This is a STRANGE one. A different type of survival horror that tried to innovate with its almost invincible ghost enemies, items that can negatively affect you through the whole playthrough, and a safe room and AI partner that can become haunted as the game progresses, harming you in the process.
The problem with this game isn't so much that it's so different from SH1-3, but rather that these additions don't add that much to justify what is lost. There's a bigger focus on combat but there's only one real boss and two firearms that are almost functionally the same. The process of defeating ghosts is cool in theory, but you need to knock them down like 3 times before the game lets you stab them with the sword and you may think that you're not doing it fast enough, and the only ghost that really feels like it behaves different from the others is Richard's.
Room hauntings don't really amount to much more than proximity damage from visibly haunted areas save for one, and they're very easy to avoid. Why not have the ghost that comes out of the wall ACTUALLY come out and chase you if you stay too long? I didn't clear a single haunting on my playthrough because I didn't even get that I was supposed to use the candles IN the room, thinking they had some connection to the ghosts and that killing them with candles made hauntings disappear. I think this is because you also stop thinking of Room 302 as a proper place in the game's second half. More puzzles could've been solved by doing things in the real world, the bar's codes are a great idea, but it's as far as they go with it, and more things to do in the room would also force you to interact with the hauntings more.
The shabby doll is another great idea, but only this and the key in the Forest World have negative effects on you. How about an item that did something positive but makes Eileen more possessed or makes enemies target her at the same time?

Speaking of, let's talk about Eileen. She's great and has the best voice acting in the game! One of the big complaints is about the game turning into "an escort mission", but I never felt like I was escorting Eileen, she felt more like my ally. Again, enemies don't target her, she doesn't have a health bar to take care of, she's actually pretty good at fighting and you can find some strong weapons for her, so she took very little damage. Saved me a couple of times from ghosts too! Her pathfinding is good and she doesn't really need to be that close to the door to follow you between rooms. Really, the only problem is that she attacks enemies that you may want to avoid, like ghosts, but she'll stop if you unequip her weapon, though you do need to be close to her to do so which is actually annoying.
So, again, hard to fuck up and get her possessed unless you play like an asshole and leave her alone all the time. What did you think was gonna happen??? I think more things could've been done to make her more likely to get possessed, like forcing her to run all the time in spite of her complaints, choosing not to give her weapons, or maybe even how often you spy on her? I know this would be frustrating, but it's these sort of interesting readings of player behavior that make SH2's multiple endings cool.

But the story is great, right? Well, you get the feeling that the presentation isn't all there as soon as you get introduced to the premise with just a still image and some text. Just a little introductory section that had Henry go from the real-life subway to the building, interacting with neighbors, to Room 302 before discovering that he's trapped would do so much for this game, something like SH3, show us just a little of the protagonist's daily life and the real places that get corrupted. But the writing isn't quite to the standards of SH2-3 either, even 1. It seems to me that the devs first thought of the concept of being trapped in your own apartment from the inside, which is very compelling, then a serial killer antagonist that has transcended death and tried connecting the two. The result is this bizarre plot point of a grown-ass man that thinks an apartment room is his mom. Or only his inner child does and he thinks making his inner child happy is the only way he'll be at peace? I guess it sounds fine if you interpret it that way... I get the whole womb symbolism, but I don't think it quite works when the character thinks of it so literally.

The story is mainly told through notes, but they can be strange too. Sometimes the authors just write their screams of horror or just things they have no reason to write about unless they wanted a video game player to read them, to the point where some of them straight up go "This is how you solve the puzzle on the other floor!" And that breaks my immersion because I'm supposed to be reading the last words of some kid that can't leave his cell. Previous games were a lot better at giving hints to the players through notes while still making them feel like something a person would realistically write, nightmare world or not. Other things like what exactly are the connections between Walter and some of his victims are left to external reading as well, though they make sense once you do the homework.
And the big elephant in The Room is Henry himself. People latch on to the fact that you can peep on Eileen (through a hole Joseph made) as something to characterize him, but it seems to me more as something they put to criticize players instead through the giant Eileen head that follows you. Even the other residents of the building don't know anything about Henry, which is ironically probably the most work done to characterize him, but not even the artist has a painting for him, despite Henry himself knowing all of these people, which makes me think the devs didn't think of him as a character at all. You'd think that having been to Silent Hill as a kid, or being the last sacrament would give him a secret connection with Walter but it really is just that he's the guy living in the apartment and it's even implied that the Silent Hill memories and things he has in the room aren't even his! Make Eileen a friend or an ex-girlfriend to make him real motivated, have him meet Walter once in his life, or just tell me what the guy's job is, give me SOMEthing!

I'm very harsh on it because I think these specific complaints aren't brought up that much, but this IS a good game. The camera angles are better and more dynamic than 2-3 and almost as good as 1's. The absurd level of detail from 2-3 isn't in the first few worlds, partly without the darkness around the environment, and they make the grave mistake of bringing back SH1/3 imagery without Alessa, but it gets more detailed and original in the Building, Apartment and Hospital Worlds. The second part of the game is pretty fun if you try to figure out how the special items and mechanics work on your own, and now, the level design makes sense, though I will always wonder why they didn't just have specific layouts for the first half. You don't need to make new worlds, just level design and enemies that aren't so boring without Eileen and the haunted room and make it less formulaic.

The OST obviously bangs and there's a lot of great atmosphere. Eileen stopping after seeing the sketchbook and the gun room only having model guns (I went back to Room 302 to empty my inventory to get them without examining them like a FOOL and also had the ghost harassing me) are some creative scares. As iffy as the story can be at times, it is very intriguing when you're playing it and Walter is the best human antagonist the series has had, as well as the first stalker enemy.

In the end, though, even Team Silent's swansong couldn't make fighting humans not look awkward as hell...