[Intrepid Homoludens]

Silent Hill 3: A review (PC version)



Pale defenses and groundlessness

I remember a startlingly interrupted sleep years ago when I was living with family. It was late evening and I must have been quite tired to fall asleep so early in my room, which was just off the kitchen, thereby in the back of the house. I don't exactly recall the details of my dream, it must have been disturbing, and all I remember was feeling as if someone or something were forcing me still, a great weight on me, and I couldn't move. But that sound. That horrible, inhuman grunting sound! It jerked me out of my sleep, I jumped out of my bed and dashed, from the back of the house to the front living room in less than two seconds. As it turned out, that sound actually came from a car trying to start in the alley, just outside my bedroom window. My dream had filtered it, distorted it into a hideous snort, causing me to flee.

The first inhuman sound I heard in Silent Hill 3 is nearly identical to that grunt that startled me then. The game, and story, begins with a dream as well. Heather, a precocious freckled teenager on the verge of adulthood, finds herself walking through a dark, abandoned amusement park, the light from the flashlight in her vest pocket falling on and illuminating the unnatural rusted grating and metal bearings she walks on, her footsteps a low and stunted clanging rhythm. Her hazel eyes, in closeup, search the periphery for any suggestion of familiarity and, in a slow breathless tone of almost endearing vulnerability, she finally inquires, ".....Where am I?" Looking down, she discovers she is clutching a knife, her eyes wide with astonishment, and the camera swiftly zooms away from her from a bird's eye view.

This is the pervasive theme of Silent Hill 3, the worthy successor of the orginal Silent Hill, and immediate cousin of Silent Hill 2 (to which it is more thematically than narratively related). The punctuation of this very first cinematic in the game lies in its introducing the player to the emotional and psychological potency of horror - the dark cocktail of sheer helplessness, mortality, macabre visions, and pale defenses. From then on the game never lets up, the potency undulates and reinvents itself, fleshy and sometimes voluptuously disgusting variations of grosteque, deeply seated unspeakable evil that feeds off the sadness and fury of human tragedies.



An instrument of fate

Heather's destiny is writ in blood, her memories speak of a dark and twisted past, almost primeval, certainly primal, and her struggles to find out more of the truth only serve to pull her further into the mire. She discovers a link between her future, her father's past, the detective hired to shadow her, and the mysterious woman who appears to her at key moments in her torment. Her vague and abstract recollections slowly form themselves the deeper we negotiate ourselves into her terror with her, circumnavigating infinite pitfalls, mutilated corpses, and walking mutations in a labyrinthine shopping mall, a lonely and bereft subway train complex, a strangely configured office building, a filthy and infested sewer system, and finally to the desolate, fog choked resort town of Silent Hill itself, with its horrifically festering hospital, confusing avenues crawling with monstrous entities, and its abandoned amusement park, runty and decayed in its gothic taint.

The sense of isolation and despair pervades the air and Heather's very soul. The world around her literally shifts and changes from sadly derelict to thoroughly putrefied. Heather herself undergoes a shifting in response, from horror to sheer desperation, from survivalist to vengeful fury, a strengthening of conviction and, one can glean, a determination to champion some weirdly architected rite of passage. And it is this, Heather's inner gauntlet, that the player rides through towards the finale, a burning climax, where Heather's violently fiery resolve finally answers and puts to rest the haunting enigmas lingering from her past as well those from Silent Hill.

Gameplay: 3/5
Silent Hill 3, as typical of games under the Survival/Horror banner, often suffers from poorly placed camera angles, particularly annoying during decided moments of combat. The player is sometimes at a disadvantage, with items and ammunition scant and only occassional, so a bit of strategy and a healthy dose of evasion are necessary. Weapon balance is relatively fair, with certain weapons affording better results on certain enemies - choose wisely, tradeoffs are noticeable. A couple or so puzzle variances shift drastically depending on the chosen difficulty level. They can be either cakewalk, or agonizingly needy of deep research or strange decrypting, on par with some of the best adventure game puzzles.

As with most Survival/Horror titles, the A.I. is nearly non-existent, with each enemy possessing its own special attack style and extent of damage unto Heather. Some enemies are harder to destroy than others, so running away shouldn't come as a surprise. Study their patterns of charging and their individual thresholds of vulnerability and you should be fine.

Interface: 3.5/5
I played the entire PC version using only the keyboard, custom mapped, with the character maneuverability set to 2D. Not too shabby, but more discerning players might opt for the flexibility of a gamepad. The mouse is not supported. Although the PC version allows saving anywhere in the game (except during boss battles), there are only eight permanent save spots available and one extra for quick saves. Silent Hill veterans should find the interface very familiar and nearly unchanged. Expect slow reaction times from Heather, again this is an annoying given in the Survival/Horror genre to increase tension - so they say.

Sound & Music: 5/5
This is perhaps the zenith of the game, along with graphics. The previous two Silent Hill titles boasted a superb and highly effective aural experience, and Silent Hill 3 continues this trend. The static emitting radio is still used to suspenseful effect, suddenly hissing when in proximity to enemies. The grunting, moaning, growling and piercing monster noises are exquisite and nicely varied. Lingering ambient sounds waft throughout the various environments, and echoes are used with good results. The rock music soundtracks, usually played during extended cutscenes, imbue the story and atmosphere with a sense of contemporary immediacy. Especially attentive ears may pick up influences from past and recent artists such as This Mortal Coil and Portishead. As a welcome bonus, the game comes with a CD audio soundtrack of all the music, sixty darkly joyful minutes' worth.

Graphics: 4/5
The character design and rendering are clearly the best I've seen yet, their individuality and imperfections approaching the quality of the CGI movie Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. All the cutscenes are in-game and well directed. The Silent Hill series heavily relies on an eerily lifelike realism, the more realistic the better. The concept here has always been to steep the player in a false comfort of familiarity - of identification of the small Midwestern town where you grew up, of the plainness of the characters that you swear you saw crossing the street yesterday, the everydayness of a frankly banal existence. Then the game yanks the floorboards from under you in a spiral of unforgiving disorientation. This is one of the inimitable genius plays of the game. However, it is not perfect. Perhaps at the expense of such beautifully rendered characters, many of Silent Hill 3's environmental textures lose their convincing veneer up close, and you're forced into distraction.

To make up for that distraction, the engine offers a drop dead gorgeous play of lighting and shadows, on par with that of Splinter Cell. Once Heather finds the flashlight, the atmosphere practically springs to life. Nearly every object in the gameworld casts its own shadow, stretching and receding according the angle of light cast upon it. This effect alone induces a gulping suspense and unrelenting dread.

Overall: 4/5
Silent Hill 3 formally puts to closure the unanswered narrative questions left behind by the first Silent Hill game, thus establishing it as its true sequel. Players who survived the original game should find this satisfying in that respect. Silent Hill 2, capable of standing on its own, is simply a fugue, and an exquisite one at that. Silent Hill 3, in addition to being the narrative heir of the first game in this series, also shares its more pervasive buffeting in terms of combat and general action, yet doesn't quite match its level of sheer tension, sudden scares, and trepidation induced of the player.

Silent Hill 3, despite its few blemishes, is masterful in its execution of sheer unrelenting atmosphere and narrative substance. It is as much an exposition of depth and scope in storytelling and pure psychological efficacy as it is a good, dark tension building ride of a game.

verry good review, it actualy helped me. i bought it for PS2 about 7 hours ago and was'nt sure if i was going to regret it. but the review pritty much told me it was worth the 12 bucks (used at block buster, in perfict condition)

[ragnar]

Perhaps I should get this game. I haven't played any survival/horror games yet, so should I get SH3 or begin with the earlier games?

i know this game is pritty much a sequal so before i even play it should i play the first one (i was told the the second one is'nt realy a sequal it's just an other story around the same universe, is this true?)

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Originally Posted by ragnar

Perhaps I should get this game. I haven't played any survival/horror games yet, so should I get SH3 or begin with the earlier games?

Originally Posted by guybrush_guy

i know this game is pritty much a sequal so before i even play it should i play the first one

It doesn't matter much in the end. But, personally, I highly recommend playing the first SH (if you have a PS1 and can find a copy), if you want to enjoy it as a connoisseur instead of an aficionado . That one is, imo, the best of the series. Interestingly, the primitiveness of its graphics adds to its atmosphere of oppression and rawness - the game keeps you in a cruel perpetual state of psychological imbalance. But until you play SH3 afterwards, the story fronds in SH will leave you hanging.

If you want me to be more specific about the story without spoiling it for you: About 17 years have passed since the horrific events transpired in the first SH, and in SH3 the heroine Heather gradually discovers her connection to it and to her destiny. Her father is Harry Mason, the hero of SH1.

(i was told the the second one is'nt realy a sequal it's just an other story around the same universe, is this true?)

It isn't ultimately a sequel, no. As I mentioned in my review, it's really more of a fugue, the fundamental conceptions and metaphors of the town of Silent Hill sets the stage for a nearly unbearably depressing love story. In this case, think of Silent Hill 2 as purgatory, to where certain souls are drawn and judgments are made. If you play it, be aware of the very mature issues and motifs that are either hinted at or handled directly in the story - interrupted love, death, guilt, anger, resentment, denial, emptiness, isolation, as well as ideas like the seven deadly sins and meta-historical layerings, and difficult issues such as emotional and physical abuse, wish fulfillment, terminal illness, and euthanasia.

*I also should add that SH3 sadly wasn't enriched with near infinite in-game references threading back to oblique sources. There was so much of this in the first SH, to the point where entire fan forums devoted themselves to untangling the spiderweb of references and conceiving a wealth of theories about the people, places, and things within the gameworld, what they might mean.

[ragnar]

So SH1 isn't available on PC? That makes it rather difficult for me to play it then, unless perhaps I could play it in an emulator or something.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

An emu is your best bet, then. I should warn you, however, that if you play SH3 first you might not be as drawn into SH1 after.

[ragnar]

I'll see what I will do, I have some other games I want to play more first.

was'nt there a game company that was converting the SH1 to the PC format, i remember visiting the website once and i'm pritty sure the download was free. in fact, i read about it in these verry forums.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Wasn't that also illegal and they mysteriously vanished or something?

i'm not realy sure, it's probibly illegal but i dont think it vanashed..i'll do some some searching on yahoo to see what i can find..



this just in!

it's an ISO and an the Espx emulator tweaked to run the game realy well.

so i'm guessing it's illegal unless you own yourself a copy, but if you already own a copy thne you should'nt have to download it. I'm sure i can buy a copy used at my local game store

[Intrepid Homoludens]

I wouldn't mind going back and re-playing some levels in SH1. I loved the street level just before you reach Midwich Elementary School, when you first exit that house on Leavenworth Street. I remember the chills going up and down my spine the moment I stepped out into the backyard. That music! Imagine an aria sung by a choir played backwards, combined with the scene of a pitch black starless night, and the only source of light in the world is your flashlight.



SH1 was very pregnant with all these references, and you have to be very keen to pick them up. For example, notice how the street names are actually the names of popular writers, many of whom write horror novels. Sadly, SH2 and SH3 don't have this extra bonus.

[pleto4_ryan]

*claps trep*

nice review...

the only thing that made me sad in this game is

Spoiler:

that you find out that Harry hasn't lived that happy life you hoped he would have...
And he dies without even being able to save him

Of course all this adds to the story and that's why the game rocks...

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Yeah, but....

Spoiler:

....it made me - and Heather - that much more determined to bitch punch that c$nt Claudia. I was in total fury during that final boss fight, even though I had to do it, um, 32 times? I wasted too much ammo on those stupid crawly body things, hated them. I finally beat the shit out of her/it by shooting the pistol to get her down and using the katana when she was down. Kinda not satisfying enough, though. I would have really liked to send that c$nt back to hell with the mace, but that's too clumsy and slow.

Also, what say the detective will probably become Heather's new adopted dad?

[Owskie]

Originally Posted by guybrush_guy

verry good review, it actualy helped me. i bought it for PS2 about 7 hours ago and was'nt sure if i was going to regret it. but the review pritty much told me it was worth the 12 bucks (used at block buster, in perfict condition)

as i like DEAD things ( hahah pun pun pun ) ill bring this dead post back to life...

i got it for like 12 dollars too at block buster with teh soundtrack ... ub3r 1337