reality. Bugs, dogs, birds, hospital staff and so on twisted into monsters by the warped recollection of a tortured little girls broken mind. Harry stops them and escapes with a new baby and thats that till SH3 and SH4 touch on it again.

But 2, much as i dearly love it, is basically a straight riff on films like jacobs ladder and Solaris. It has nothing to do with the first beyond being set in the same town, only now for some reason its bringing everyones inner fears to life not Alessas. Which was fine, it told a neat story and the experience is fantastic.

Buuuuut it should have ended there, unfortunately people like Tom Hullet who became the defacto project leader after konami took development to the west was so smitten with 2 he decided "i am the living bible of silent hill and the cult shit was boring and needlessly convoluted" when the whole crux of the story is a cult abused a girl and payed for it with the most extreme consequences. Now instead Silent Hill took a hard right into being a magic therapist town that exclusively lures in amnesiacs to go through a purgatory experience till they admit and confront some conveniently forgotten plot hook that often due to bad writing never made sense. Again and again and again.

This continued into all future media like the comics, mobile games, novelisations and so on. Silent Hill is just a wierd town that acts as a magical therapy session because thats what Silent Hill 2 did. It kind of retro actively soured a lot of people on 2 purely because it became the defacto way the series was copy pasted from then on. Not unlike Resident Evil 4 really. Fine game but everything after that imitated it in later sequels was trash.

Its kind of sad because it is one of the best horror games ever made. Up there with Fatal Frame, Nanashi No Game, Resident Evil 2, Forbidden Siren and so on. Its just a shame that it was the sole reason the direction of the series became repetitive, homogenised trash that even the creators like Matsuhiro Ito have said 'ruined the story of a small town american cult we were trying to tell'. Mostly because people who dont know any better play it or anything made in the west after and assume 'magical therapy purgatory town' is the story of silent hill. When the story about what the town is, why its a mess and so on is purely contained in the core Cult storyline of 1,3 and 4/The Room.

It lead to a lot of survival horror fansites in the early 2000's basically laughing at how SH2 brought in so many proto emo kid armchair psychologists who were quick to tell you every games every facet was 'a representation of the protagonists sexual frustration' and to this day theres whole wikis set up by them that keep adding to that because SH2's constant imitation has cemented in them the idea that it IS just a magical therapist town and the original story is as pointless as Tom Hullet wanted it to be.


It is an amazing game that unfortunately lead to the ruination of the franchise at the hands of people that loved it too much. But at least its still around for future generations to enjoy in the age of slender em up crouch walk first person haunted house simulators. That notion of "using sex and death to shake the players heart deeply" will hold up long after ageing graphics make games like amnesia look like shallow jokes years from now.

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Not wanting to just be a downer theres some fascinating videos about SH2 because it inspired a lot of things in media as much as it was inspired by things that came before it.



God knows playing Silent Hill then watching Stranger Things shows some obvious influence.

[Lotus Victoria]

Fantastic post! Let me comment on some of your opinions.

It has nothing to do with the first beyond being set in the same town, only now for some reason its bringing everyones inner fears to life not Alessas. Which was fine, it told a neat story and the experience is fantastic.

To be totally honest with you, I kind of like the idea of "Silent Hill" being the only thing that connect the series. It's like Legend of Zelda, Zelda being the only thing that connects one thing to the other. I like the way they tell stories in the franchise (I know most plots because I read a lot about them), so I'm okay with that.

Now instead Silent Hill took a hard right into being a magic therapist town that exclusively lures in amnesiacs to go through a purgatory experience till they admit and confront some conveniently forgotten plot hook that often due to bad writing never made sense. Again and again and again.

This is something that I've heard a lot, and I gotta agree. From all the Silent Hill plots that I've seen, most of them are inspired in SH2, going as far as using SH's symbolism with no context at all. What a shame.

This continued into all future media like the comics, mobile games, novelisations and so on. Silent Hill is just a wierd town that acts as a magical therapy session because thats what Silent Hill 2 did. It kind of retro actively soured a lot of people on 2 purely because it became the defacto way the series was copy pasted from then on. Not unlike Resident Evil 4 really. Fine game but everything after that imitated it in later sequels was trash.

I like the idea of the city teaching a lesson to those who venture into it. It's an interesting premise - but if all stories are the same, as you've said before, it probably gets boring after a while.

Its kind of sad because it is one of the best horror games ever made. Up there with Fatal Frame, Nanashi No Game, Resident Evil 2, Forbidden Siren and so on. Its just a shame that it was the sole reason the direction of the series became repetitive, homogenised trash that even the creators like Matsuhiro Ito have said 'ruined the story of a small town american cult we were trying to tell'. Mostly because people who dont know any better play it or anything made in the west after and assume 'magical therapy purgatory town' is the story of silent hill. When the story about what the town is, why its a mess and so on is purely contained in the core Cult storyline of 1,3 and 4/The Room.

I've read a lot of opinions on this topic. This is a very interesting discussion - some people defend the cult stories, and some defend the "magical therapy purgatory town" story. Both are interesting to me, it all depends on the writing, really. As I've said, I finished SH4's story and it is freaking great, but SH2's story is more intelligent with all its symbolism and stuff. Both are good for me.

It lead to a lot of survival horror fansites in the early 2000's basically laughing at how SH2 brought in so many proto emo kid armchair psychologists who were quick to tell you every games every facet was 'a representation of the protagonists sexual frustration' and to this day theres whole wikis set up by them that keep adding to that because SH2's constant imitation has cemented in them the idea that it IS just a magical therapist town and the original story is as pointless as Tom Hullet wanted it to be.

I'll search for this topic. Seems very interesting.

It is an amazing game that unfortunately lead to the ruination of the franchise at the hands of people that loved it too much. But at least its still around for future generations to enjoy in the age of slender em up crouch walk first person haunted house simulators. That notion of "using sex and death to shake the players heart deeply" will hold up long after ageing graphics make games like amnesia look like shallow jokes years from now.

Yeah! Story aside, SH2's gameplay and atmosphere (the real meat of the game) still hold up incredible well because of the facts that I've said before. Meanwhile, games like Amnesia, Outlast, and Slender are still scary, but for how long? Only time will tell.

Thanks for your reply, mister.

[dope_danny]

This is something that I've heard a lot, and I gotta agree. From all the Silent Hill plots that I've seen, most of them are inspired in SH2, going as far as using SH's symbolism with no context at all. What a shame.

A brief rundown of Post Silent Hill 2 media:
-Silent hill V/Homecoming - an amnesiac soldier goes to silent hill to find his brother but discovers a truth he forgot because reasons
-Silent Hill Origins - a trucker who as forgotten his childhood explores silent hill and discovers a truth he forgot because reasons
-Silent Hill Downpour - a prisoner gets trapped in silent hill and discovers a truth he forgot because reasons
-Silent Hill shattered memories - a man questions his memories as he explores silent hill and a truth that was forgotten gets discovered because reasons
-Silent Hill the arcade - a group of people try to rescue a little girl from the ghost ship on toluca lake and one member discovers a forgotten truth because reasons
-Silent Hill Orphan - 3 people from an orphanage discover 30 years ago something happened they all blacked out, at the end the survivors discover a truth they forgot because reasons
-Silent Hill The Escape - an amnesiac man escapes alchemilla hospital to discover a truth that was forgotten because reasons
-Silent Hill book of memories - a player made character finds a book that lets them alter memories only to discover that someone has been changing theirs. At the end a truth is revealed that they forgot because reasons.

I could go into all the comics but the descriptions will be exactly the same even for the 'original' stories unconnected to games. I'm sure you can see a pattern here. I think V was where i really gave up on hoping for better since working in film/tv media i actually happened to talk with Patrick Doody who wrote it. He told me he had never heard of the series and wanted to 'bring his own take'. Then it was a straight rip of the movie inter-spliced with out and out whole lifted scenes from Hostel. Team Silent was gone and that attention to detail and intent of semiotics and their usage was gone. It was a brand exercise where Konami was selling the name and not demanding quality. Honestly i think its what eventually lead me to drop games like WoW later. It taught me to not trust a brand name i love even from the same publisher. If the people who made what you loved left then its not the same thing anymore. You can give it a chance and sometimes like Devil May Cry you will be pleasantly surprised but 99% of the time its new people imitating rather than iterating because they just dont get it. No game series rings more true to that than Silent Hill.

This has been the best, most in depth summary of the series. But it really upsets the aforementioned 'im an armchair therapist and this doesnt agree with muh headcanon'/'ignore the creators intent, its all open to my interpretation' crowd.

[thewallofsleep]

Great thread with insightful comments. Props.

I never owned a PlayStation, only N64. For this reason, my sole exposure to survival horror was seeing my cousin play Resident Evil 2 on PS1 and then buying it for N64 when it was ported. I loved that game, but I didn't play any other horror games, even after I got a PS2. I should have purchased SH2 back then, but it flew under my radar. I revisited the survival horror genre later when I got more interested in horror as a whole using emulators. Sadly, emulation of disc based systems can sometimes be a little wonky. Not only that, but the control scheme and set camera angles (not to mention outdated early 3D graphics) are difficult for me these days. I'm happier watching that old games me played than playing them myself, unfortunately.

Silent Hill 2 is a masterpiece, despite my never having finished it myself. I deeply regret not having purchased it and played it when it first came out, since I did own a PS2. I'm still glad I can enjoy it and respect it for it's place in history.

[Requimortem]

It's not but enjoy your delusion.

[Musta]

SH2 is on my top 3 games of all time. Its... glorious

[Deleted]

It's not but enjoy your delusion.

Why so stingy?

Anyway, I agree OP. The atmosphere, soundtrack and characters are outstandingly well executed.

If you have the patience, check the video below. Very insightful.

[Requimortem]

Why so stingy?

You don't seem to understand the definition of that word.

[Cæli]

It's not but enjoy your delusion.

what are the games that came to your mind ?

[thewallofsleep]

It's not but enjoy your delusion.

It's certainly a subjective thing. I think SH2 is a landmark title in the horror game genre with major historical significance, but there's no objective criteria to be able to call it the pinnacle of the genre.

[Lotus Victoria]

Why so stingy?

Anyway, I agree OP. The atmosphere, soundtrack and characters are outstandingly well executed.

If you have the patience, check the video below. Very insightful.

I'll take a look as soon as I'm home. Thanks for the time to search this video for me!

[Deleted]

You don't seem to understand the definition of that word.

You don't seem to contribute anything relevant to the thread's discussion.

[Requimortem]

You don't seem to contribute anything relevant to the thread's discussion.

"discussion". You mean circlejerk?

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It's certainly a subjective thing. I think SH2 is a landmark title in the horror game genre with major historical significance, but there's no objective criteria to be able to call it the pinnacle of the genre.

"landmark title in the horror game genre with major historical significance"

I'm sorry, what? Exactly what has the game itself done?

[mvaliz]

Silent Hill 2 definetly had its golden moments I'll remember.

But the game that has forever taken my heart (and prolly a few years of my life) was the first Fatal Frame game.

OMG, you just want to talk about being stuck in the middle of an unholy nightmare... =/

[dope_danny]

Silent Hill 2 definetly had its golden moments I'll remember.

But the game that has forever taken my heart (and prolly a few years of my life) was the first Fatal Frame game.

OMG, you just want to talk about being stuck in the middle of an unholy nightmare... =/

The fact that every game after continues to nerf the crazy shit from the first is a testament to how fun that game is.

[TheWorkingTitle]

SH2 was great, but I think the original was even better due to the aforementioned plot. I'd also put RE2 and 4 ahead of SH2 for having some of the greatest jump scares and gut-wrenching battles.

Now, I've yet to play Dead Space, RE7, Outlast, and Alien: Isolation, so maybe my opinion is slightly uninformed.

[thewallofsleep]

"discussion". You mean circlejerk?

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"landmark title in the horror game genre with major historical significance"

I'm sorry, what? Exactly what has the game itself done?

You're being rude and confrontational for no discernible reason. I more or less agreed with you, but you apparently just want to argue.

[dope_danny]

SH2 was great, but I think the original was even better due to the aforementioned plot. I'd also put RE2 and 4 ahead of SH2 for having some of the greatest jump scares and gut-wrenching battles.

Now, I've yet to play Dead Space, RE7, Outlast, and Alien: Isolation, so maybe my opinion is slightly uninformed.

Dead Space is basically RE4 but in some respects better. But like Resident Evil its a really 50-50 thing on preferring the first or the second more. The first is a great 'cabin in the woods' kind of isolation based horror but 2 is the traditional horror 'now containment of the threat has failed and its on a larger scale' deal. Like Aliens to Alien. Its on a space station with residential areas which i feel really breaks up the monotony of the first games 'this is an industrial factory from stem to stern' that got a little old over time. Still really one of the best EA games of the last ten years but i'm firmly in the 'it may be action horror, but its the best action horror ever got' camp and prefer Dead Space 2. Both fantastic games but the scale and variety makes 2 the better game even if its not as scary if that makes sense.