Content warning: This assessment discusses Silent Hill: The Short Message’s story, which incorporates references to self-hurt.
As a lifelong horror fan and longtime horror critic, I did not count on to assessment a free Silent Hill recreation that launched, PT-fashion, only a few minutes after it was revealed. And I actually did not count on it to be as forgettable as it’s. After greater than a decade away from consoles, Silent Hill: The Short Message revives the sequence as the primary of a number of video games over the subsequent few years. I sincerely hope future installments within the franchise can rekindle the lengthy-absent magic as a result of The Short Message doesn’t try this. In extra methods than one, it is not the playable teaser Silent Hill followers hoped for.
Silent Hill: The Short Message is a primary-individual horror recreation constructed on the thought of a time loop through which its tormented principal character is trapped. If that sounds acquainted, wait till you play it. The recreation is blatantly impressed by PT (or “Playable Teaser”), Hideo Kojima’s guerrilla demo for the by no means-launched Silent Hill title he was as soon as engaged on. The Short Message shouldn’t be Konami working again PT’s story with out its director. It’s a model-new entry into the sequence meant to be one thing of a leaping-on level for gamers uninitiated with the beforehand hibernating horror sequence. It’s neither tied to any previous entry, nor a teaser for a future installment.
Clocking in at about 90 minutes, its time dedication is temporary, its monetary dedication is non-existent, and but I nonetheless cannot advocate it as a result of it winds up feeling like a caricature of itself and should solely sour–or bitter further–one’s reminiscences of what was, for a time, the style’s greatest sequence.
The Short Message does not happen in Silent Hill, however it explains why that’s and tries to inform a narrative that checks all the same old containers. Main character enjoying the function of an unreliable narrator? Check. Horrors which can be heightened each time that character descends into the supernatural Otherworld? Yup. A twist that recontextualizes every part you have seen earlier than it? Of course. These may very well be seen as non-negotiable parts of any recreation sporting the Silent Hill identify, however the formulation felt recent in Silent Hill 2, was nonetheless satisfying in Silent Hill Homecoming, and was obvious–but not, I suppose, recreation-ruining–in Silent Hill Downpour. In The Short Message, nonetheless, it simply feels performed out, prefer it’s writing a ebook report utilizing solely the Spark Notes, understanding Silent Hill to be a metaphysical jail for a tortured wrongdoer, and taking the shortest attainable path to inform that story.
Referring to an in-universe worldwide incidence coined “The Silent Hill Phenomenon,” the sport explains that locations of despair have been identified to be enveloped in fog earlier than issues get even worse. Basically, the sport suggests, you may have a Silent Hill wherever, even within the unusual German city filled with Japanese teenagers the place the sport is about. It seems like a foolish addition to the lore when, beforehand, Silent Hill has by no means actually been thought of as being in the identical bodily place anyway. Silent Hill wasn’t precisely a city a lot as a vibe, however The Short Message confuses that method, or maybe intentionally reimagines it for the more serious.
These superficial particulars of what Silent Hill has been and, as I infer it, “should be,” are worsened by a script that lacks subtext or subtlety to a groan-inducing diploma. Characters converse their thoughts with such precision that they go away nothing unsaid, ever. As the participant, there is no room to misconceive, to ponder a personality’s intentions, or to be misdirected in any means aside from the a technique it does attempt to, which is probably going the apparent one you may see coming after only some minutes within the recreation.
The Short Message does search meaningfulness in its narrative, telling a darkish story about self-hurt, bullying, and a condemned constructing affected by ordinary suicides amongst younger women. There’s a kernel of one thing price exploring there, however it needs to be achieved deftly. Rather than paint in vibrant colours to create one thing poignant that each spooks its viewers and carries its supposed message to the end line, the sport seems like a firehose with two settings: platitudes and nonsense.
With frequent body-charge drops that see the sport endlessly floating between 40 and 60 frames per second, the sport additionally feels suboptimal on a technical stage. Given the strictly linear method and the restricted environments or results, it strikes me as odd that the sport cannot preserve constant efficiency.
But enjoying it is not only a technical eyesore. It’s an all-too-acquainted haunted home story that takes the seeds of PT however bears solely rotten fruit. In reality, The Short Message is indistinguishable from the last decade of PT-likes which have crowded Steam and different platforms since Kojima’s high-secret demo hit PS4. It’s truly worse than a number of the many others I’ve performed given the way it retreads a lot acquainted territory however to a much less spectacular diploma.
For instance, environments can morph within the instantaneous you flip away from them, meant to supply the sport with a way of disorientation a la Layers of Fear. But whereas that recreation enhanced this characteristic with phantasmagoric Dorian Gray-inspired shows, the place up was down and its setting nearly got here to life across the participant, The Short Message tends to merely swap one hallway for one more. Virtually the whole portion of the sport that takes place exterior of the Otherworld exists in decrepit hallways filled with graffiti the place each hall seems the identical. Occasional reside-motion scenes solely re-coloration the monotony resulting from how each scene staged with actual folks unfolds in the identical featureless white house.
The Short Message additionally makes use of disembodied voices to recall reminiscences you may unlock by choosing up notes and different clues throughout the story. Though that is fairly customary online game fare, I nonetheless suppose it may be achieved properly, equivalent to with the Amnesia sequence. But the standard of each the writing and appearing can typically make these moments in The Short Message inadvertently comical, equivalent to when I interacted with a pizza and was scolded by the reminiscence of a pissed off mom.
PT-likes seldom disguise their influences, selecting as an alternative to lean into them to attempt to catch fireplace the best way PT did, however within the case of The Short Message, the story and gameplay each go away it in a decidedly worse place than different copycats. It provides the broad strokes of PT–a time loop, a haunting, some claustrophobic hallways, and even a child in mortal danger–but not one of the dizzying terror.
Just because it misunderstands what made PT particular, and what made so many video games attempting to fill that void subsequently forgettable, The Short Message appears to not perceive Silent Hill’s personal properly-established successes. In the previously iconic Otherworld, you may flee an unkillable monster with no means to defend your self aside from your means to dash. This applies a contemporary horror recreation trope to a sequence that after proudly invented the muse for a lot of video games to come back, and in flip hurries gamers via what has typically been the sequence’ greatest facet. Not solely are you able to not discover a lot of the Otherworld, which in previous video games has helped create a dire temper befitting of the style, however you may’t even cease working. The monster is at all times chasing you in these scenes till you clear an invisible threshold, escape, and kick off the subsequent cutscene.
Even if that is how it should be, I’m not uninterested in the horror style’s monster chases after they’re achieved properly, however The Short Message fails to take action. These sequences are widespread within the recreation and rapidly develop tiring given how they have a tendency to have one proper path and a number of other fallacious paths, resulting in many trial-and-error failures with checkpoints that ship gamers again to begin.
While at first I discovered these moments elicited a little bit of stress in me the best way an efficient horror recreation ought to, I quickly succumbed to frustration each time the hallways would flip into the burnt-orange Otherworld, as a result of I knew it meant extra guesswork with extreme penalties laid forward. The harsh industrial music organized by sequence legend Akira Yamaoka and a sincerely creepy monster draped in cherry blossoms, designed by the equally lauded Masahiro Ito, are the sport’s solely vibrant spots and assist make these in any other case irritating sections a bit of extra memorable.
Still, a brand new Silent Hill must be greater than a soundtrack and a cool monster. The sequence’ greatest efforts include unforgettable tales that really feel as if they function on mystifying dream logic that lead gamers to query what they’re seeing at each flip. The Short Message is determined to be understood and devoid of novelty, leaving no room for interpretation, no sense of lingering thriller, and no sturdy impression for anybody who could also be enjoying a Silent Hill recreation for the primary time. Its unintended brief message finally ends up feeling sadly apparent: Do not obtain.
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