I always enjoyed the horror genre. Sure, I may love those family friendly Nintendo games, and all of those bright colors in it. But, whenever I get the feeling, I just want to play a game that’s grim, dark, and terrifying. And thankfully, there is no short supply of terrifying video games. There are so many, like Dead Space, now turned into a non-survival horror game in the 3rd game thanks to EA’s co-op decision, Fatal Frame, which is now being highly censored due to angry mobs of femi-nazis, and Five Nights at Freddy’s…….. And that’s all I gotta say. But if there are two wonderful horror games that I love more than any other, it would be Resident Evil and Silent Hill.
These two games have become major staples in the horror genre, for being revolutionary, and for both being screwed over by their companies, with Resident Evil becoming an action series, and Silent Hill being practically dead. But, before Capcom and Konami screwed these franchises over, they were the best of the best back then, making masterpiece after masterpiece after an occasional “okay” review, then back to a masterpiece again. It was incredible seeing how successful these horror games were… But what makes them different from how scary they are? Why is one different from the other? Well, I will be using Resident Evil Remake on the Gamecube and Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams for the Xbox to describe this.
In Resident Evil, the fear you get is from paranoia. As you continue through the mansion, in the dark, you have no idea what’s around the corner. It could be some ammo or herbs, or even a shotgun. Or, it could be a zombie, or a Crimson Head, or even a boss like Yawn the giant snake or Black Tiger the spider (I think these people have no idea what a tiger is). You are always wondering, always guessing what is going to be right behind the door. And to make it worse, they change many things from the original and add it to the remake. Like the dog in the hallway. In the original one of Playstation, the dog would come out of the window once you passed it and attack you. In the remake, however, they trick you by only making a crack in the window. And once you come back down the hall, then comes the dog, ready to attack you. The paranoia makes you wonder when something is going to come and attack. But paranoia doesn’t only come in the form of a monster waiting for you in the next room. It also comes from when a zombie could walk right into the room you are in and surprise you. This is always random, but whenever you least expect it, or when you are on your way to another part of the mansion, a zombie could come right around the corner and attack you. But what makes the paranoia even more effective is another feature added to the remake, and that is the Crimson Heads. After you kill a zombie, instead of just going away, the body will stay there, lying on the ground for quite some time. The only way to have the body disappear is by shooting off the head (or the ankle on rare occasions), or coming back with kerosene to burn the body. But, if you try to ignore the body, it will get right back up the second you pass it, turning the zombie into a Crimson Head, a stronger, faster, and more powerful creature. The paranoia is only added when you remember that you’re ammo is very limited. In fact, everything is limited. You’re ammo, you’re herbs, you’re kerosene, and even the amount of times you can save. You are always wondering if you should use an item here or save it for later. You don’t know what to do or when to use an item. You are just supposed to pray that it was a good idea to use the shotgun ammo on the Crimson Head holding the round item, or if it was a good idea to save before giving yourself the serum after being poisoned by Yawn. The paranoia not only comes from the threat of enemies coming near you, but it also comes from the danger of using an item at the wrong moment. That is the kind of fear Resident Evil instills in its players.
Well, now that we finished with Resident Evil, I think it’s time we talk about Silent Hill… 2… Restless Dreams… Whatever. Silent Hill 2, too, can make the player feel paranoid. But instead of doing that, it uses something a bit better; Psychology. It wants you to feel disturbed and uncomfortable when you are playing. The fog all around the small town of Silent Hill keeps the enemies hidden from sight, however it is never used as a jumpscare. Instead, your radio gives off the sound of when a monster is near, and they slowly appear in the fog, never once jumping out at you. Instead, it makes it disturbing, to frighten you in a way by just looking at the creature and how they behave. This is shown a lot throughout the game, I should add. Everything in this game wants to disturb you. Like in the opening of the game, when you make it to Silent Hill. James says that his wife sent him a letter, although she has been dead for three years after a disease killed her. It doesn’t tell you exactly everything, making it very subtle, and all you can do is play through the game, and listen to James and see how he behaves in order to put the pieces together to find out the story. Even the first creature you run into is disturbing. The setting itself is disturbing. Besides the thick fog that is covering every inch of the city, there is blood covering the streets, old rotten apartments, garbage piled up everywhere, boarded up door and windows, and even dead bodies that can be examined all over the town. It makes it look like the town is abandoned or something. The sound is also quite disturbing in this game. Instead of the sound consisting of a monster screaming as loud as possible to injure your eardrums, what you have is a radio close to you, that starts to make a loud fuzzy noise whenever a monster is around. This is both helpful, as monsters are hard to see in the fog and they give you a chance to protect yourself, as well as being scary, as you now know that danger is close by. The music too is terrifying. The music consists of some nice music that sounds both haunting, but comforting at the same time. Then there is music that is just made to freak you out. I think the best moment that describes this is when in the apartment, when James reaches into a hole to grab the Clock Key, and the music is just this one metal object slamming against something. And then, it gets louder. And louder. And louder, making you get freaked out. And since there is obviously something on the other side of the hole, it makes this experience much more terrifying. And then there is the music for Pyramid Head, which is a bunch of loud metal clanging and banging together, as well as some instruments playing as well, making it both creepy, but saddening as well. Oh, and then there is Pyramid Head himself. Ignore the fact that he has become a major sell out in the franchise and let us remember that Pyramid Head was actually terrifying. And I mean TERRIFYING! Easily the most disturbing thing in all of Silent Hill 2, which is saying a lot. The first time you run into Pyramid Head, he isn’t even able to attack you. Instead, he stands behind a pair of steel bars, and just looks at you, as the radio goes crazy. All he does is stand there, and does not move. This is so much more disturbing than you think it is, as just looking at him, you’re thinking “Oh god. I gotta go near THAT guy”? And yes, you do… Several times. And when you meet him again in the same apartment, he is molesting a Mannequin, and you’re just forced to hide in a closet as he walks around, knowing that you are nearby. That is terrifying, knowing that a threatening monster is right in the same room with you, ready to kill you at any moment if you aren’t prepared. Pyramid Head is enough to prove my point that Silent Hill 2 is a disturbing game, but Team Silent went out of their way to make this game as disturbing as possible, giving us this beautifully terrifying masterpiece.
So, as you can see, though Resident Evil and Silent Hill 2 are both great horror games, they both have a different approach when it comes to using horror. Resident Evil is all about trying to mess with the player’s mind, making you feel unsafe in an abnormal environment, while Silent Hill 2 wanted you to explore the worst of humanity and to embrace it rather than detest it. I feel that both of these games show what survival horror really is. It’s a genre that puts the player in a situation that messes with them psychologically, pinning them against creatures that have more power than the players does, taking away the power that the player would have in a game like Halo or Grand Theft Auto. In a horror game, you are forced to use whatever you have on you to survive, and hope that it will be enough to make it to the next save point, and hope you have enough Ink Ribbon for it. Resident Evil and Silent Hill 2; They are both different in their scare methods, but are both perfectly well-made horror games.
These two games have become major staples in the horror genre, for being revolutionary, and for both being screwed over by their companies, with Resident Evil becoming an action series, and Silent Hill being practically dead. But, before Capcom and Konami screwed these franchises over, they were the best of the best back then, making masterpiece after masterpiece after an occasional “okay” review, then back to a masterpiece again. It was incredible seeing how successful these horror games were… But what makes them different from how scary they are? Why is one different from the other? Well, I will be using Resident Evil Remake on the Gamecube and Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams for the Xbox to describe this.
In Resident Evil, the fear you get is from paranoia. As you continue through the mansion, in the dark, you have no idea what’s around the corner. It could be some ammo or herbs, or even a shotgun. Or, it could be a zombie, or a Crimson Head, or even a boss like Yawn the giant snake or Black Tiger the spider (I think these people have no idea what a tiger is). You are always wondering, always guessing what is going to be right behind the door. And to make it worse, they change many things from the original and add it to the remake. Like the dog in the hallway. In the original one of Playstation, the dog would come out of the window once you passed it and attack you. In the remake, however, they trick you by only making a crack in the window. And once you come back down the hall, then comes the dog, ready to attack you. The paranoia makes you wonder when something is going to come and attack. But paranoia doesn’t only come in the form of a monster waiting for you in the next room. It also comes from when a zombie could walk right into the room you are in and surprise you. This is always random, but whenever you least expect it, or when you are on your way to another part of the mansion, a zombie could come right around the corner and attack you. But what makes the paranoia even more effective is another feature added to the remake, and that is the Crimson Heads. After you kill a zombie, instead of just going away, the body will stay there, lying on the ground for quite some time. The only way to have the body disappear is by shooting off the head (or the ankle on rare occasions), or coming back with kerosene to burn the body. But, if you try to ignore the body, it will get right back up the second you pass it, turning the zombie into a Crimson Head, a stronger, faster, and more powerful creature. The paranoia is only added when you remember that you’re ammo is very limited. In fact, everything is limited. You’re ammo, you’re herbs, you’re kerosene, and even the amount of times you can save. You are always wondering if you should use an item here or save it for later. You don’t know what to do or when to use an item. You are just supposed to pray that it was a good idea to use the shotgun ammo on the Crimson Head holding the round item, or if it was a good idea to save before giving yourself the serum after being poisoned by Yawn. The paranoia not only comes from the threat of enemies coming near you, but it also comes from the danger of using an item at the wrong moment. That is the kind of fear Resident Evil instills in its players.
Well, now that we finished with Resident Evil, I think it’s time we talk about Silent Hill… 2… Restless Dreams… Whatever. Silent Hill 2, too, can make the player feel paranoid. But instead of doing that, it uses something a bit better; Psychology. It wants you to feel disturbed and uncomfortable when you are playing. The fog all around the small town of Silent Hill keeps the enemies hidden from sight, however it is never used as a jumpscare. Instead, your radio gives off the sound of when a monster is near, and they slowly appear in the fog, never once jumping out at you. Instead, it makes it disturbing, to frighten you in a way by just looking at the creature and how they behave. This is shown a lot throughout the game, I should add. Everything in this game wants to disturb you. Like in the opening of the game, when you make it to Silent Hill. James says that his wife sent him a letter, although she has been dead for three years after a disease killed her. It doesn’t tell you exactly everything, making it very subtle, and all you can do is play through the game, and listen to James and see how he behaves in order to put the pieces together to find out the story. Even the first creature you run into is disturbing. The setting itself is disturbing. Besides the thick fog that is covering every inch of the city, there is blood covering the streets, old rotten apartments, garbage piled up everywhere, boarded up door and windows, and even dead bodies that can be examined all over the town. It makes it look like the town is abandoned or something. The sound is also quite disturbing in this game. Instead of the sound consisting of a monster screaming as loud as possible to injure your eardrums, what you have is a radio close to you, that starts to make a loud fuzzy noise whenever a monster is around. This is both helpful, as monsters are hard to see in the fog and they give you a chance to protect yourself, as well as being scary, as you now know that danger is close by. The music too is terrifying. The music consists of some nice music that sounds both haunting, but comforting at the same time. Then there is music that is just made to freak you out. I think the best moment that describes this is when in the apartment, when James reaches into a hole to grab the Clock Key, and the music is just this one metal object slamming against something. And then, it gets louder. And louder. And louder, making you get freaked out. And since there is obviously something on the other side of the hole, it makes this experience much more terrifying. And then there is the music for Pyramid Head, which is a bunch of loud metal clanging and banging together, as well as some instruments playing as well, making it both creepy, but saddening as well. Oh, and then there is Pyramid Head himself. Ignore the fact that he has become a major sell out in the franchise and let us remember that Pyramid Head was actually terrifying. And I mean TERRIFYING! Easily the most disturbing thing in all of Silent Hill 2, which is saying a lot. The first time you run into Pyramid Head, he isn’t even able to attack you. Instead, he stands behind a pair of steel bars, and just looks at you, as the radio goes crazy. All he does is stand there, and does not move. This is so much more disturbing than you think it is, as just looking at him, you’re thinking “Oh god. I gotta go near THAT guy”? And yes, you do… Several times. And when you meet him again in the same apartment, he is molesting a Mannequin, and you’re just forced to hide in a closet as he walks around, knowing that you are nearby. That is terrifying, knowing that a threatening monster is right in the same room with you, ready to kill you at any moment if you aren’t prepared. Pyramid Head is enough to prove my point that Silent Hill 2 is a disturbing game, but Team Silent went out of their way to make this game as disturbing as possible, giving us this beautifully terrifying masterpiece.
So, as you can see, though Resident Evil and Silent Hill 2 are both great horror games, they both have a different approach when it comes to using horror. Resident Evil is all about trying to mess with the player’s mind, making you feel unsafe in an abnormal environment, while Silent Hill 2 wanted you to explore the worst of humanity and to embrace it rather than detest it. I feel that both of these games show what survival horror really is. It’s a genre that puts the player in a situation that messes with them psychologically, pinning them against creatures that have more power than the players does, taking away the power that the player would have in a game like Halo or Grand Theft Auto. In a horror game, you are forced to use whatever you have on you to survive, and hope that it will be enough to make it to the next save point, and hope you have enough Ink Ribbon for it. Resident Evil and Silent Hill 2; They are both different in their scare methods, but are both perfectly well-made horror games.
