What made Silent Hill a masterpiece
In the mid to late 90’s the videogame landscape was going through a very interesting change, not just in the way the games were presented but also in the popularity of certain genres. The advent of 3D gaming changed things forever, and thanks to Resident Evil horror games started to grow in popularity: from Clock Tower to Parasite Eve and Nightmare Creatures, it was the start of a new era.
However, there is one game that came out of the desire to compete with Capcom’s franchise that was able to stand head and shoulders above the other games. That would be Konami’s Silent Hill.
Released in March in 1999 this game would set itself apart from the other games trying to be a direct competition to Resident Evil thanks to its dark story, great atmosphere and solid gameplay, and 21 years later, this game still holds up as a brilliant piece in gaming history.
The game puts you in the role of Harry Mason, after crashing his car on the outskirts of Silent Hill he wakes up to discover that his adopted daughter Cheryl is missing and that the entire town is deserted and covered in a deep fog that hides nightmarish creatures.
The game makes use of tank controls for Harry to move, something rather usual from this era. However, it has an advantage over other games from the time: the entire game is rendered in 3D. This makes it much easier to travel over the environment and explore the town, and although you can’t see much due to the fog (a clever trick to hide render distance) in closed spaces it still makes things much easier.
While the game uses a fixed camera perspective, not unlike other games of that era, they give you some free reign to move the camera in many areas. This not only makes combat much more manageable, as you can face whatever enemies attack you from behind, but also makes puzzle solving and exploration considerably more enjoyable and dynamic.
Combat-wise the game puts you at a disadvantage: not only the ammunition for firearms is quite limited (it is a survival horror after all) but the melee combat makes you remain closer to the enemy and you risk being hit by them. This makes every enemy encounter quite intense as you might want to save some ammo for a boss later on or you might not have enough health to fight an enemy head on.
While you might be prepared to fight an enemy you’ll still feel a considerable amount of dread from facing down the horrifying creatures that roam Silent Hill. character designer Naoko Sato created the horrifying creatures that would fill the streets of the first Silent Hill, alongside the bosses that you would face later on the game.
The puzzles are also one of the trademarks of the franchise. Many of them require quite a bit of exploration and make good use of the area where you are located: you might need a chemical component to obtain a medallion or play around with the flash on a camera to see clues as to how open a set of doors.
The atmosphere is one of the best elements of the game. Masashi Tsuboyama was the designer that worked on backgrounds of the game and they are able to instill a sense of dread and horror in the environments of the game. They are complimented by the music by legendary composer Akira Yamaoka. Rather than resorting to traditional compositions he created different sounds made to cause dread and feelings of unease and panic. The track “My Heaven” for example was used by distorting the sound of a dentist drill.
The story is one of the better aspects of the game. The focus on an ordinary father doing whatever it takes to save his daughter is a story that, while simple, it’s very easy for the player to relate to. As the story progresses you find out what caused you to crash and what brought this nightmare to the town: an evil cult led by Dahlia Gillespe trying to summon their god by sacrificing your daughter, who as it turns out is one half of the soul of Dahlia’s daughter, the previous failed sacrifice to summon God.
Though the plot is presented in a convincing way through the game with dialogue that is mildly superior to the average that we heard from other games back then, it’s the CGI cutscenes that make this game stand head and shoulders above everything else.
Made entirely by Takayoshi Sato over the course of one year, these cutscenes make a terrifying job not only at introducing the world and the characters, but also to showcase the emotion, pain and horror that the characters go through the story, which is quite impressing considering that Sato made all of the facial expressions himself rather than relying on motion capture.
Overall, Silent Hill is nothing short of a masterpiece: a solid gameplay with a solid story, very memorable scares and great horror, it is no surprise that the game was received incredibly well when it was released, and was instantly called a classic.
However, the biggest question is whether or not the game holds up. Many games from back in the day haven’t aged the best so this is a legitimate concern. In my opinion? Absolutely. The quality of life elements like the camera make it quite easy to pick up and play, and the combat is still intense and well executed. While the plot might be the weakest of the original installments, there’s no denying it’s still strong and terrifying.
You can buy the game on PS3 for 6 dollars and it’s well worth it. I highly recommend it.
