The Silent Hill franchise has a rather polarizing history. With nine entries into the series across several platforms, both on home console and handheld, fans have had plenty to love and plenty to hate about the twisted world of Silent Hill. Vatra Games, a new developer to the series, have now come on the scene to give us our newest dose of horror with Silent Hill: Downpour in an attempt to return the series to its survival horror roots that many fans feel the series has lost. So, were the people at Vatra able to recapture the old school terror that made the originals so intriguing while making the game accessible to a new generation of gamers? The answer is yes… and no.
As with most Silent Hill games that came before it, Silent Hill: Downpour introduces us to our protagonist with little exposition. Just like James Sunderland in that ratty bathroom and Heather Mason in that terrifying mall, we are given control of our character with very little insight into who they are or why they are in the situation that they are in. This time it’s soft spoken prisoner, Murphy Pendleton. After performing some morally questionable activities in the prison shower room (it’s not as dirty as it sounds) Murphy finds himself on a prison bus being transferred to a new prison. Unfortunately for the passengers, the bus crashes down a hill as it nears the town of Silent Hill and when Murphy awakes to find that he is the only one there left alive, your adventure into Silent Hill begins. Most Silent Hill games in the past have centered around a character purposefully traveling to the haunted town for some specific reason but with Silent Hill: Downpour Murphy Pendleton arrives here completely by accident and spends the majority of his time just trying to escape while avoiding the monsters that reside there.
The first thing that you’re likely to notice is that water, specifically rain, have been given special importance in this game. Not only is water a constant threat, like a room filling up and forcing you to flee before you drown, but the rain itself dictates the amount of interaction you’re likely to face with the local monsters. Whenever the rain starts to fall, the creatures not only become more plentiful but also become more aggressive and will be more likely to attack you. Luckily, the town is full of buildings that you can hide in and wait out the storm. The various buildings are also a great place to find side quests, a relatively new addition to the series. Not every side quest is insanely fun and you can finish the main story without completing any of them but some of them are extremely well designed and offer up some pretty nice rewards for completing them as well as some fantastic Easter Eggs for long time fans of the series.
Murphy’s back story, along with his hidden secrets, slowly begin to unravel through a series of flashbacks you are presented with as you progress through the game. As with all Silent Hill games you’re never sure if what you are seeing is what really happened or if it’s just the town messing with your fragile psyche. I won’t offer any spoilers but I will say that Murphy’s story makes the most sense out of any Silent Hill story I’ve played through. The decisions you make while playing will dictate which one of six possible endings you will get. As of now I have unlocked three of them and I have been satisfied with every one of them.
As much as I enjoyed my time with Silent Hill: Downpour I do have to admit that it did have its share of problems.
The combat system is probably the most obvious problem this game has. Many Silent Hill fans berated Silent Hill: Homecoming for its focus on combat. By making the protagonist a capable fighter, they felt that the game was robbed of the tension of being a regular Joe facing off against seemingly insurmountable supernatural forces. With Silent Hill: Downpour the developers dialed back your combat ability to make the encounters with the monster more tension-filled but they may have dialed it back a little too much. I can appreciate the fact that my character is not a trained fighter but the combat system you’re forced to deal with is just north of broken. You swing way too slowly, your weapons inexplicably break every few minutes, the lock on system barely works, and blocking rarely blocks the blows you want it to. I found myself avoiding combat altogether whenever I could.
There are also some graphical issues to deal with. The game makes good use of the Unreal 3 engine for most of the characters and locations but some locations lack detail and the character models for the monsters are way overused. You only see a handful of different enemies throughout the whole game. There is also the occasional pop-up and screen tearing.
However, the worst insult that I could level at a Silent Hill game is one that Downpour is unfortunately guilty of; and that is that it’s just not very scary. The spooky atmosphere is spot-on and the chase sequences through the Otherworld are harrowing but the overall sense of dread that Silent Hill games are supposed to give you is just missing somehow. There are a few moments that may make you jump but I never once felt like I needed to take a break from playing to catch my breath, which is something that I dealt with in spades while playing through the new Silent Hill HD Collection.
Complaints aside however, I feel that this game is the best thing to happen to Silent Hill in several years. With an engrossing story, interesting characters and spooky atmosphere, no one should be afraid to book another trip to Silent Hill. And as long as you’re willing to put up with some outdated controls and occasional graphical hiccups, you just might enjoy your stay.
