Fuckin' hate shit like this. Being chased by unstoppable monsters. It's scary the first time, to be sure. Maybe the second time. But if I die enough - and the
woooh spooky lighting ensured I did die enough - I get to a point where I just want this flower bitch to sit down so I can solve the fucking puzzles and get the rest of the fucking story. Swear to Christ if they turn Red Pyramid into a Mr. X ripoff in
Silent Hill 2's remake I'm gonna be mad (I'll still play it, and hopefully it's good, but still).
This was the first thing I played on my PS5 so it took me a while to realize the Maya scenes were live-action and not that the PS5 has such insane graphics. But, I don't know, I guess because I'm 30 and also don't play newish games often, so I'm still blown away by splotchy skin in
Marvel's Spider-Man, or even how Anita's eyebrows here have like individual hairs. Since, really, all I do most of the time is play PS1
Resident Evil [バイオハザード] or NES
Mega Man [ロックマン]....
So with
The Short Message, can we say
Silent Hill is back? What would that mean? Is Team Silent ever going to reunite? Probably not, but that doesn't mean the SH2 remake will necessarily be bad. Will Konami redeem themselves for cancelling
Silent Hills and burying
P.T.? No, I don't think so, but they could at least redeem themselves from the PS3-era games, can't they? Or does
The Short Message mean "Silent Hill is back" in the same way that, technically,
Silent Hill: Book of Memories was technically a Silent Hill game?
First off, it's about time I admit to myself there's definitely a difference between "being a fan of
Silent Hill (the first game)" versus "being a fan of
Silent Hill (the entire franchise)." The original game is my favorite, but it's never going to come back in any way. Rather, SH2 hijacked the franchise's direction with this "the town is limbooooooo xDD" shit I don't really love. SH2 is itself a great game, better indeed than SH1 in a number of respects, but I simply prefer the wacky sub-JRPG evil cult plot over the "spooky foggy town forcing you to atone for your sins" plot.
Silent Hill 3 is a direct sequel to SH1, skipping any concrete link to SH2, but the themes of SH2 have infected the world of SH1, and now all the monsters are allegorical for Heather instead of being "what if Resident Evil but surreal," which is comparatively superficial, but it's what I appreciated most about the original game (Ito seemed to be "trying too hard" with SH3...).
So,
The Short Message brings us a world not unlike SH2, except somehow the horrors of Silent Hill (the town) have spread to Germany through a mix of Japanese witchcraft and COVID-19 isolation (??). I don't feel like spoiling the story here, but basically Anita is uncovering a mystery about herself, her mother, and her friends in a manner not unlike James, and decidedly unlike Harry. But our sole monster here is more like the Butcher from Silent Hill Origins. Or am I misremembering that game? Then the
dad boss, at least. Something like that.
The monster is Anita's mom, right? Not Maya?I guess some people have complained that the story is too overwrought and on-the-nose. That's not untrue, but I'm okay with it; the social media bullying stuff is essentially alien to me because I consider myself too old for that sort of thing, so it's basically the opposite end of the spectrum of Harry trying to save his daughter - it's just different from my life either way. The voice acting is shit, and I don't think it's an intentional choice to pay homage to the early games, so this is the real reason why I might think less of the story. I also feel there's maybe a hole here? Who is
the boy in the sketchbook? There are people it could be, but nothing too overt, in my opinion.
Also, I understand why they do the content warnings, but I feel maybe it comes up too often? Is it trying to be postmodern by showing it every chapter? Or should I expect SH2 Remake to open with a warning, "The following game contains scenes of
a dude fucking murdering his terminally ill wife to euthanize her"? Because... uh, spoilers?
NOBODY
COWARD ~ ~
she's so pure. And i... i don't deserve followers.