It’s comprehensible to really feel anxiousness a couple of new Silent Hill recreation. After an extended record of duds (e.g. Silent Hill HD Assortment, Downpour, Guide of Recollections) and the heartbreaking cancellation of a daring tackle the franchise (Silent Hills), Silent Hill appeared like a collection with out clear path or voice. However after final yr’s beautiful Silent Hill 2 remake, there was a brand new spark of hope.
Silent Hill f retains hope alive: It’s a robust, stunning, and devastating new entry in Konami’s long-running psychological horror franchise. f honors the spirit of Silent Hill, whereas taking sufficient probabilities with its components to really feel optimistic about future entries from Konami.
For even essentially the most informal of Silent Hill followers, it’s a must-play.
Silent Hill f’s most radical change is its setting. In contrast to earlier video games that have been primarily set in fashionable New England, f explores the fictional Japanese village of Ebusigaoka, a once-prosperous mining city that has since been largely deserted, turning into a “unhappy little city,” in response to its protagonist.
Ebusigaoka in its pure kind is charming and sometimes stunning. Past the tightly packed properties and companies within the city middle, there are pathways that result in serene pockets of nature and tucked-away shrines, all of it gorgeously rendered with a fantastic mist and brilliant inexperienced mosses. At instances, it looks like digital tourism to a tiny charming village. However early within the recreation, Ebusigaoka transforms: A menacing fog, crimson pink flora, and tumorous lots devour the city, the beginning of a nightmare for its playable character, Hinako Shimizu.
Hinako is an extraordinary and restrained highschool woman, previously a cheerful and energetic youngster who has been damaged down by cultural norms and an overbearing father. Her quiet wrestle and confusion about her standing in society and amongst her good friend group are subtly defined by interactions together with her classmates and in her in-game journal. However a lot about Hinako and why she suffers by the nightmarish occasions of the sport stay mysterious — even after a full playthrough of Silent Hill f.
Silent Hill f is performed throughout two worlds: Ebusigaoka, and a mysterious liminal area generally known as the Darkish Shrine. In Ebisugaoka, Hinako searches for solutions alongside her associates, visiting areas acquainted to her (her center college, associates’ properties). Within the Darkish Shrine, which she known as to typically throughout moments of nice duress, she is guided by a mysterious determine identified solely as Fox Masks who purports to assist ease her psychological anguish by a collection of checks and rituals.
Piecing collectively what occurs — and why — between these two worlds is considered one of Silent Hill f’s nice puzzles. Clues are left scattered on notes, carved into wooden and rock, and uncovered by Hinako’s journal, which fills itself out in a compelling approach. I desperately searched for each scrap of paper and storytelling artifact to flesh out the sport’s mysterious narrative, fastidiously studying new revelations from Hinako about herself and others. And on the finish I used to be solely barely sated — a second playthrough of Silent Hill f isn’t solely advised, it’s virtually warranted if you wish to actually know what the hell is happening right here.
Hinako is an atypical protagonist for the Silent Hill franchise, even relating to fight. Like many different characters within the collection, she isn’t a educated combatant — however she is extra highly effective than another hero or heroine we’ve managed on this franchise. Sure, she will swing a metal pipe at a flesh monster till it expires, however being succesful in fight requires focus, persistence, and stamina. Just about all of the motion in Silent Hill f is carried out dangerously up shut by way of melee weapon, together with baseball bats, kitchen knives, and the odd ceremonial dagger. A lot of Hinako’s melee weapons can harm and break, resulting in tense moments the place the best choice when confronted with a monster is to flee.
Credit score: Picture: NeoBards Leisure/Konami
Silent Hill f has elicited some pre-release hand-wringing over its supposed “Soulslike” fight. Sure, there are dodge strikes, counterattacks, and light-weight/heavy assaults carried out with shoulder buttons on a controller. However any comparability to the gameplay of Darkish Souls or Elden Ring is overblown. Mechanics like a stamina meter and charged melee assaults have been in early Silent Hill video games; they’re simply extra uncovered in f.
However Silent Hill f’s fight will get boring after some time. Particularly through the last few hours, the place the sport throws three or extra enemies at you concurrently, fight could be a slog. At my breaking level, I wound up avoiding enemies not out of warning or worry, however out of pure annoyance. A few of that comes right down to enemy selection; there aren’t that many enemy archetypes to struggle, and (at the very least on “Story” issue mode) don’t meaningfully change their ways over time.
Hinako’s skills do change all through the sport although. At shrines (which additionally function save factors), Hinako can alternate artifacts and meals gadgets as choices, incomes Religion, which might then be spent on upgrades. These upgrades embody additional well being and stamina, and the power to equip extra charms known as omamori that confer particular boosts.
These omamori perks are fairly compelling, and I discovered myself switching them out and in to go well with my present wants. One helpful omamori reduces the quantity of injury a weapon takes, however solely when utilizing gentle assaults. One other provides Hinako a small refill of well being after slaying an enemy. And whereas some omamori might be discovered all through Ebusigaoka and the Darkish Shrine, some can solely be earned “gacha” fashion by spending Religion to earn a random one. It’s a enjoyable system, and I discovered myself investing in it closely on my first playthrough.
Silent Hill f’s improve system presents some intriguing trade-offs as you play: Do you have to maintain onto meals which may provide a well being or stamina refill, or put it aside for an providing at a shrine? You possibly can solely carry a lot, in spite of everything. And is it price saving up for higher, costlier omamori, or shopping for what now you can to be extra survivable? Regardless of which path you select, the improve system encourages exploration and cautious useful resource administration, whereas additionally providing some flexibility to match your play fashion.
None of these upgrades will enable you to with Silent Hill f’s intelligent and sometimes flummoxing puzzles, although. Whereas lots of them observe a standard construction (discover this crest, discover the correct slot for it), they’re virtually at all times lavishly introduced, typically as scrolls, work, or conventional Japanese cultural gadgets. Among the greatest are like small narratives from which you’ll must divine options, and fortunately there are three difficulties to select from: Story (the best), Onerous, and Misplaced within the Fog (a difficult, unlockable issue). I’ve no disgrace in admitting that even in exhausting mode, I turned to my very clever spouse to assist me decipher among the recreation’s puzzles.
What could also be unsatisfying for a lot of gamers of Silent Hill f is the sport’s story, which is — devoted to the collection — opaque and disjointed. As I wrapped my first 13-hour playthrough of the sport (on Story mode issue), I used to be left extra confused than gratified. However I additionally knew {that a} New Recreation Plus playthrough would provide new story revelations and experiences, together with variations on enemies and beforehand unavailable quests. Positive sufficient, inside minutes of beginning a second run with my cleared-game save, I knew much more about Hinako’s life and the occasions that result in the sport’s first ending. With 4 extra unlockable endings, there’s definitely extra to chew on. And I’m at present chowing down.
There’s loads I like about Silent Hill f, regardless of my preliminary dissatisfaction with a few of its story. It’s a completely beautiful recreation, with stellar artwork path and character design, expertly rendered with near-photorealistic (however nonetheless dreamy) element. Konami, developer NeoBards, and author Ryukishi07 make many daring, stylistic selections; it’s refreshing to have new voices tackling Silent Hill tales. Music from collection mainstay Akira Yamaoka and newcomer Kensuke Inage provide a mélange of kinds; basic Silent Hill sounds, each melodic and dissonant, mix superbly with conventional Japanese music kinds.
Silent Hill f’s creators make sturdy selections in material. Whereas the franchise has not shied away from graphic violence and grownup subjects, f trades in intense themes of abuse, gender discrimination, torture, and self hurt. The graphic violence on show is a step past what the Silent Hill video games have been identified for — the content material warning that prefaces the sport’s title display needs to be taken fairly severely.
Maybe the very best, most vital ingredient that Silent Hill f will get proper is the maintain it has on me after only one full playthrough. I can’t cease desirous about it. I can cease taking part in. I can’t wait to see the reactions to its story, its most grotesque and gory moments, its considerate puzzle design. I can’t not peek down each alleyway or facet room as I replay it, hoping to search out some new morsel of story — or one thing even weirder — as I attempt to remedy its last puzzle: What actually occurred to Hinako in Silent Hill f?
Silent Hill f will likely be launched Sept. 25 on PlayStation 5, Home windows PC, and Xbox Collection X. The sport was reviewed on PS5 utilizing a prerelease obtain code supplied by Konami. You could find extra details about Polygon’s ethics coverage right here.
