Silent Hill 2 Remake Second Opinion

Story Time (It’ll be short, I promise)

It’s 1998, and I had recently purchased Metal Gear Solid for the PlayStation.

Inside of the jewel case was a demo for a game I’d never heard of, “Silent Hill.”

After blasting through my MGS obsession, I fired up the demo, excited to learn it was a horror game. Already a fan of Resident Evil, I was up for more, and…I didn’t immediately take to Silent Hill’s rudimentary graphics (not appreciating its technical marvel at the time), but one thing for sure, I was hooked to this eerie town…it was calling me.

I rented the game, sat with my chair in the middle of parent’s living room playing it until 2 am, left petrified to even turn out the lights before climbing the stairs to bed.

I introduced the game to my friend, his obsession grew with mine, and subsequently we played Silent Hill 2 and 3 together, mesmerised by the depths of these psychological horror masterpieces. Silent Hill as a franchise became my number 1 obsession, but ever since Silent Hill 3, it’s been nothing but disappointment and / or heartbreak teases (I’m looking at you PT). Even the free teaser ‘Short message’ left me very underwhelmed.

And so, hope was lost. Whether the games had changed, or I had changed, me and Silent Hill could never connect like we used to, so when news of a Silent Hill 2 remake hit our screens I barely glanced in its direction, following nothing about the development or even watching any trailer, I wasn’t ready to get false excitement.

I was going to buy it, novelty sake, reignite the memories for old time’s sake and if anything my partner and I could talk critically about how the remake was never going to live up to my expectations…I mean…how could it?

Is it any good?

Yes.

Yes it is.

Did you resonate with any of my story? Have you felt the magic of Silent Hill stop long ago and, like me, you enjoyed the later franchise games well enough, but they didn’t…shake you? They didn’t move you in ways to evoke discomfort, terror, or isolation?

Then stop reading now, go play it.

This entire review will be spoiler free, only touching on the mechanical difference, the improvements, and the way Bloober Team have handled the game. I won’t divulge difference in puzzles or locations, I think the suspension of not knowing what to expect is too important for a game like this, especially for those who have tied nostalgia to it.

And this is where I’ll make it abundantly clear that I can only speak from a perspective of a jaded fanboy who hasn’t felt moved by the franchise in a long time. I never profess to be the most eloquent writer, maybe my reviews break all known conventions of writing style, but that’s okay for me, because I want everything to feel like it comes from the heart, the excited brain of a passion reignited wanting to tell you everything about why this game is good, whilst carefully telling you nothing that would steal some magic from your experience playing it.

And the double-sided beauty of the jaded fanboy is that while nostalgia-bait is going to play on my biases, my toothcomb is etched so fine that imperfections stand out to us.

So, if you’re still with me, let’s tread once again into this foggy little town of Silent Hill.

The Story, The Characters, The Atmosphere

Silent Hill, a tourist resort town, and a special place for you and your wife.

You are James Sunderland, and you’re parked up on the outskirts of Silent Hill. Your wife, Mary, has written to you, informing that she’s waiting in Silent Hill for you.

But Mary is dead, she has been for the last 3 years…disease…but it’s her handwriting…

And that’s all you need to know.

Silent Hill 2 required no prior knowledge of the first game, it’s a side-story devoted to James and Mary, isolated from the goings-on of the first game, but intertwined in that this town doesn’t feel right, it’s not as you remember it; it’s abandoned, entrenched in a thick fog, warping itself into impossible spaces around your insecurities, fears, your deepest traumas…and then there’s the monsters…repulsive, indescribable, pathetic, sorrowful, terrifying, uncomfortable, like someone’s painful memories forming into humanoid flesh-sacks that move in uncanny ways.

Silent Hill 2 is a psychological horror game, reliant on keeping you in discomfort, fascinated with the repulsion of the town’s signature…maybe I best keep that bit quiet for the newcomers. ‘Unease’ is a prevalent theme of the game, as you are repeatedly put on a knife’s edge, having your expectations subverted at the very moment you felt like you’ve started to understand how things work.

But what of the Remake?

Confidently I can tell you that the Silent Hill 2 Remake is as gorgeous as it is atmospheric. The hallmark of the town, its thick fog, is just as disorientating as it was in the original, and it looks fantastic. It’s hard not to walk everywhere to marvel at the awe of your surroundings. The original’s signature sound creator Akira Yamaoka returns to update all the tracks and provide some new ones, keeping familiarity while adjusting the dials slightly and keeping the experience fresh, a tight balance executed well.

I love the character redesigns; I think they’ve been handled well and their voice acting choices are excellent. The dialogue feels more authentic, maybe that’s because we get to see more detailed expressions on their faces, but also the silent moments where the expressions do all the talking show James as a far more tired individual, carried by this small spark of hope to push on.

Credit should also be given to Bloober Team for understanding the importance of retaining player immersion through little-to-no on screen prompts or hud elements. Default settings keep the entire screen clean of information, save for a small white dot appearing above nearby objects and an ammo counter only when you raise your guns; these can be further removed with the ‘Retro’ setting, but I don’t recommend it as you’ll likely miss items throughout your journey, but maybe that adds to the excitement for you. Finally, I whole-heartedly recommend switching to ‘Performance’ setting to get the smoothness of the 60 FPS for PlayStation users (trust my you sacrifice very little graphically, it’ll still look amazing), and speaking of PlayStation users: turn off the visual vignette for the ‘Caution’ damage, it’s very distracting, PlayStation 5 controllers will colour-indicate your health for your convenience and it works perfectly, in my opinion this should have been the default.

Overall, the crucial part of the game stacks up with the original well, it’s like diving back over 2 decades and rediscovering a long-lost love that sparks joy and fear. So, what about the updates?

What’s Retained, What’s Improved, and What’s Changed

As stated earlier I don’t intend on informing of any location, item, encounter or puzzle changes, they are too important for you to discover on your own and awkwardly say under your breath, “That’s not in the original…wait who’s this now?...hang on that’s not meant to be there…this is a safe spot I can-OH GOD WHAT IS THAT?!”

And my personal favourite: “…Why is that there? Whis is [redacted] missing? Who or What has it!?”

Let’s talk about the mechanical changes. The Remake shakes perspective and shifts from static camera angles to the popular over-the-shoulder 3rd person perspective. I loved how the original’s camera angles deliberately obscured certain roads ahead to force you, uncomfortably, into the unknown, and I won’t lie that the 3rd person view doesn’t allow for that anymore, but what it offers in return is the sense of something potentially creeping up on you from behind, since you can’t see the enemies creeping up behind you while you’re trying to aim at the target in front of you.

Enemies now come with alternative flavours, and some have the capacity to ambush you, which mixes things up a little. I’ve heard that combat was a worry for a lot of people who saw the videos showcasing it, but I’m pleased to say that I found the combat to be intuitive and implemented well enough. The D-Pad houses quick-slots for your guns, while the ‘fire’ trigger on its own swings your melee weapon, allowing you to take a few headshots and then follow it up by clubbing them to the floor, and the satisfying way James clubs the downed enemies before following up with the classic Silent Hill ‘stomp’ feels like a satisfying end to the combat. There are a few times I’ve felt that my shotgun blast should have connected but somehow didn’t, but let’s chalk that down to skill issue before I get conclusive results.

Do you like breaking windows? Because you can break windows now! Store windows and car windows offer items behind them, so if you’re not bothered about alerting nearby enemies get smashing the town up!

The town has also opened up with extra small location, larger main locations, and further points of exploration interest, each with little titbits of minor lore concerning its residents to expand the life of this sleepy town. Those familiar with the old dynamic maps system of prior Silent Hill games will be glad that they have returned, but now they’re toggled without pausing the game, so I hope you’re in a safe location before checking where you should be going.

Puzzles return in 3 distinctive flavours, easy, medium, and hard, and while the hard puzzles don’t feel as obtuse and infuriating as Silent Hill 3’s Shakespeare puzzles I get the impression this should be the default, they don’t feel limiting but will provide you with a headscratcher for a few minutes. Also, yes, puzzles come with the cryptic, disturbing writing style that they’ve been known for, and in their signature font. This kind of stuff may seem insignificant, but maybe it’s just my neurodivergent brain firing off at the small attentive details that add together to make Silent Hill 2 what is it, all while extending the game with positive inclusions.

Segway into further inclusions, collectibles make their way into the game in the form of memories and photos. Photos are simply collectible polaroids of bizarre or obscured imagery and are numbered for your convenience, while the memories are you encountering specific locations, items or puzzles from the original that are not used in the Remake. These memory encounters are nice throwbacks but are handled bizarrely, causing a TV-Static jittering effect when you find them, leaving you looking at them in the first instance thinking “okay, what was that? Am I meant to do anything?”. Overall, inconsequential, but treasure hunters can have some joy and extra reward for exploring the town for all its nooks and crannies, and I admire anyone who finds all the collectibles on the ‘Retro’ style interface.

Closing words

Silent Hill 2 the remake delivers.

The town is expanded, the combat is more engaging (although the combat was never a focal point for the games anyway, and you’ll still have plenty of instances where you’ll want to escape), and the frightening designs of the locations are a marvel of some wonderful craftsmanship. It’s funny, as a review you should also be weighing up the pros and cons on scale and offering people the gritty ins and outs of your experience, what worked and what didn’t, and you’ve probably thought “this is a one-sided review, you’ve not said a lot of negatives here.” And that’s because I’m struggling to think of some, and authenticity takes stage for me above forcing points across that make them a bigger deal than they are. All I can tell you is that I’ve been walking this beautifully constructed town now for a long time, encountering little to zero bugs or glitches, where I feel transported back to my youth and have once again reignited with my love for Silent Hill.

It's a genuinely good experience, a testament to time and love to recreate a faithful yet fresh take on a beloved game in the horror franchise, and one that sat on countless “favourite game of all time” lists. When you’re able to afford it, grab the game, sit down with it at night with the lights low, immerse yourself into the gut-wrenching stories of the town’s sole inhabitants, and become awash with discomfort and dread. Welcome back Silent Hill, I’ve missed you…

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