Silent Hill 3 (2003) Throwback Review
Introduction:
There seems to be a consensus among Silent Hill fans that the atmosphere of the games can be somewhat enchanting. After finishing Silent Hill 2 Remake not too long ago, I didn’t feel ready to leave that town behind. I wanted more. There’s something addicting to the horror presented in these early games
And the real wonder is, why? Why did I want more rusty and decaying nightmare fuel? I think it’s because, unlike its competitors like Resident Evil, you aren’t exploring haunted mansions or creepy castles in Romania. In Silent Hill, you explore mundane locations such as apartment buildings, subway stations, and schools. There’s something beautiful about the relatable nature of its terror. It feels like once I shut off the game console and feel the silence around me, I myself could be warped to Silent Hill.
It’s going to be a while before we hear if Bloober Team and Konami are going to link back up for more Silent Hill. But after the stellar reviews anything is possible! A Silent Hill 1 remake would make the most sense because its plot is interconnected to Silent Hill 3. But this is Konami we’re talking about. They seem to be aiming mostly for fan favorites with their remakes. They skipped Metal Gear Solid 1 and 2 and jumped straight for the popular pick, Metal Gear Solid 3. And the same goes with Silent Hill; they skipped 1 and jumped for the more beloved Silent Hill 2. It’s of course hard to gauge, but from my own findings it seems like the second most popular game in the series is Silent Hill 3.
After falling in love with the world thanks to SH2 Remake, I refuse to wait possibly 3-4 years for a potential Silent Hill 3 Remake. Let’s see how the PlayStation 2 original holds up.
Gameplay:
If you remember from my SH2 Remake review, I criticized the control scheme of the original game. I’m not going to go back on my word and suddenly act like I love it now. But, with the added investment of being a much more serious fan of the series, I’m able to transport myself back to 2003 and face the controls for what they are. I’m not going to sit here and act like “the combat is bad on purpose because you’re playing as an everyman”. That’s dumb.
I had a revelation while I was thinking over the old control style of Silent Hill 1-4. Three of my favorite games of all time are the Team Ico trilogy, and all of those games arguably have iffy controls. Personally, they never bothered me too much. When I play a game like Ico, I can dismiss the lackluster combat because I understand that’s not what the game is about. And the same thing can be said about Silent Hill 1, 2 and 3. It’s not about action. It’s about the atmosphere, music, monster designs and story. So you know what? I had no shame putting the combat difficulty onto Easy. I wasn’t really in the mood for anything harder. I’m here for the vibes.
Silent Hill 3 uses fixed camera angles, a lock-on system when you aim at an enemy, and tons of menu navigation. The lock-on is a godsend in these games, and usually makes combat a matter of distance between you and your enemy. Because I chose Easy for the combat, I was given an extreme amount of resources. 60 shotgun bullets and 30 handgun bullets in under two hours- that kind of easy. But like I said, I’m not in the mood to die a bunch of times and be kicked back to the title screen. This is the era before autosaving and fast loading. You can easily lose a ton of progress if you die. Couple that with bottomless pits and some unexpected one-hit kill obstacles, and this game could be frustrating on higher difficulties. Oddly enough, I couldn’t find much information on peoples experience with Easy mode in this game. I heard Silent Hill 3 on Normal was harder than 2 on Normal, and that the game suffered from too many enemies overwhelming. Bottomless pits also didn’t sound fun; luckily they aren’t present in Easy mode. I didn’t feel overwhelmed with enemies during my playthrough; so it’s possible that choosing Easy meant a decreased amount of enemies. Works for me! I honestly prefer less frequent combat and more time to soak in the environments.
Usually I’m not too crazy about fixed camera angles, but multiple times during my playthrough, I audibly said “wow” at how artfully placed these angles are. I also made frequent use of the L2 button, which forces the camera to keep an almost over-the-shoulder position. While the camera is certainly not perfect, and I found myself struggling to get good angles at times, it’s also not as bad as I expected.
These are my favorite fixed camera angles in any game.
Other than combat and navigation, the early Silent Hill games are noteworthy for their puzzles. These games remind me of point and click adventure games. I remember feeling that way after finishing Silent Hill 1 a few years back. You usually bump into a main point of interest and get some hints. Then you have to explore other areas, and bring items back to the main point of interest. The answer is often hilariously goofy; like the infamous canned juice down the garbage chute in Silent Hill 2. It’s hard for me to gauge how complicated these puzzles are because I put the puzzle difficulty on Easy. That’s right, I did combat and puzzle difficulty on Easy. Am I a baby? I guess. But at least it gives me a reason to replay this game at a later date.
I actually do regret picking easy on the puzzles because the game gave me painfully obvious hints for every solution. It also felt like I was moving through certain levels too fast. Apparently on Easy, some of the smaller puzzles are gone entirely. I’ve heard that Hard puzzle difficulty is a bit too much in this game, so next time I play Silent Hill 3, I will definitely be picking Normal difficulty for puzzles.
One last important note is the weaponry found in this game. It seems a bit extreme and almost comedic how many weapons you find in Silent Hill 3. You can find things like a katana, a mace, a submachine, a flamethrower and lightsaber (the last two being available on New Game +). It makes me wonder if it’s because the designers wanted the player to embrace combat more (noted by the addition of a block button). Or maybe they wanted to boost the feeling of Heather Mason’s more combative attitude when compared to the series’ previous two protagonists. Heather is seventeen years old and isn’t afraid to give some attitude to people she feels earned it. I can’t help but feel like the crazier weaponry match her personality.
Presentation:
I think it’s pretty safe to say that even the worst Silent Hill games have some pretty great atmosphere and locations. And luckily, Silent Hill 3 is far from the worst in the series. It’s in the top three for sure!
And a lot of that has to do with how incredible the locations are to explore this time around.
Silent Hill 3 is clearly defined in two halves (more on this later). The first half follows Heather Mason as she makes her way home from a day at the mall. Narratively speaking, it’s pretty lacking. But in terms of gameplay and the focus of this section of the review, presentation, it’s incredible.
We quickly get to explore an empty mall and attempt to take the subway home. As somebody who spent the first 22 years of his life living in New York; I’m quite familiar with taking buses and subway trains. I’ve done the specific mall to subway trip multiple times. I have to commend Team Silent for being able to translate these locations so seamlessly into a PlayStation 2 game. The subway was absolutely perfect and felt right at home for me. It might be lost on people who live in more rural areas, but trust me, the subway was incredibly realistic. Even things like the ticket machines and wooden benches were spot on. We then take the sewers, and get into an office building/construction site. I couldn’t stop but take in the little details like posters on the wall, whiteboards scribbled with notes, and desks cluttered with knick knacks. The office building might have the most attention out of any area of this game, and I loved it. I also love the scenery that feels empty in a dreamlike way. In the mall there’s these escalators that lead down to nowhere but black bottomless pits. That’s just one example.
I mention all this because I’m astounded that this is a 2003 game. The Xbox 360 wouldn’t launch for another two years, and the PlayStation 3 for three more years. Silent Hill 3 looks like it belongs on those systems. The character models look fantastic, and the details in the environments are gorgeous. Everybody mentions the blemishes on Heather’s face looking great, but I also loved her hair. It looks like she recently chopped it to shoulder length herself in a bit of rebellion or curiosity. It’s awesome. I can’t remember the last time I was this shocked by how good a PlayStation 2 game looked.
We then get to the second half of the game. This is where it becomes clear that Silent Hill 3 was butchered during development. I don’t mean that in an aggressively negative way. It’s a fun game all the way through. But unlike the first two games which take place all in the town of Silent Hill, this third game only has us in town for a couple of hours. And we even have to revisit one of the main dungeons of Silent Hill 2, Brookhaven Hospital. As somebody with a love/hate relationship with Brookhaven, I was a little cautious about entering it again. But I think Silent Hill 3’s take on Brookhaven Hospital is my favorite level in the entire series. It becomes clear very quickly that Heather is being stalked as she explores the hospital. She’s being left notes from a freak names Stanley Coleman. Many times when you open a door to a new area, you can hear footsteps and doors opening and closing. Sometimes heavy breathing too. You can just imagine some gross weirdo running away from you, the player, leaving these notes. I expected to bump into Stanley at any moment.
The use of sound in this game is perhaps better than any other game I’ve played. There’s always this feeling of distant terror. Whether it be footsteps in the room above you, or a woman crying off screen. There’s also the Pendulum enemy, which makes the most horrifying sound ever.
As for the voice acting, it’s Silent Hill. I’ve seen many debates online stating that the voice acting in the original games were specifically aiming for a David Lynch style. A bizarreness to the delivery which adds to an otherworldly feeling. I love that approach, but sometimes you can still tell that the voice actor just sucks. Luckily the only voice actor I think doesn’t do a good job is for the character of Douglas. At least in the first half of the game. The second half he started to grow on me a bit.
Needless to say, 21 years later and Silent Hill 3 still needs to be studied for its levels of high presentation and atmosphere in gaming.
Story:
Ahhh, possibly the most divisive thing about this game. It is pretty much accepted as a fact that Silent Hill 3 was supposed to continue the trend established by Silent Hill 2. For those unfamiliar:
Silent Hill 1 tells the story of the titular town becoming a hellscape mostly because of a cult named “The Order”.
Silent Hill 2 instead makes that titular town a more spiritual and custom punishment for those with darkness in their hearts. To me and many other people, this is the better approach for Silent Hill. It allows each protagonist to have an entirely new version of the town made specificially for their trauma and backstory.
Silent Hill 3 was supposed to follow Silent Hill 2’s version of the town. But reportedly, Japanese players didn’t love Silent Hill 2 as much as the first game. And both fan outcry and Konami (arguably just Konami) urged Team Silent to link Silent Hill 3 to the SH1’s cult storyline.
Add on a rushed development period (hence the reused assets and hospital from SH2), and we have the released version of Silent Hill 3.
Regardless of its troubled development, it’s a miracle that Silent Hill 3 turned out as good as it did. I adore Heather Mason as a protagonist. The writers did a great job at portraying a late teenager. Sometimes Heather comes off as a capable adult, but mostly she comes off as a child still figuring herself out- which she is. 17-19 is a weird age where you feel yourself crossing the bridge of childhood into normal adult life, but you’re not quite there yet.
Team Silent nailed their third protagonist. I didn’t mind the cult storyline coming back, but I must admit I found none of the cult characters particularly amazing. Claudia (our main antagonist) was alright, but not given enough screen time. The same can be said about Vincent- not enough screen time. Despite his goofy voice acting, I did like Douglas. He starts off as a semi-antagonist figure but quickly becomes Heathers main companion.
Again, all of these characters (including Leonard) could benefit from more screen time. This game only took me six hours to beat, and I hear on Normal and Hard difficulties it only takes about 8-10. Remember how I mentioned the first half of the game (Heather coming home from the mall) was narratively lacking? That’s because you only get like five minutes cumulative total of cutscenes for the first half of the game. You have so many questions and don’t feel much for any character. Another sign of rushed development. Unfortunately I see many people online say the aimlessness provided by the lack of story in the first half made them stop playing. My honest advice is Easy mode on bother difficulties. I was able to breeze through the first half and get to the main story bits fairly fast. But if you mostly love gameplay, the first half is still great.
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It wouldn’t be a Silent Hill game without heavy themes. While Team Silent has been extremely tight-lipped about the original story ideas for Silent Hill 3, it’s pretty obvious if you read between the lines. Tons of blood, women in pain, body image issues and some vaginal imagery paint a clear picture. It was supposed to be a horror story about womanhood.
Part of the reason I loved the first half of the game is because I felt like it was telegraphing the everyday horrors women could face when traveling alone. The subway level in particular made me empathize with my sister, who lived in New York even longer than I did and used the subways way more than me. It’s common sense for women in cities to carry pepper spray.
The Stanley Coleman stalking segment is a perfect reflection of creepy men forcing themselves onto women. Forcing their imaginary lives with specific a woman onto them. It’s disgusting and horrifying, and even more relevant today than ever with the advent of parasocial relationships thanks to the internet. Seriously, this 2003 game says a lot about stalking even today.
I really do wish the game focused on this stuff more. I see a lot of theories online that the original game could be all about abortion. Heather faces a forced pregnancy thanks to the cult in this game (another plot point I wish was elaborated on earlier in the game). Was that an idea from the original story concept? Some people have theorized because of some concept art that the character of Vincent might’ve originally been an older classmate or young teacher in Heathers high school, thus getting her pregnant.
The three images of Vincent on the left could easily fit in a high school setting. The image on the right (the final version) still gives off the impression of a young handsome teacher with predatory intentions.
I could spend all day writing more and more theories and wishes regarding Silent Hill 3. But the reality is quite simple:
This game is a miracle.
It was rushed and distorted by its publisher. Thankfully, a passionate group known as Team Silent were still able to make a work of art worth experience. This game gave me my favorite Silent Hill protagonist, some of my favorite levels, favorite musical tracks and moments. Yes, it could’ve been much more.
But nonetheless, it’s an absolute gem.
I can’t stop thinking about Silent Hill 3.
(In an effort to move away from traditional numerical scores, I will use the following metric: Hated, Felt Neutral, Liked, Loved, Can’t Stop Thinking About)
