[Even though this is a remake, I did this review under the angle for a first-time player and avoided direct spoilers.]
As someone who hadn’t played the original Silent Hill 2 (but knows about it by proxy), effectively getting to experience it for the first time under a new coat of paint has been a good experience. I hate to use the word ‘faithful’ when describing sticking to the source material and script, but the remake has been a straight and true retelling with polish all around — Occasionally, spotty performance, stagnating combat and wishing for more subtle callbacks do hamper things, somewhat.
The most considerable praise I have to give is the actors’ performances and direction; the cutscenes are generally simple back-and-forths between two characters, but the way they’re shot along with character reactions and nuances to their expressions add that bit extra depth — James is already a complicated character (by my money), and Luke Roberts’ performance brings James’ depiction of an awkward, hope-starved drip to a new level. How he whimpers and grunts when stomping downed enemies, little quivers of his lips or flicking his gaze, while a different, unwell character has a distant, hollow stare; character models are expressive and use that expression without dipping into the uncanny valley. Despite using the same script, does this change the vibes of the scenes? Absolutely, but there’s greater weight and emotion carried through since the performances and direction are so nicely done.
Though speaking of performance, the game is oddly spotty at times and for seemingly random reasons. Raytracing helps add to the visual quality, but it saps framerates to a surprising degree, especially during rainy sections. I had multiple instances where the game hit a loading buffer or stuttered due to standing in a particular place or pointing the camera a certain way, hiccuping back to back until everything ‘caught up’. It wasn’t so constant that it got irksome, but it happened enough to merit mentioning.
James plays like a fridge with feet, and that’s not intended as a negative. The inputs for James in combat are straightforward: A melee swing, aiming a ranged weapon, a 180 spin and a directional dodge. The latter is quite generous regarding avoiding attacks, as James covers a decent bit of ground and has some semblance of invincibility at the start. He feels like an average Joe when it comes to being an unskilled fighter, but that doesn’t hamper things unless you’re throwing wild swings left and right. Granted, the enemies become easier to read than a book over time depending on whether you recognize patterns and timing, know when a counter-hit is coming, and spot attack tells. Based on your skill, you can have James practically dance around enemies and make mockeries out of them, though whether this adds or subtracts from the combat will depend on your outlook.
Two nagging issues did stick with me: The first was the lack of melee options, as only two melee weapons (not including new game plus) are true to the original, but it felt like something else could’ve been added for more variety or choice. Combined with the second, where a later enemy type can outright stop your attack in an obnoxious ‘parry’, eventually combat feels less of an ‘I have to do this to survive’, to an ‘I need to do this to proceed without getting bonked in the back of the head’. A dungeon just past the halfway point ramps up the combat so much that it left me wondering if more mechanics/options were intended but dropped.
As is par with the series, Silent Hill 2’s environments look fantastic, with the town being a still, faded and washed-out snapshot in time, with its later changes being oppressive and unpleasant — And I mean that as complementary. Silent Hill 2 isn’t a happy game by any stretch, with the fog, eeriness and overall dread combining to create an atmosphere that is so comically effective at not only leaving a raincloud over your head but instilling tension and that concern nowhere can feel truly safe. Silent Hill 2 regularly left me with a low, thudding heart rate and a ‘sweep and clear’ approach to exploring, especially when things got more nightmarish. The game likes to scare you not by screaming your guts out but by making you steadily sweat with the worry that something will happen at some point and startle you when it’s least expected — I had to end one of my streamed play sessions earlier than intended, not because I was tired of playing it for the night, but because I was practically exhausted from the constant fear I was feeling.
To the games’ credit, it doesn’t employ obnoxious jump scares that induce tinnitus; there’s a handful of environmental scares that are startling, but Silent Hill 2 weaponizes the aforementioned dread and tension against you to multiply the spookiness, whether by an encounter or the ambient soundscape. One source of scares does end up overstaying its welcome in a hurry though, as there’s an enemy type that likes to hide around corners or behind objects then pop out for an ambush. The first dozen times are chuckle-worthy in that ‘ohh, you got me!’ kind of way, but by the end of the game, it was pretty easy to sniff out when an ambush was coming, excluding scripted ones.
There are only two significant missteps with the game (and even then, they aren’t horribly egregious) being combined twofold, with callbacks to the original game and an additional character later on with their nagging dialogue. Throughout Silent Hill 2, there are instances with puzzles/items or context-sensitive locations that have been changed/replaced with a mini-vignette being used to highlight it. This would be a nice, unintrusive nod; however, near the halfway point, a character joins James that turns these moments from subtle to blatant, making quips while exploring and sucking a portion of the tension away. In the context of the story, their involvement makes sense as to why they’d be trying to lead James forward, but not being able to quiet down about smashing windows for items or ‘going the wrong way’ comes across as nagging and only serves as agitation.
It’s like there’s an attempt to bring some levity to the despair and stress, but it’s delivered less tongue-in-cheek and more tongue-out-of-mouth. That said, the additional character’s quippy commentary lasts for around nine to twenty minutes based on how you proceed, so it isn’t agitating for very long — It was still negatively effective enough to pull me out of the horror, though.
Even with the remake having part of its foot stuck in the past and combat losing its lustre by the end, Silent Hill 2 is still an easy recommendation; I’m not the most well-versed when it comes to the horror genre, yet I’m confident that it’ll deliver if you’re after a thoughtful, exploratory eerie journey in a small town that wants you dead (and dreary).
