Reviewer Dani can’t cease fascinated with Silent Hill f. Regardless of its nice attraction, she will be able to’t forgive the sport for a couple of main flaws. And these may additionally bitterly disappoint different Silent Hill followers.
With each hour I spend testing Silent Hill f, the long-awaited survival horror recreation divides me increasingly more into two components.
One half of me is in love with the improbable setting, the nice staging, and the beautiful soundscape. I can’t cease fascinated with the sport and am already planning my third playthrough.
The opposite half of me is disenchanted as a result of Silent Hill f leaves lots of potential untapped, makes boring design choices, and commits two main errors that I simply can’t recover from.
Silent Hill f sends me on a wild curler coaster experience that leaves my feelings in a sweat-inducing tangle. So the reply to the query you’re all dying to know is rather more sophisticated than you would possibly assume: “Is it an excellent Silent Hill recreation?” Let me take you on a sensory journey so you may piece collectively the reply for your self.
A feast for the eyes with a couple of minor drawbacks
For the primary time, the 26-year-old collection turns its again on the small US city of Silent Hill and takes me to Japan as an alternative. And the builders get loads out of the brand new setting.
Silent Hill f is a lovely recreation that mixes horror and wonder to create a complicated mix that feels otherworldly, dreamlike, and eerie abruptly.
After schoolgirl Hinako argues along with her father and flees to her pals, the village of Ebisugaoka is engulfed in thick fog and overrun by monsters. I sneak via the slender alleys of the village, remedy puzzles in a foggy rice area, search refuge in an deserted faculty, and repeatedly get up in an alternate dream world.
Silent Hill f presents me with many various settings – generally I’m in buildings, generally within the open air, however the recreation stays linear all through.
Right here and there, I can discover a couple of optionally available areas – however Ebisugaoka is on no account a labyrinth during which I may get misplaced.
When the fog descends on the gorgeous Japanese village, I instantly really feel like I’m again in Silent Hill. When stunning, vivid crimson flowers unfold like an unstoppable plague and steadily take over the village, I can’t assist however marvel at their magnificence and splendor. The horror on this small Japanese city will not be at all times apparent and generally hides within the surreal magnificence and small particulars that remodel a standard setting into a wierd twilight world. This uncommon mixture captivates me from the very first second.
The one slight damper on my enthusiasm is the know-how: even on our high-end take a look at system with an RTX 5080 and AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D, there have been minor stutters all through the sport throughout exploration, fight, and cutscenes, which detract from the general impression. Because of this, I’m deducting one level from the score for efficiency.
Not a straightforward digestible meal – with an especially bitter aftertaste
I don’t need to reveal any particulars concerning the story, as a result of piecing it collectively is a elementary a part of the Silent Hill f gaming expertise. It’s primarily about Hinako, who’s torn between her dad and mom’ expectations and her personal needs when a wierd fog descends on the town.
Silent Hill f throws me straight into an online of mysteries, psychological pictures, and cryptic snippets of knowledge, and I’m glad to get caught up in it. It offers with Japanese tradition and the picture of ladies within the Sixties. It’s about household expectations and obligations. Bullying in school and friendships. Faith and common beliefs.
The wildest theories are already dancing round in my head. I start to distrust Hinako’s pals, weighing their each phrase. Silent Hill steadily throws me into even deeper abysses that make my jaw drop.
At its greatest, this horror recreation offers me goosebumps again and again. Disturbing conditions alternate with eerie staging that makes my abdomen tie itself in knots.
I might love to attract a line underneath it right here and inform you that Silent Hill f will get all the pieces proper in its story…
… however then it makes two huge errors that put my love for the sport to the take a look at. I gained’t reveal any particulars concerning the story, however I do want to speak about moments that would spoil the shock for you. So when you don’t need any details about the gameplay and the ending, skip the subsequent two sections within the spoiler field.
[[1st mistake: An unfortunate metaphor
About halfway through the game, I witness an important change that raises many exciting questions from a story perspective and opens up the potential for numerous gameplay possibilities. To reinforce the metaphor, this change also spills over into the gameplay.
I think the idea of linking story and gameplay is great…
… but this endeavor fails completely due to the technical implementation. Within minutes, all the tension that Silent Hill f has built up so well up to this point is shattered. The game mechanics turn the horror game into a run-of-the-mill action orgy that doesn’t fit the tone of the game at all.
This could have been solved in a much more elegant and subtle way, which would have had a thousand times greater impact. As it is, it just feels like a huge foreign body that I can’t ignore until the end and which, for me, becomes a real turn-off.
2nd mistake: Take two!
Silent Hill f offers a total of five different endings. On the first playthrough, all players see the same finale. Only in New Game Plus are there opportunities to unlock the remaining endings. So far, so familiar.
On my second playthrough in New Game Plus, a significant part of the story actually changes. I get to see completely different dialogues and new or slightly modified cutscenes, and I can delve deeper into the story thanks to new documents.
Suddenly, I experience a completely new interpretation of events that change the story so much in places that the second run feels like a new game. New Game Plus cleverly intertwines with the first playthrough and motivates you to engage with the game even more…
…but it also leaves a bitter aftertaste.
Because at this point, at the latest, it becomes clear to me: if you want to understand the story of Silent Hill f even a little bit, you have to finish the game at least twice.
The first ending cannot stand on its own, feels unsatisfactory, and seems more like a teaser for NG+ than a complete story.
Silent Hill f raises so many different themes: family, friends, role models, folklore, illness, and so on. None of these are brought together or explained.
I’m not talking about having to fill in a few gaps here and there yourself, as in the Silent Hill 2 remake, for example. No, I miss the common thread, and it feels like I’m missing a huge chunk of the game. And I can only find it by playing through the game a second time.
A fight system to show your nostril up at
The brand new action-oriented fight system induced lots of dialogue within the run-up to the discharge. After two playthroughs, I can provide the all-clear: Silent Hill f will not be a Souls-like recreation. The fight system has completely regular recreation mechanics with a couple of gimmicks which may be new to Silent Hill video games, however have been seen a thousand instances in different motion video games.
I assault with gentle or heavy assaults, dodge enemy assaults, parry on the proper second…
… I’ve to observe my stamina consumption and likewise control my sanity after I activate focus mode. My particular assault can stun enemies – a breather! – My melee weapons don’t final without end and I’ve to restore them, I can improve my stats, Omamori fortunate charms give me small buffs, there are gentle and heavy weapons…
As you may see, Silent Hill f virtually overwhelms me with tutorials on the fight and degree system. It feels bloated and misplaced – and it’s not even notably nicely applied.
There’s hardly any hit suggestions. Hinako takes unusual breaks between all her actions, which drive me loopy. The hitboxes of the enemies are everywhere. Focusing on solely appears to work on odd calendar days.
And I’ve given up counting what number of instances I’ve smashed my baseball bat in opposition to a wall. The fight system and the slender corridors simply don’t combine.
The restricted sturdiness of the weapons provides neither tactical depth nor pleasure to the sport; it’s simply annoying. A minimum of on the primary two issue ranges, there are at all times sufficient weapons or restore kits mendacity round.
Talking of issue: in story mode, which Konami recommends because the “basic Silent Hill expertise,” the fights really feel very straightforward, with a couple of exceptions. The bosses specifically go down quicker than I can assume “Pyramidhead.”
The “arduous” mode, i.e., the second issue degree, is extra paying homage to a standard issue degree, as we all know it from the Silent Hill 2 remake, for instance. Right here, nonetheless, the sport turns into irritating in direction of the top as a result of the fight system stays fiddly and the ever-increasing waves of enemies make it a torture. The boss fights additionally drag on too lengthy because of the extreme well being bar. The proper gaming expertise would due to this fact lie someplace between the 2 modes.
Goosebumps you may hear
If I haven’t scared you off but, make sure to play Silent Hill f with headphones! As a result of the sound design is admittedly – pardon my informal language – completely superior!
Intense background music and oppressive silence alternate skillfully. As I sneak via the supposedly abandoned corridors of the varsity, I flinch on the sound of stomping footsteps. I flip round in panic on the rustling of leaves within the forest. My abdomen tightens after I hear a rumbling noise and don’t know the place it’s coming from.
The spotlight, nonetheless, are the magnificent items created by Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka. Conventional Japanese devices and melodies meet dissonant tone sequences, distortions, and series-typical creaking that seems like somebody is taking part in on outdated constructing pipes.
Yamaoka creates an eerie cloud of sound that caresses my ears however on the similar time sends a shiver down my backbone. And above all of it hangs a hypnotic melancholy that pulls me deeper and deeper into this distinctive environment.
…
What? No objections in any respect?
Nope. The soundscape is prime notch. We completely agree on that…
…
Can I play it in German?
Silent Hill f has English and Japanese voiceovers. Each are good, however I extremely suggest the Japanese one as a result of it sounds and feels much more genuine.
In fact, you may choose a German translation and have all of the textual content and subtitles displayed in German. There is no such thing as a German voice performing.
So does all of it really feel like Silent Hill or not?
Sure…
No.
Now let me end!
In its greatest moments, sure.
Silent Hill f does lots of issues proper. The masterful interaction of sound, visuals, and staging is dripping with Silent Hill aptitude. The hairs on the again of my neck rise up when the digicam performs with perspective in cutscenes and divulges issues taking place behind Hinako’s again. When Hinako’s pals out of the blue say unusual issues throughout a standard dialog.
The horror recreation is aware of how you can throw out a thriller to seize me as a participant and maintain me hooked.
However then there are all these moments that snap me out of this trance. The clunky fight system places the give attention to motion, which in the long term distracts an excessive amount of from the horror and the preliminary pressure. Particularly in direction of the top, Silent Hill f now not seems like survival horror.
After which there are the 2 design choices I discussed earlier that I simply can’t forgive the sport for. Even the story, which is definitely fairly thrilling, culminates in endings that attain the extent of kitschiness of a “experience into the sundown” and unfold in a means that I might not have anticipated from a Silent Hill recreation. Most of the resolutions are so clumsy that they depart me disenchanted. The build-up to the thriller is a lot stronger than the precise rationalization behind it – and I want I hadn’t learn a number of the diaries and was nonetheless at the hours of darkness.
The rancid and rusty otherworld from the earlier video games made me really feel very uncomfortable and gave me the sensation that I might catch an an infection if I seemed on the oxidized metal partitions one too many instances. As compared, the choice world in Silent Hill f appears very sterile and leaves me lacking that sure one thing.
“So is Silent Hill f an excellent Silent Hill?” By now, it is best to notice how tough it’s to reply this query. The horror recreation is a basic case of “It’s nice, however…”
For each optimistic and excellent expertise I had…
… is adopted by one thing that bothers me, ruins the temper, or makes me really feel like I’m being taken for a experience as a participant.
Regardless of all the pieces, I had fun with the survival horror recreation and will certainly give it a 3rd attempt to delve deeper into the story and its secrets and techniques. Silent Hill f is an effective horror recreation with plenty of nice concepts, terrific sound, and improbable staging, …
… however in the long run, it nonetheless can’t sustain with its distinctive predecessors as a result of it places too many obstacles in its personal means.
Editor’s conclusion
Silent Hill f doesn’t have it straightforward. It’s the primary fundamental recreation within the collection in 13 years. The primary fundamental recreation within the collection since Kojima’s notorious P.T. was scrapped. For the primary time, the collection is ready in Japan. The stress on the builders and the expectations of the followers are huge.
When colleagues requested me in latest days what I considered Silent Hill f, my proper eye began to twitch. As a result of I merely can’t sum up this gaming expertise in two sentences. The horror recreation makes so many errors. It takes paths that merely don’t go well with my style or disappoint me. The longer I give it some thought, the extra fake pas and technical errors I discover. And but it nonetheless impacts me. I simply can’t get away from Silent Hill f. Usually, I play video games via as soon as and watch different endings on YouTube. However for the primary time, I actually need to unlock each ending myself and expertise the modifications in NG+.
Silent Hill f will not be a basic Silent Hill expertise. It doesn’t even come near one of the best spin-offs within the collection. However it’s a particular expertise that, in its greatest moments, seems like a return to the foggy US city. It might not go down in historical past as one of the best Silent Hill recreation, however it’ll undoubtedly stay in my reminiscence for a very long time to come back – regardless of its simple tough edges.
Not often have I been so glad that I don’t have to present a recreation a rating. Not often lately has a recreation captivated and enthralled me a lot, solely to frustrate me to the max the subsequent second.
Silent Hill f has an extremely thrilling story, scores factors with actually inventive digicam work, and arguably one of the best sound design I’ve heard lately.
However the recreation additionally suffers from a horrible fight system, uneven pacing, and questionable design choices. Why is there no point out anyplace within the recreation of how essential a second playthrough is? With such an essential New Recreation Plus, there merely must be a touch about it.
Regardless of all its issues, I maintain coming again to it. This Silent Hill simply gained’t let me go. As a result of regardless that Silent Hill f is terrible in its worst moments, it’s masterful in its greatest.
