Silent Hill 15 years of survival horror

When did we stop being scared in video games? There was a time when playing a survival horror was synonymous with being embarrassed. De think twice before messing with the lights off and headphones on . Okay, lately has come for another title other able to put one’s hair stand on end, but big franchises like ‘Resident Evil’ failed to impress while (expect a godsend ‘The Evil Within’ , the new commitment by the dirty and grimy survival of Shinji Mikami, Dad ‘RE’).

Today marks fifteen years of the launch of ‘Silent Hill’ , the title that was born to tell others how they had to make a good game rompenervios able to take us to the edge of madness. It’s never been fucked face a survival horror . At that time, the work of Shinji Mikami and was on the second installment, but his proposal of special agents against zombies did not go the typical resource swipe blaring when less (or not so little) expected, easy scare.

Eye, ‘Resident Evil’ hooked us and remains one of the best known brands in the industry, even though its latest installment to date is a total absurdity which urine on the original (in the worst possible sense), but ‘ Silent Hill ‘ , perpetrated by Team Silent, playing in another league.

Welcome to Silent Hill Resort Town:-

Harry Mason is directed drive to Silent Hill with his daughter Cheryl. Have an accident. Mason is knocked unconscious. When he awakes in horror finds that Cheryl is not on the passenger seat. They have come to Silent Hill, but the car is wrecked and Cheryl missing.

In ‘Silent Hill’ everything is designed to transmit distress, fear, discomfort and even disgust if you’re a little apprehensive. The early stages could not be more discouraging: the city is completely empty and all they found around every corner are traces of blood, foreign bodies, crushed wheel chairs … The ideal place to spend a nice holiday if we plan to finish them with a horrible death .

The graphic style of the game, very different to what was being done in the genre, takes advantage of the limitations of the machine that runs (the first PlayStation) and puts them in your favor to create a truly rarefied atmosphere. Against the ‘Resident Evil’ and prerendered scenes, ‘Silent Hill’ commitment generated 3D environments in real time to allow their creators to play with certain visual elements capable of maddening injury.

A regular guy:-

Accustomed to the games of this type they were featuring law enforcement (‘Resident Evil’), detectives (‘Alone in the Dark’) and even treasure hunters (‘Sweet Home’), one of the keys’ Silent Hill ‘was put ourselves in the shoes of an ordinary guy .

Harry Mason, for the player, is a father who lost his daughter in an accident and has to deal with it as you would any other: the desperate . Find an ally to another, you will get some help (very little), but basically only face a strange town which also has several each more twisted alternate dimensions.

The fog and the fear of the unknown

‘The Mist’ by Stephen King is one of the many influences that can be found in the game. In its pages we discover a small population that is abruptly flooded by a thick fog. A strange mist monsters hiding inside. The protagonists are a group of people who are forced to stay in a supermarket without really knowing what to expect or do to eliminate the threat. The fear of the unknown will devour.

In ‘Silent Hill’ fog will be responsible for receiving us with open arms into a resource that works on two levels: one is responsible for covering the shortcomings of the console (the PlayStation joy could not move with three-dimensional environments that currently take for outdated), but the other is a fantastic monster that gets us into the body the fear of the unknown in the most cruel manner. Cheryl appears from time to time through the thick fog and the player will be forced to go after her, but the fog … the fog is always there and it sounds strange arise.

As if this were not enough, the developers decided that they could still do more to generate discomfort through a twisted use of the camera. Choosing some really odd angles makes the player is thinking at all times, to turn the next corner, expect a certain death.

Teachers of psychological terror:-

There are horror movies or games that, over time, lose their original capacity to shred our nerves. And there are video games and movies that remain essentially intact: the movie ‘Alien: The Eighth Passenger’ is and will remain a key piece of psychological horror. Today, fifteen years after the release of ‘Silent Hill’, is freaking out as the first day.

The soundtrack from Akira Yamaoka is excellent, but especially where the game excels is in the section of the sound effects. The Fog (and dark when Harry wanders areas where it misses) is the perfect excuse to move all the psychological burden to the audio. Mason visibility is always very small, which takes the player to be constantly aware of all the sounds that occur around him.

To this must be added the more screwed all game including invention: the radio that Mason takes over and tells you with a static sound wonderful, the proximity of some monster. You can draw a parallel between this radio and motion detector that takes over Ripley for the position of the xenomorphs in ‘Alien’, but the radio is much less grateful .

Assaulting our worst nightmares:-

‘Silent Hill’ eventually became a franchise with a handful of deliveries, none of them live up to the original, unfortunately, but we left a lot of other memorable locations and enemies.

A hospital, a school, the same streets of Silent Hill … the alternative version of all these places that suddenly fill with blood, guts and strange beings … Pyramid Head as absolute enemy … momentazos as the flying monster impacting window the cafeteria … phones ringing in an abandoned and cursed people …

‘Silent Hill’ gets into the skin, meat, digs into your ribs with a sharp knife and, in the 2014, tells you that you have no idea what a survival horror if you have not played .