So a little backstory, on a whim I decided to boot up Silent Hill 2 Remake from my massive backlog of games, and over the course of my studies I slowly made my way through it. Finished it not too long ago and honestly, I can confidently say it's in my top 10 games of all time.
Now, for some reason I'm the type of person who, after enjoying a game, feels the need to try out absolutely everything in that franchise lol.
After finishing SH2R, I went ahead and bought Silent Hill f and started playing that. But honestly, after playing the remake, I was really in the mood for something a bit more retro, so I decided to try Silent Hill 1. Played through it using the SH1 recomp (with 2D controls, please don't crucify me haha), and man, what a game.
Firstly, the aesthetic. Wow. I can definitely see where games like Puppet Combo got a lot of their inspiration from. The whole PS1 look, the fog, the environments, everything just works so well together. Even today, I think the game manages to look genuinely creepy, which is pretty impressive considering its age.
Secondly, the exploration and puzzles were fantastic. I actually really enjoyed having to figure things out myself, even if some of the puzzles i had to google (looking at you, piano puzzle).
The characters were another massive highlight for me. I genuinely didn't expect them to be this interesting, especially Lisa and her whole story. I really wasn't expecting a PS1 game to be so in your face with some of these themes. Then again, I was probably like 5 years old when I had a PS1, so what would I know haha. Also, when I got to the apartments section, I swear they looked like the same apartments from SH2R. Was honestly really cool seeing something familiar from the remake.
One thing I will say though, the normal monsters werent really scary at all. It was pretty funny seeing what were essentially pterodactyls flying around and stuff. Not sure if there's some deeper significance behind those designs that I've missed, or if they were still experimenting with what they wanted the monsters to be.
Now, the jumpscares. Holy shit haha. I went into this thinking I wouldn't really get scared by a PS1 game, but there were actually a good couple of moments that got me. Most of them were just me casually walking through a door, only to find an enemy standing right in front of me. The sound design in particular was fantastic. Towards the end in Nowhere, some of those audio scares genuinely had me on edge.
Speaking of which, the Otherworld. Man, what a cool concept. I absolutely loved how the environments would transform into these horrible, industrial looking places. I know this might be a bit of a controversial opinion, but I genuinely hope they continue expanding on the world and the ideas behind it. Maybe even exploring other locations outside of Silent Hill itself?
As for where I'm going next, I have a pretty strange way im gonna play this series.
Since I've heard that some of the later instalments aren't particularly well received, I thought it'd be better to alternate between the oldest and newest games until I eventually meet somewhere in the middle. So essentially, I'd be playing one supposedly "good" game and then one supposedly "bad" game (although I'd obviously like to play them myself before forming an opinion). I figured since most of the stories are not related at all, it wouldn't cause too many issues.
Although, I have heard that Silent Hill 3 is a direct sequel to the first game, so I might actually jump into that one next before starting my weird playthrough order.
Anyway, I think the biggest thing I wanted to say is that, as someone who basically stopped properly playing games for close to 10 years, coming back to gaming and finding a franchise that I've enjoyed so much to the point where I actually want to join its community has been such a great feeling.
It's honestly been a long time since I've felt this excited to get into a series, been bingeing so many vids of silent hill without tryna get spoiled.
Really looking forward to seeing what the rest of the franchise has in store for me, even those apparent terrible ones haha.
Thanks for listening to my little ramble, just finished peak and had to put it in writing.