This review contains spoilers
(Content warning for unreality.)
The Otherworld bleeds into the real. The industrial, dull and muted tones of our ethereal counterpart appear all over reality. Heather Mason is subjected to the nightmare both in and outside of it. There is barely any distinction.
Likewise, the spaces of the Otherworld are far more visceral this time around to make up for it. Pulsating, bloody walls and the corpses of humans with their babies in clear view. It's an onslaught on her mind, with no escape from it. Unlike James and Harry, Heather has no overworld to escape to for a bit - there is scarcely a town of Silent Hill for her to clear her head in. It's a never-ending nightmare.
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At the time of me writing this, I am about to be placed into a mental residency against my will for a few weeks. While I'm there, I will be almost completely isolated from my support network and unable to write. In a lot of ways, I feel like I'm about to face a never-ending nightmare with very little help.
I don't know what they're going to do to me there. But the uniform walls and ambience of the place all feel familiar. Like I've been trapped there before. I feel as if I'm entering another reality that I've visited in a dream, shrouded in darkness.
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It is an extremely compelling choice to kill off Harry Mason in this entry. When Heather comes home from her long way home, which comprises the first half of the game, she finds his corpse sitting in his armchair. It's something I didn't expect, I thought Harry was just going to be absent throughout the game.
Harry's death marks when Heather starts to truly see the cult as a threat: something that she was earlier able to relegate as his responsibility. Now, it's on her shoulders to handle.
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I used to look up to my father.
I used to aspire to be like him, to want to make him proud of me.
Now I don't know what to think of him.
The proverbial death of my father's image in my mind some years ago came with it my political evolution. As I started to see the systems we live for what they really are through reading more theorists, I came to see what my father was. A slave to capital who worshiped those systems, and didn't like me pointing that out. I was thrust into the true darkness of our world without support and it broke me.
He is still superficially kind to me. He claims to have my best interests in mind.
But then he sends me away against my will. He tells me to not think of it this way, but I know that the version of my father that I looked up to so much back then never existed. He was always just looking out for the interest of capital, and I need to be "fixed" and become more useful to it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When Heather comes to the end of her journey, after defeating the reborn god like her father did seventeen years ago, she is born anew - but retains who she was before in some respect.
She's gained a greater sense of who she is, regained her memories of her previous life as Alessa.
But she's still the same Heather we've followed throughout. She even keeps her hair the same.
Was the journey through Silent Hill worth it to gain a greater understanding of herself?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At the end of the day, I don't know what's going to happen to me when I'm away. I played Silent Hill 3 with my boyfriend as one of our last calls together and just... felt it. Silent Hill has a way of doing that to you.
However, I think that if Heather could make it through hell and come out better, maybe I could too.
That doesn't make me any less terrified, but it does make it a little easier.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In my restless dreams,
I see that site,
Backloggd.
I promise I'll return there someday.
Wait for me...
The Otherworld bleeds into the real. The industrial, dull and muted tones of our ethereal counterpart appear all over reality. Heather Mason is subjected to the nightmare both in and outside of it. There is barely any distinction.
Likewise, the spaces of the Otherworld are far more visceral this time around to make up for it. Pulsating, bloody walls and the corpses of humans with their babies in clear view. It's an onslaught on her mind, with no escape from it. Unlike James and Harry, Heather has no overworld to escape to for a bit - there is scarcely a town of Silent Hill for her to clear her head in. It's a never-ending nightmare.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At the time of me writing this, I am about to be placed into a mental residency against my will for a few weeks. While I'm there, I will be almost completely isolated from my support network and unable to write. In a lot of ways, I feel like I'm about to face a never-ending nightmare with very little help.
I don't know what they're going to do to me there. But the uniform walls and ambience of the place all feel familiar. Like I've been trapped there before. I feel as if I'm entering another reality that I've visited in a dream, shrouded in darkness.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is an extremely compelling choice to kill off Harry Mason in this entry. When Heather comes home from her long way home, which comprises the first half of the game, she finds his corpse sitting in his armchair. It's something I didn't expect, I thought Harry was just going to be absent throughout the game.
Harry's death marks when Heather starts to truly see the cult as a threat: something that she was earlier able to relegate as his responsibility. Now, it's on her shoulders to handle.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I used to look up to my father.
I used to aspire to be like him, to want to make him proud of me.
Now I don't know what to think of him.
The proverbial death of my father's image in my mind some years ago came with it my political evolution. As I started to see the systems we live for what they really are through reading more theorists, I came to see what my father was. A slave to capital who worshiped those systems, and didn't like me pointing that out. I was thrust into the true darkness of our world without support and it broke me.
He is still superficially kind to me. He claims to have my best interests in mind.
But then he sends me away against my will. He tells me to not think of it this way, but I know that the version of my father that I looked up to so much back then never existed. He was always just looking out for the interest of capital, and I need to be "fixed" and become more useful to it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When Heather comes to the end of her journey, after defeating the reborn god like her father did seventeen years ago, she is born anew - but retains who she was before in some respect.
She's gained a greater sense of who she is, regained her memories of her previous life as Alessa.
But she's still the same Heather we've followed throughout. She even keeps her hair the same.
Was the journey through Silent Hill worth it to gain a greater understanding of herself?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At the end of the day, I don't know what's going to happen to me when I'm away. I played Silent Hill 3 with my boyfriend as one of our last calls together and just... felt it. Silent Hill has a way of doing that to you.
However, I think that if Heather could make it through hell and come out better, maybe I could too.
That doesn't make me any less terrified, but it does make it a little easier.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In my restless dreams,
I see that site,
Backloggd.
I promise I'll return there someday.
Wait for me...
2 Comments
Thank you 🥺
Iru
1 year ago