The Enduring Legacy Of Silent Hill 2 And Team Silent

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It SHOULDN’T have been like this. In 2005, before they would “officially” join the ranks of gaming’s most hated companies, Konami formally shut down Team Silent. The group of plucky and scrappy misfits responsible for one of the greatest eras in survival horror’s history were no more. One might argue it was the beginning of the end of top quality mainstream horror games not made by Capcom (who themselves were pushed into an identity crisis after Resident Evil 4). But from the ashes of Team Silent’s shuttering, a tiny ember has stayed burning, flickering, clinging to existence. Not only have its creations aged well (for the most part) the appreciation for just how magnificent its quality truly is has grown over the years as well.

Full of brilliantly haunting symbolism.

Silent Hill 2: Gaming’s survival horror magnum opus that has endured across decades for its narrative, atmospheric, level design and mastery of expectation subversion. It’s more than the story of James Sunderland being drawn to the abandoned town after receiving a letter from his wife presumed dead. It’s a small scale narrative in every way about a fog-engulfed town predatorily drawing in the most morally flawed, broken, and vulnerable individuals into its many dreary destinations to further agonize them at every turn. A dark, mentally harrowing, and torturous journey into the depths of the town’s darkest secrets. The fact that it has yet to be truly outdone by any of its contemporaries is hugely impressive. Think of it as the survival horror equivalent to the original Alien: the standard-bearer of space-based horror cinema.

It’s a testament to Silent Hill 2’s commitment to only allow its writing, direction, or any part of its design to swell beyond its minimalist aspirations when it needs to, for instance during a boss fight. It is not a work of fiction in which global populations are threatened.

The industrial, grimy sound of Akira Yamaoka’s score combined with its stinging, unorthodox, and cavernous soundscape designed by the aforementioned Yamaoka is so deeply intertwined in the personality, not only with Silent Hill 2, but the series as a whole. A unique sense of unease, genuine fear, and uncertainty is only further enhanced by what Yamaoka was able to create here.

Characters who are more than what they initially seem and balancing that with the very difficult subjects in which Silent Hill 2 deals with throughout its runtime is a brilliant accomplishment. Dealing with the kinds of personal strife and crimes (sexual abuse victimhood, animal cruelty) that they are is rarely seen in games today that might be considered taboo and proscriptive to even consider discussing, let alone doing so. Conveyed with such a steady hand, intelligence and respect I have so much admiration for not only how the narrative plays itself out but as to how it plays with ambiguity so effectively not only through it’s story but through its characters as well.

The majority of gameplay sequences largely involve slow and uncertain treks through dim corridors, lit only by a flashlight. Solving puzzles and uncovering the history and present of the town whilst navigating the way through the abandoned buildings crawling with beautifully twisted enemies (special mention to Pyramid Head). It’s not meant to be a power fantasy, James controls as any of us would in his situation. He’s not an acrobatic superhuman able to mow through enemies at his whim, if he was how could we feel helpless, vulnerable, trapped, and enclosed as the game wants us to feel? While I will agree that control didn’t have to be as stiff as it ultimately turned out to be, needing to meet the game halfway a little more than one should probably expect, I believe that the game plays how it should be played and controlled. It is linear, it is rigid, but I think that’s how most of us would be as a video game protagonist.

Considering the games wealth of potential conclusions (including the beautifully zany dog ending on a potential second play-through) It is a slightly more difficult task to unify it into one cohesive message, but in my estimation this work is a sobering reminder that no matter how much our demons affect our individual experiences, we only become truly evil when we succumb to taking our personal torment upon others repeatedly to the point of a character revolution. Heinous acts must not become a pattern we embrace and they do not define us if we do not let them.

As the years go on the reverence for Silent Hill 2 and the other Team Silent developed games in the series grows ever stronger, not just for myself but many other horror patrons as well. The distaste for Konami grows ever further, companies generally do not care about public perception until it starts affecting their bottom line and they are no different. I can't help but be sad that the small dedicated group of creatives was fractured by a truly venomous company, never seeing another opportunity quite like the Silent Hill games of the early 2000s while Konami is still thriving off of their mobile games expenditures. It shouldn't be like this, but no matter how irritating it is, we must not let it take the best of us with it.

Wherever you may be in life, I hope you are doing well. We cannot thank you enough.