Silent Hill 3 Review
article by: Abram Wintersmith
issue date: 9/2/03
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Silent Hill 3
Genre: Survival Horror
Developer: Konami
# Of Players: One, but spectators encouraged.
Platform: Playstation 2
ESRB Rating: Mature
Price: $49.99 - New, $44.99 - Typical Price Preowned
Silent Hill, what a lovely place to visit on a vacation when you need to get away from it all. Who can find a place that even compares? I mean, who needs a theme park unless it's one that's crawling with blood and pus-filled monstrosities that resemble one of Salidore Dali's nightmares? The malls are teeming with dog-like monsters, giant-like THINGS, and the nurses! Oh those evil, perverted nurses, with the bloody crust on their uniforms, aiming pistols right at your head. What a friendly and happy town this is!
Who am I kidding? Silent Hill 3 is SCARY AS HELL.
Right before the opening sequence, the folks at Konami warn you that there will be "Disturbing and Violent Images", and this is like a car salesman telling a customer, "This vehicle has four wheels". When the introduction movie begins you are blasted with horrific images of tentacles, blood, steel gratings, blood, monsters, horrified expressions of the main character, violence, and did I mention the blood?
No sooner do you hit the Start button, your main character, Heather, is plunged into that dark and twisted world with only a switchblade in hand, and you're hit right off the bat with that oppressive darkness and creepy imagery. From there, it all goes downhill, but at least your first death is only a dream of the horrors to come.
Yes, the combat still sucks, and Heather is a weakly just like the rest of those main characters in Silent Hill 1 and 2. She has a few different methods of attack, and the weapons eventually get more varied, including the addition of a flamethrower and a submachine gun. As usual, the real cool weapons are available after the first completed game; especially the beam-saber. (Heather: The Lost Jedi?) There's even a costume that allows our heroine to shoot beams from her eyes.
As far as the storyline is concerned; it's even darker and more oppressive than the first two, but in a neat twist, it ties in events from Silent Hill 1, and if you played through Silent Hill 2, you can see more scenes that neatly bundles the entire trilogy together. If you're looking for any sort of humor in a game, look elsewhere because this game is devoid of it. However, what it lacks in humor is more than makes up for in the compelling story. You might be disturbed by the images in the game, they might even give you nightmares (Siryn's note: Already had one from this game...), but more often than not, you'll pick up the controller to play more, just to see what happens next, or to solve that devilishly hard puzzle that's been blocking your progress.
One last thought, the mapping hasn't changed all that much from the first two installments of Silent Hill; the path is for the most part linear, funneling your character off to the next open room, which either has goodies to collect that will help you survive or save the game, or cart you off to the next group of beasties to kill (less likely) or run away from (more likely). However, it still serves to build up the fear factor as Heather runs from door to door, looking for some way to escape one monster or another. ("It's coming! Oh my GOD!!! This door's lock is broken! NOOOO-**Gish!**")
For those of you who enjoyed your first two trips into Silent Hill, this would be an excellent opportunity to go on back and relive those horrific memories. Players new to the series or the survival horror genre in general, I would recommend poring over the pre-owned bins for a copy of the original and work your way through because of the story tie-ins and the extras available for those who survived the first two macabre video game tales. In any case, if you like your horror scary enough to soil underwear, this is one you gotta pick up.
THE SCORE:
GAMEPLAY: 7 - There are still some control issues that weren't fixed from the original Silent Hills, but these are forgivable. The menus are easy enough to navigate through, and you can customize the difficulty of not only the game itself, but of the puzzles, which is very appealing to those who want to think and others who would rather see more action.
SOUND & MUSIC: 10 - The Silent Hill series has always impressed me with their use of sound, noises, and sparse, but creepy music to set the mood and feel for the game. Darkness is oppressing, the crackle of the radio as a sort of radar, and the randomized banging and howls will always serve to make someone jump.
THE FREAK-OUT FACTOR: 8 - Few games will scare you better than this one. The only reason why it doesn't score higher is the fact that there are few innovations to the monsters themselves. Yes, they're downright disturbing to look at, but for this third installment, I would have liked something more, like one of those giant stabbing things to whisper out Heeeaaather... or something that would betray some degree of evil cunning or intelligence. (Siryn recommends Clock Tower 3 if you're looking for this type of monster within a game.)
TOTAL SCORE: 25 - For any survival horror nut out there, I'm recommending that you go out and plunk down your fifty bucks, and if you?re into Strategy Guides, there is one available for this game. Those who are new to the series and want to be scared out of their wits, Silent Hill 3 is an excellent place to start.
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Images credits & copyright:
US Official Silent Hill 3 Site.
(http://www.konami.com/silenthill3/) - August, 2003
Japanese Official Silent Hill 3 Site).
(http://www.konamityo.com/sh3/index.html) - August, 2003
Electronics Boutique.
(http://www.ebgames.com/) - August, 2003
Resources:
Konami.
(http://www.konami.com/) - August, 2003
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