Silent Hill review by Tyson
Overall
Buy
Silent Hill has easily become one of my favorite PlayStation games. I recommend buying this game for anyone who is looking for a fun PlayStation game or for those who love survival horror games.
Gameplay
Silent Hill has an interesting story for a survival horror game. The game starts off with our character Harry Mason awaking from a car crash. He notices that his daughter is missing and goes adventuring into the town of Silent Hill to locate her. Along the way he will bump into various intersting characters like Cybil the cop, Lisa the hospital nurse, or Dhalia the crazy religous lady. Also various different sub plots will show up such as a reiligous cult and some popular drug being manufactered in Silent Hill. Overall I really liked the story and characters in this game.
Like most survival horror games Silent Hill will have you exploring the environment, fighting various creatues, and solving weird puzzles. What I love about Silent Hill is how it does all this with so much style. Exploring the town of Silent Hill is so much fun. You always seem to find something weird or some kind of goodies while exploring. I really liked how the map would update itself as you progress through the environment. If you spot an unopenable door then a red x appear on the map where the door is. When you stumble into an area with a puzzle then something like a circle would show up on the map or even some kind of description would be written on the map. The game also uses some unique settings for the enivronment as well. Who would of thought something like an elementray school could be so scary.
I came away really enjoying the combat in Silent Hill. I liked how the game used a good assortment of ranged and melee weapons. I liked how many weapons let you move while using them. It such a good design choice when compared to ther survival horror games that lock you in place to use a weapon. Also who doesn’t love fighting some mutant dog with a steel pipe. There is just something awesome about knocking down a mutant dog with a swing of your pipe while it is leaping at you.
The puzzles in Silent Hill is an improvement over many other survival horror games. Sure you have a lot of bring item x over to spot y but then there are puzzles that just break the mold of survival horror games. One such example is the piano puzzle where you need to read this poem about birds which tells you what keys to press on the piano.
Control
Silent Hill still sticks to the traditional “tank” style control schemes that many survival horror games use on the PlayStation. Thankfully though they do give you a few more options then other games. You can do things like hop back or strafe side to side to avoid enemy attacks.
Graphics
I feel that Silent Hill is a very impressive game for the PlayStation console. So much mood is set with the fog and lighting effects from your characters flashlight. I loved how the environment graphics would change from this foggy town to some kind of demon infested area with rusted metal grates everywhere. The various character and moster models look fantastic as well.
Sound
The guys over at Konami really nailed it with the audio in this game. The static from you radio when monsters are nearby really adds some fear to the game. The voice work is great even though the dialog is kind of cheesy at times. Background music is great as well. Everything with the audio seems to have had a lot of care taken to it and I really like that.