Silent Hill 4: The Room is the fourth installment in the Silent Hill survival horror series. The game is similar to the past entries in terms of atmosphere, never letting the player know what's behind the next corner or down the street. Aside from the traditional third-person-view, there is now a first-person mode which is used to control the main character when he is in his apartment. Objects that can be interacted with are highlighted by eyeball icons. The previous games in the series have mostly been about exploring the town and solving puzzles, but this installment has much more combat involved. There are more enemies in a given area, spread in cramped spaces. The main character mostly uses a standard Silent Hill arsenal of weapons, such as the steel pipe, pistol and a golf club.
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Left to Rot
Team Silent's last effort went into this experimental and odd entry in the Silent Hill franchise. It is not as well remembered as the trilogy itself, at least for what I could read on the internet and asking people online. It is quite sad, but I can totally understand why after finishing it and is not everyone would enjoy, initially. Specially comming from prior entries which follow a set structure regardless of how wildly they might differ thematically. The Room is different.
We awake in an unknown apartment complex, inside what must be our room: 302. After taking a look at the main entrance to the room, we find out the door is completely shut. Someone took a huge amount effort and emphasis on not wanting us to leave the room whatsoever.
"Don't Go Out!!"
-Walter
Peeking into the door's peephole reveals that we are at least not alone, a lone woman wonders outside our door. She can't hear us and our only way to interact with "the outside world" is through pen and paper; notes. After exploring most of what the room has to offer up to that point, we end up staring at a large hole in the bathroom wall. In classic Silent Hill fashion, our protagonist ventures straight into the darkness to another entirely different location where the adventure starts.
The Room as I said before drifts away from the conventional spirit of the series. For instance, it is not even located in Silent Hill to begin with but a town nearby called South Ashfield. The town is full to the brim with people just living an everyday life, that is quite a contrast to the other three games. It makes emphasis in the room itself, not just as a place but as an enigmatic living entity that lives on it's own throughout several small changes we'll be seeing while we progress in the adventure. It feels like being inside of a creature that doesn't exist or rather, we can't comprehend.
But where does the "bad reception" comes from exactly? Tough one. The very nature of this game being an experiment of sorts for Team Silent delivers a layer of complexity above prior titles when it comes to storytelling and structure. It's story is secretly told and sparse ine the aforementioned notes, that can be found through the apartment and the world themselves we explore. How the game structures the map is simpler than prior entries, since it's divided into little worlds entirely different from one another. Think of it just as a level or zone. The absense of challenging puzzles (aside from the water prison world puzzle) might have been one of the factors too since they were not challenging at all. It is fractured into little pieces and the room serves as the central hub to take a break from time to time, read through the notes and piece the story together in something that can make sense in your head.
But, I believe there is something definitely lacking in The Room: Emotion. It is known that Silent Hill as a town can manifest people worst thoughts and transform them into reality. What does that have to do with Silent Hill exactly? This isn't about the protagonist we control, Henry. But rather it's the story of Walter Sullivan; an individual with more close ties to the town of Silent Hill, an it's religious cult. The distant nature of Henry is quite peculiar as it is non-intrusive and let's the story flow naturally while exploring a world that is not his with more ease. But it lacks that strange yet beliveable human connection characters previous titles had up to that point. This is were The Room fails to make an impact on me.
The Room is unusual, unsettling and quite interesting knowing this is Team Silent last game. Definitely feels like a side-project in the making, while Silent Hill 3 was recieveng all the manpower and money possible to develop; Silent Hill 4 was a strange experiment that they turned into a full game. For me, it's the scariest Silent Hill game by a long shot. Don't believe me? See the intro for yourself.
Team Silent's last effort went into this experimental and odd entry in the Silent Hill franchise. It is not as well remembered as the trilogy itself, at least for what I could read on the internet and asking people online. It is quite sad, but I can totally understand why after finishing it and is not everyone would enjoy, initially. Specially comming from prior entries which follow a set structure regardless of how wildly they might differ thematically. The Room is different.
We awake in an unknown apartment complex, inside what must be our room: 302. After taking a look at the main entrance to the room, we find out the door is completely shut. Someone took a huge amount effort and emphasis on not wanting us to leave the room whatsoever.
"Don't Go Out!!"
-Walter
Peeking into the door's peephole reveals that we are at least not alone, a lone woman wonders outside our door. She can't hear us and our only way to interact with "the outside world" is through pen and paper; notes. After exploring most of what the room has to offer up to that point, we end up staring at a large hole in the bathroom wall. In classic Silent Hill fashion, our protagonist ventures straight into the darkness to another entirely different location where the adventure starts.
The Room as I said before drifts away from the conventional spirit of the series. For instance, it is not even located in Silent Hill to begin with but a town nearby called South Ashfield. The town is full to the brim with people just living an everyday life, that is quite a contrast to the other three games. It makes emphasis in the room itself, not just as a place but as an enigmatic living entity that lives on it's own throughout several small changes we'll be seeing while we progress in the adventure. It feels like being inside of a creature that doesn't exist or rather, we can't comprehend.
But where does the "bad reception" comes from exactly? Tough one. The very nature of this game being an experiment of sorts for Team Silent delivers a layer of complexity above prior titles when it comes to storytelling and structure. It's story is secretly told and sparse ine the aforementioned notes, that can be found through the apartment and the world themselves we explore. How the game structures the map is simpler than prior entries, since it's divided into little worlds entirely different from one another. Think of it just as a level or zone. The absense of challenging puzzles (aside from the water prison world puzzle) might have been one of the factors too since they were not challenging at all. It is fractured into little pieces and the room serves as the central hub to take a break from time to time, read through the notes and piece the story together in something that can make sense in your head.
But, I believe there is something definitely lacking in The Room: Emotion. It is known that Silent Hill as a town can manifest people worst thoughts and transform them into reality. What does that have to do with Silent Hill exactly? This isn't about the protagonist we control, Henry. But rather it's the story of Walter Sullivan; an individual with more close ties to the town of Silent Hill, an it's religious cult. The distant nature of Henry is quite peculiar as it is non-intrusive and let's the story flow naturally while exploring a world that is not his with more ease. But it lacks that strange yet beliveable human connection characters previous titles had up to that point. This is were The Room fails to make an impact on me.
The Room is unusual, unsettling and quite interesting knowing this is Team Silent last game. Definitely feels like a side-project in the making, while Silent Hill 3 was recieveng all the manpower and money possible to develop; Silent Hill 4 was a strange experiment that they turned into a full game. For me, it's the scariest Silent Hill game by a long shot. Don't believe me? See the intro for yourself.
This review contains spoilers
A lot of great ideas, with rough execution. The structure of the game being contingent on visiting your apartment to heal and deposit items meant that the first half was largely a breeze, whereas the second half was both extremely compelling and irritating at the same time. Definitely didn't enjoy revisiting every level over again with Eileen following slowly behind me. Still, I had a good time for the most part, and there were plenty of great scares.
The game's strongest aspect, and the thing that tied the whole experience together in the end, was the story of Walter Sullivan. I found myself completely enthralled with how he was mysteriously established as a cold-blooded killer, and especially how they managed to apply his story, as you later piece together, to the cold loneliness and isolation you feel when trapped in your own apartment as Henry. This was conveyed best in the portion where you're exploring the nightmarish version of Henry's apartment building, and you learn about Walter's past, all set to a haunting and soul-crushing, yet eerily comforting piece by Akira Yamaoka. It spoke to my favourite kind of horror - existentialism. The fear of becoming something you despise, the fear of being isolated, the fear of being forgotten - all embodied in a truly sick individual... that I both feared and pitied.
It's not as good as their previous entries, but it's still far better than anything that came after it. Team Silent had such a strong grasp on creating horror, and I fear we'll never experience anything close to their efforts ever again.
Fuck Konami, btw.
The game's strongest aspect, and the thing that tied the whole experience together in the end, was the story of Walter Sullivan. I found myself completely enthralled with how he was mysteriously established as a cold-blooded killer, and especially how they managed to apply his story, as you later piece together, to the cold loneliness and isolation you feel when trapped in your own apartment as Henry. This was conveyed best in the portion where you're exploring the nightmarish version of Henry's apartment building, and you learn about Walter's past, all set to a haunting and soul-crushing, yet eerily comforting piece by Akira Yamaoka. It spoke to my favourite kind of horror - existentialism. The fear of becoming something you despise, the fear of being isolated, the fear of being forgotten - all embodied in a truly sick individual... that I both feared and pitied.
It's not as good as their previous entries, but it's still far better than anything that came after it. Team Silent had such a strong grasp on creating horror, and I fear we'll never experience anything close to their efforts ever again.
Fuck Konami, btw.
Deserves more of a remaster than SH2 tbh
It's got decent themes of isolation and neglect, but the story structure in which it's conveyed in isn't the best, I feel as though this is echoed with it's level sequence.
The whole room part of it is ahead of it's time so it's weird to also see worse escorting mechanics than something like RE4 which came out just 6 months later.
It's got decent themes of isolation and neglect, but the story structure in which it's conveyed in isn't the best, I feel as though this is echoed with it's level sequence.
The whole room part of it is ahead of it's time so it's weird to also see worse escorting mechanics than something like RE4 which came out just 6 months later.
am nem emlekszem xddd full spedrubn vot
creepy tall nurses burping all over the place
i did not enter the room