Product Description

In Silent Hill, you assume the role of widower Harry Mason, who is trying to get away from the pain of his wife's loss by taking his daughter on a road trip. After a car accident on the outskirts of the resort town of Silent Hill, you regain consciousness to find that your daughter, who was previously asleep in the backseat, has left--or has been taken--from the scene. To find her, you must go into town and unlock the secrets that linger seven years after a tragic fire scarred the town.

The game features formidable monsters, perplexing puzzles, a realistic 3-D town and, most of all, an acute sense of foreboding caused by Silent Hill's creative lighting and sound effects. The makers have included five different endings, based on performance throughout the game, so think, be quick on your feet and hope for the best of all possible outcomes.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1965 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Konami
• Released on: 2000-10-13
• Platform: PlayStation
• Subtitled in: German
• Number of items: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
A downright creepy "survival horror" title, Silent Hill succeeds where most Resident Evil-inspired titles suck: keeping you hooked and instilling you with fear throughout the game. Players are cast as Harry Mason in his desperate search for his daughter, who mysteriously disappeared after their car crashed into a gully outside of a desolate resort town.

The 3-D environments in Silent Hill are bathed in fog or darkness, making its dismal setting all the more eerie; this also allows for some spectacular lighting effects when using a flashlight in the dark. Granted, there are some pretty coarse graphics being obscured here, but it's a fair trade-off, considering the game's short load times.

Silent Hill is played from a third-person perspective, viewed from both fixed and moving camera angles. As with similar games, the viewpoint can be awkward at times, especially during combat, which here is so clunky that you should try to avoid it whenever possible--something you should do anyway, as this isn't Tomb Raider.

Rather than resort to cheap scare tactics, Silent Hill features a gameplay twist that works very well with its limited visibility environments. Harry carries a radio with him that crackles with static whenever the game's nasties are near, and continues until they are no longer in the vicinity or have been killed off. (Enemies may require further whacking when they're down, as they like to play dead.) Additionally, the supported Dual-Shock controller pulsates in a heartbeat-like fashion whenever you are moderately or seriously injured. --Joe Hon

Customer Reviews

The original and the best
Despite this game being quite a few years old now it still the best in the series. Each time I play this game it never fails to entertain. The atomsphere is dark and heavy. Not forgetting the awsome soundtrack that oozes fear. A town full of fog, snow and monsters set this game apart from other 'survival horror' games. The characters are well developed and there is a pleasent depth to the plot of silent hill, which falls into place nicely at the end of the game. With five endings to play for this is a game worth playing again. A well deserved five stars.

Scary. Brilliant.
The biggest problem that this game has ever had is that it was labelled 'Survival Horror' and lumped into a category with Resident Evil, with which it was then unfavourably compared. The fact of the matter is that the two games have relatively little in common.

Resident Evil is very heavily influenced by George A Romero - all frantic and lumbering zombies, wave after wave of flesh-eating monster trying to hunt down and kill the soldier-types who are the protagonists. Silent Hill has much more to do with psychological horror - the very street names, such as Bloch and Bachman give away the design team's inspiration. This is a game that doesn't try to make you jump - it tries to make you turn on all the lights when you're playing it because you feel THAT uneasy. You don't take the role of a sterotypical hero, just a normal guy who's out of his depth and trying to figure out what on earth is going on. Aren't we all?

The strength of the game is in the atmosphere - the grainy darkness, the torchlight and half-glimpsed horrors of the backgrounds. The way that sound effects can come from nowhere, shocking and terrifying with just the sound of crying. The lack of understanding exactly what's going on, and the fact that even the sympathetic characters are rarely what they seem, or if they are, then at as least as much risk as the good Mr Mason.

With five possible endings (including the great UFO ending) and a whole bunch of variations available every time it's replayed, even the fact that the game isn't that long doesn't count against it.

Go on, play it with the lights turned off. Dare you.

The ultimate in survival horror.
From the first moment this game fires up and the opening cutscene plays with that awesome theme tune you realise this is different. Then the game starts. What then proceeds is the most chilling, bloodcurdling game straight from the seventh dimension. The graphics may be dated now but the terror in this game is still tantamount throughout. The fog, actually a way of making so that the developers dont have to do the full 3D world, is frightening as you cannot see whats ahead. Especially when the radios warning noise starts telling you something is there and you cant see it. The darkness follows when you get to the school and just when you think you cant be scared enough the siren starts and hells mouth opens. Simply THE greatest survival horror of all time particularly when coupled with its succesors. The Res Evil makers came close with 4 to matching but are still way off. If you missed this first time around and are curious because of 5 dont even hesitate. BE PREPARED TO BE SCARED!!