A living nightmare
Heather likes to think of herself as an ordinary girl, though she is about to discover that there is more to her life than she can actually remember. Her life is turned upside down when a trip to the shopping mall turns into a nightmare, and consequently begins to lead her down a path which will not only expose her to the occult, religious fanaticists and her own personal hell, but also begin to unravel the mysteries of her past.
The fog binds us all
Heather would appear to be a much stronger character than both Harry and James (from the previous games). While the other two men were middle aged and relatively calm in nature, Heather is young, aggressive and frankly a little bit of a bitch. Her actions and reactions with and towards the other NPCs are simply more interesting to watch. In fact, nearly everything about Silent Hill 3 is more interesting than its predecessors. The third iteration flows much better than the second, getting off to a flying start rather than making you wander around aimlessly for a good hour. Heather starts her quest off in an amusement park, but wakes up from this dream after a sudden shock. There is a constant switch between the real world and seemingly alternate worlds throughout. These transitions get more creepy as you progress through the game, testing your ability to handle fear, though you will get the occasional Resident Evil-esque cheap shock.
Right off the bat, your only method of defending yourself against the hideous beasts inhabiting the game world is a pocket knife. You’ll eventually graduate onto the handy steel pipe, and later on get into the serious weapons such as the shotgun, sub machine gun and katana blade. The combat system has been improved since Silent Hill 2, as it is no longer a case of mindless hacking and slashing. Monsters seem a lot stronger across the board, and it is likely that you will be doing more running than fighting this time around. If running isn’t your forte, you can lure the monsters using some beef jerky, and then bop them across the back of the head with your steel pipe. Various strikes for the melee weapons are still controlled by the amount of pressure you put on the button, though this methodology has been improved.
Puzzles are back in a big way for Silent Hill 3, because a horror game without puzzles is like a car without a battery. Once again, you can select from three difficulty levels for your puzzles (at the same time as you set the normal game difficulty), with Easy simplifying, and sometimes excluding puzzles, while Hard will expose you to all of the puzzles in the game, while ensuring that they test out your ability to think. Puzzles are fairly linear in this outing due to the confined spaces provided by the game, though there are some moments where you will be scratching your head.
Length is probably the most troublesome issue in Silent Hill 3. By correcting the problems in the flow of the gameplay, Konami seem to have made things seem a little bit shorter. In my case, the ending was reached after about 6 hours (though the game’s clock read 3 hours and 32 minutes) on the normal difficulty, so expect somewhere between 6 and 8 hours for your initial playthrough. It’s short, but once again, there are alternate endings to the story which are triggered by doing/not doing certain things during the course of the game. There are also a couple of new weapons and costumes to unlock by achieving certain criteria.
Deck the halls with blood and gore
Silent Hill 3 boasts an amazing overall atmosphere as well as some of the most impressive visuals on the Playstation 2. One moment you’ll find yourself in what appears to be a normal shopping mall, and suddenly everything will change – the walls will be covered in blood and dirt, the lights will have gone out and some of the ugliest creatures you’ve ever seen will be roaming around. Silent Hill 3 displays some of the most stomach churning environments you are likely to see in a game without the display being over the top. Texture work on the environments is on par with Silent Hill 2, with a few new special effects in certain parts of the game. All environments are rendered in real time.
The most notable graphical change is the elimination of the pre-rendered cut scenes. The reason for the lack of FMV is the simple fact that Konami didn’t need to produce any because their real time characters look better than the pre-rendered characters in Silent Hill 2. Facial texturing and animation is second to none – the characters look real and provide a convincing range of emotions. Heather’s in game animation is also very good; in fact I think this is one of the first times we’ve seen a female character in a game who actually runs like a girl. The new monsters are absolutely grotesque, and the returning monsters are as gruesome as ever. Camera control has been enhanced slightly from Silent Hill 2, though there seem to be a couple more static camera moments than in the previous game. Frame rate is consistent across the game and the option to play the game in 60 Hz has also been provided.
The aural experience of Silent Hill 3 is does an excellent job in complimenting the overall visual style and producing a spine tingling atmosphere. The soundtrack succeeds in providing a somewhat creepy atmosphere during the cut scenes, but excels when combined with excellent ambient audio. The hairs on the back of your neck will stand on end when the crashing of metal and inhuman screams are combined with decadent environments. The lyrical work in the intro and credits sequence isn’t particularly good, though. Voice acting is top notch, with each character having a talented actor and an excellent script to work with.
Sleep with the light on
It’s fair to say that Silent Hill 3 is the strongest entry into the series to date. The atmosphere makes the player feel slightly unnerved and a bit scared, but the excellent gameplay compels them to continue playing. It’s almost the classic mix of what a sequel should do - surpass the original in every conceivable way. Silent Hill 3 provides one of the most satisfying audio/visual experiences on the Playstation 2, and manages to back it up with solid gameplay. Don’t let the issue of length concern you as Silent Hill 3 is one of the must play titles in the Playstation 2’s software library.
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