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Silent Hill: Shattered Memories - |OT| of Not Your Father's Silent Hill

E

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
End game spoiler, but does anybody else think it's ironic that
the thread title is exactly how the game ends? :lol
 
Y

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I think it noted how I tried to "game" some of the psyche profile things by acting like they were trick questions: I said that all the people were sleeping, that 2 of the couples were same-sex, and that none of the ink-blots were sexual in nature.
Click to expand...

So I did this too--exactly--and didn't get any comment. But I thought it might have reflected on John? I couldn't be sure, exactly.

This was a pretty short game. I was surprised. I played it in two sittings. I did really enjoy it, even though I think I liked it a lot more than I knew I should have. The component parts are pretty weak. The adventure segments are entirely too easy and for babby. The solution is always a foot away, with one exception (the planetarium puzzle), though the alternate puzzle (the art studio) was WAY easier. I like "doorknob" jiggling--that's how you effectively create a dungeon in a modern building. Still, the atmosphere was quite awesome. I didn't so much mind the compartmentalization until later in the game when you do the segment in the car
sinking into the lake.
I thought that was really brilliant and I was really a bit tense, but I thought to myself that all I needed to do was take a deep breath and I was in no real danger. So I question that decision, but I don't think it really impacts things too much. It just falls a little flat to me because you really can't ever be stuck-- not on a boss, not on a puzzle, not from getting lost, not from not understanding where to go.

The nightmare segments can get fucked. They present to you the motion cues as these bizarre full-body waggles, and if you actually follow the prompts, the game is considerably more difficult. It's much easier to just flick your wrists in the proper direction. Halfway through, the prompts stop coming up all together, which bothered me because up to that point I had muddled my way through each of the chases avoiding all contact because I could not get the full-body waggles to work at all, no matter what I did. Then it came to me. And I enjoyed it more! I like that they were fairly brief, but the amount of frustration that climax packed into a five or ten minute segment is to be commended. The last few "labyrinths" were frustrating and shitty. The
wheelchair and swimming segments
can be accomplished by shaking the controllers like maracas.

The story was cool, and I liked the psychologist bits a lot. But man, he needs to be fired.

I'm not sure how my choices impacted the world. I never really got a good look at the monsters, but from what I did see, the way they changed was not obviously linked or interpretable based on any decision I made in the game.

Despite my disappointment with the general "streamlining" of Silent Hill, I really liked the game. It's imaginative and different.
 
H

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
EatChildren said:
End game spoiler, but does anybody else think it's ironic that
the thread title is exactly how the game ends? :lol
Click to expand...
I noted this to myself a while back, but didn't mention it since it would seem oddly self-serving. I must be psychic :lol
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
my internet hasn't been working for a few days and i don't know if it'll stay up and i have this long crazy theory shit that might be kinda like brandonh's (i dunno i haven't read his posts yet)

so instead I'll just post a few observations and maybe get into crazy theory stuff later:

-Lisa brings up Harry's daughter even though he never mentions her; possible hint that Cheryl is the one creating the illusion?
-I'm slightly color-blind, so the pill part totally freaked me out. She asked for yellow pills the first time, and I was totally unsure whether I gave her yellow or green. When she called me and said she felt horrible, I was cursing out loud as I ran back, I honestly didn't know whether I fucked up. Then she's already dead with a bottle full of red pills spilled out all over the table. Nice job making me feel bad, jerk.

Ironically, on my second playthrough, she asked for red pills, so no chance of confusion. I got them for her and she called me later to tell me about a "bad dream" and upset. I get back and she suddenly looks at me and dies before blood comes out of her head. No extra pills on the table.

-The "frigid" echoes and messages. The first one with the guy calling his girlfriend from the burger place asking why she won't do it with him, and if it's her parent's house, and the second one with the child shadow lingering over a break-up note from him to her. I'm definitely thinking that was a boyfriend Cheryl had in high-school, but because she was so emotionally fucked up, he dumped her because he wasn't getting any.

-On Bryant's Overlook, there's a car with an echo of a girl crying in the passenger seat. The message is of a boy pressuring her into having sex, but she doesn't feel up to it. The girl's got her face in her hands, but she looks just like teenage Cheryl. I don't recall if it said this on my first playthrough, but on my second she definitely tried to talk him out of it by saying she'll "tell [her] dad," to which the boyfriend laughs and says, "your dad's not here." There's a specimen of a collected butterfly in the trunk (Cheryl liked collecting butterflies), so I'm absolutely positive that it was Cheryl trying to invoke Harry as an imaginary guardian to protect her from the boy.

-The "Problem Child" in the mall. When I heard the mall guard in the first message talk about "how much sadness was in those eyes," I was sure it was Cheryl. But I hadn't noticed the echo outside the theater until my second playthrough, where the guard's partner calls 911 because the girl stabbed the guard and presumably killed him. I can't imagine that Cheryl would have actually killed someone (and have gotten away with it, considering that the guards had picked her up before and could describe her).

-The teacher that Cheryl was having a relationship with in high school. For the car photo, the message notes that he's old enough to be her father, and while we can't see his face, his hair and skin make him look just like the CGI Harry from Silent Hill 1. That's part of my theory... which I'll save for later.


edit: yep my internet went down right before i clicked post and i had to save this to notepad hope i can post this before it goes down agai-
 
abstract alien

abstract alien

Member
EmCeeGramr said:
-On Bryant's Overlook, there's a car with an echo of a girl crying in the passenger seat. The message is of a boy pressuring her into having sex, but she doesn't feel up to it. The girl's got her face in her hands, but she looks just like teenage Cheryl. I don't recall if it said this on my first playthrough, but on my second she definitely tried to talk him out of it by saying she'll "tell [her] dad," to which the boyfriend laughs and says, "your dad's not here." There's a specimen of a collected butterfly in the trunk (Cheryl liked collecting butterflies), so I'm absolutely positive that it was Cheryl trying to invoke Harry as an imaginary guardian to protect her from the boy.


edit: yep my internet went down right before i clicked post and i had to save this to notepad hope i can post this before it goes down agai-
Click to expand...
I never noticed that
it could very well be her
...wow
 
F

Futurevoid

Member
Yes, the items you pick up throughout exploration all have some tie back to the main plot. It's almost a game unto itself figuring what the symbolism is meant to represent for each.

Great observations, EmCeeGramr!
 
T

ThatObviousUser

ὁ αἴσχιστος παῖς εἶ
Futurevoid said:
Yes, the items you pick up throughout exploration all have some tie back to the main plot. It's almost a game unto itself figuring what the symbolism is meant to represent for each.

Great observations, EmCeeGramr!
Click to expand...

Well, it was. My view is that
the game's events are an allegory for Dr. K probing into Cheryl's mind
.
 
H

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
Andrex said:
Well, it was. My view is that
the game's events are an allegory for Dr. K probing into Cheryl's mind
.
Click to expand...
which is why the texts and calls are so important.
They're shattered echoes of Cheryl's life through mediums with which she is familiar. In addition, they're reflective of how Cheryl lived her life. Now here I'm curious, those who have the message with the boyfriend complaining about not getting any, did you pick yes or no when Dr. K said "virgin" when you got to the school?
 
H

Hellsing321

Member
doomed1 said:
which is why the texts and calls are so important.
They're shattered echoes of Cheryl's life through mediums with which she is familiar. In addition, they're reflective of how Cheryl lived her life. Now here I'm curious, those who have the message with the boyfriend complaining about not getting any, did you pick yes or no when Dr. K said "virgin" when you got to the school?
Click to expand...

There are some messages/texts that don't seem like they were from Cheryl's memories. The ones with the dad taking his son hunting don't seem like anything Cheryl would have experienced.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
okay dumb as hell theory time

Silent Hill 1 and 3 never happened.

If Fantasy-Harry knows all about his life before the car crash, why doesn't he instantly remember that he lives in Silent Hill, something he should know? Because for the last 18 years, he's been "in town on vacation" visiting Silent Hill, fighting demons, and saving his daughter. When the charade suddenly changes (as a result of the real Dr. Michael Kaufmann's work) he's confused because even his real life had been distorted. Cheryl has such terrible memories of Silent Hill that she denies that she and her father ever even lived there.

Dahlia wasn't just "a monster" in this game, depicted as both a slut and a pathetic senile old woman; she was turned into a monster in Cheryl's previous delusions, a cult leader who doesn't care for her daughter. That's why in Silent Hill 1, Harry's wife is almost an ideal: a woman who passed away a long time ago, with no identity. It's why Allessa Gillespie's father was never named. The idea of her loving father and terrible mother being together made no sense, so she seperated them. In her earlier delusions, Dahlia ends up dead, struck down by her own machinations; Cheryl's own desire to see her mother dead.

At the amusement park, Harry "saved" Cheryl from a dragon in the cut-out board. He tries to joke with her in flowery medieval speak about how he saved her from being "consumed" by the red horned winged beast, but Cheryl acts embarrassed and points out that it's just a painting, it's not real. But later, Cheryl herself accepts it as real. The cartoony horned winged beast becomes a much darker and twisted threat: the God of Silent Hill. Yet it's still just a paper tiger, a "painted dragon," not real.

The figures of Lisa, Kaufmann, and Cybil all stem from Cheryl's ambivalence towards the authority figures in her life: policemen, doctors, psychiatrists. They try to help her, but in the end they're just getting in the way. Lisa and Cybil may have been constructs that persisted through various states of her delusions, or were inspired by real people she knew. Kaufmann, heck, she might have just seen his name in a phonebook and found the evil doctor working with her mother to be a useful idea. Her mother is asking for a psychiatrist for her daughter? Well, those doctors must be against her too. The cops, too. They think they're doing the right thing, but they're just puppets of that horrible Dahlia.

Cheryl's own role in SH1, if it is indeed a delusion, is also telling. She "dies" and is "reborn" in a new form after Harry defeats the evil god. Of course she entered a new life: after Harry died when she was seven, her life totally changed.

SH3 may have been a more advanced stage of denial: no longer a child, she wasn't able to continue pretending that Harry was still around. So she invents a new, tragic, and heroic death for him: he was killed by the cult of Silent Hill, the symbol of her hated home (we know from her mugshot in Shattered Memories, where she's wearing clothes like Heather/Cheryl's in SH3, that she spent time away from the town) and of her mother. She personally defeats the evil this time.

At least, that's the delusion she presents to her previous psychiatrists. They indulge her, nod while she blabbers nonsense about how cultists tried to kidnap her and her father saved her from monsters. They may have suggested alternate viewpoints, which became the alternate endings of Silent Hill 1:
"Yeah, but Cheryl, your dad was still dead in that car crash wasn't he?"
"Cheryl, after defeating the god, your dad must have been abducted by aliens, right? Because that's about as believable."

"The other therapists didn't work out for you."

So the real Kaufmann takes a different tack. He focuses on Cheryl and Harry's relationship. Not on her and her father's imagined fights against evil, but her everyday life. He provokes her, cuts through the bullshit, and it shows. Her fantasy Harry grows weaker and confused as Cheryl's various delusions grow out of control and can't keep themselves straight as Kaufmann gets closer to the truth. Harry can't fight against the monsters anymore. The monsters themselves become as disjointed and irrational as Cheryl's fantasies themselves, and are revealed to be nothing but children attempting to cling to Dad like snowflakes, keep him from shattering the ice where he's been frozen in time for 18 years.

^^^^^dumb bullshit!!!!!!!!!!!!^^^^
 
I

I AM JOHN!

Banned
Any GAF heroes wanna help a brother out?

I'm currently stuck in Midvale High. From the looks of the sign, they want me to cut through building B through the Chemistry Lab, then through the Planetarium, then from there some more rooms until the Gym. Thing is, the Planetarium is locked. I can enter the Art Studio, but the door out is locked too. There's a still life set-up I can interact with, but it doesn't seem like it does anything (it would make sense that the puzzle would be to make the model match the painting next to it, but I cannot seem to get it to match... maybe because there's a posing doll that I can't touch). Any advice?
 
M

MiniDitka

Member
I AM JOHN! said:
Any GAF heroes wanna help a brother out?

I'm currently stuck in Midvale High. From the looks of the sign, they want me to cut through building B through the Chemistry Lab, then through the Planetarium, then from there some more rooms until the Gym. Thing is, the Planetarium is locked. I can enter the Art Studio, but the door out is locked too. There's a still life set-up I can interact with, but it doesn't seem like it does anything (it would make sense that the puzzle would be to make the model match the painting next to it, but I cannot seem to get it to match... maybe because there's a posing doll that I can't touch). Any advice?
Click to expand...
The puzzle will reveal a number you call that will open the door that is locked in the room. Mach up the sculptures to the pic and there's your number
If you still cant figure it out and want to know exactly what to do
you dial 555-8465
 
E

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
I AM JOHN! said:
Any GAF heroes wanna help a brother out?

I'm currently stuck in Midvale High. From the looks of the sign, they want me to cut through building B through the Chemistry Lab, then through the Planetarium, then from there some more rooms until the Gym. Thing is, the Planetarium is locked. I can enter the Art Studio, but the door out is locked too. There's a still life set-up I can interact with, but it doesn't seem like it does anything (it would make sense that the puzzle would be to make the model match the painting next to it, but I cannot seem to get it to match... maybe because there's a posing doll that I can't touch). Any advice?
Click to expand...

You cant go through the planetarium unless you open it first, but thats okay as you 'chose' the artroom. Inside this room is a puzzle to open the locked door. As you've noted there are some sculptures casting shadows on the wall, and a portrait showing them set up.

Look at the sculptures and look to the above left of where their shadow is casting. It should give away what you have to 'do'.
 
A

AKingNamedPaul

I am Homie
EmCeeGramr said:
okay dumb as hell theory time

Silent Hill 1 and 3 never happened.

If Fantasy-Harry knows all about his life before the car crash, why doesn't he instantly remember that he lives in Silent Hill, something he should know? Because for the last 18 years, he's been "in town on vacation" visiting Silent Hill, fighting demons, and saving his daughter. When the charade suddenly changes (as a result of the real Dr. Michael Kaufmann's work) he's confused because even his real life had been distorted. Cheryl has such terrible memories of Silent Hill that she denies that she and her father ever even lived there.

Dahlia wasn't just "a monster" in this game, depicted as both a slut and a pathetic senile old woman; she was turned into a monster in Cheryl's previous delusions, a cult leader who doesn't care for her daughter. That's why in Silent Hill 1, Harry's wife is almost an ideal: a woman who passed away a long time ago, with no identity. It's why Allessa Gillespie's father was never named. The idea of her loving father and terrible mother being together made no sense, so she seperated them. In her earlier delusions, Dahlia ends up dead, struck down by her own machinations; Cheryl's own desire to see her mother dead.

At the amusement park, Harry "saved" Cheryl from a dragon in the cut-out board. He tries to joke with her in flowery medieval speak about how he saved her from being "consumed" by the red horned winged beast, but Cheryl acts embarrassed and points out that it's just a painting, it's not real. But later, Cheryl herself accepts it as real. The cartoony horned winged beast becomes a much darker and twisted threat: the God of Silent Hill. Yet it's still just a paper tiger, a "painted dragon," not real.

The figures of Lisa, Kaufmann, and Cybil all stem from Cheryl's ambivalence towards the authority figures in her life: policemen, doctors, psychiatrists. They try to help her, but in the end they're just getting in the way. Lisa and Cybil may have been constructs that persisted through various states of her delusions, or were inspired by real people she knew. Kaufmann, heck, she might have just seen his name in a phonebook and found the evil doctor working with her mother to be a useful idea. Her mother is asking for a psychiatrist for her daughter? Well, those doctors must be against her too. The cops, too. They think they're doing the right thing, but they're just puppets of that horrible Dahlia.

Cheryl's own role in SH1, if it is indeed a delusion, is also telling. She "dies" and is "reborn" in a new form after Harry defeats the evil god. Of course she entered a new life: after Harry died when she was seven, her life totally changed.

SH3 may have been a more advanced stage of denial: no longer a child, she wasn't able to continue pretending that Harry was still around. So she invents a new, tragic, and heroic death for him: he was killed by the cult of Silent Hill, the symbol of her hated home (we know from her mugshot in Shattered Memories, where she's wearing clothes like Heather/Cheryl's in SH3, that she spent time away from the town) and of her mother. She personally defeats the evil this time.

At least, that's the delusion she presents to her previous psychiatrists. They indulge her, nod while she blabbers nonsense about how cultists tried to kidnap her and her father saved her from monsters. They may have suggested alternate viewpoints, which became the alternate endings of Silent Hill 1:
"Yeah, but Cheryl, your dad was still dead in that car crash wasn't he?"
"Cheryl, after defeating the god, your dad must have been abducted by aliens, right? Because that's about as believable."

"The other therapists didn't work out for you."

So the real Kaufmann takes a different tack. He focuses on Cheryl and Harry's relationship. Not on her and her father's imagined fights against evil, but her everyday life. He provokes her, cuts through the bullshit, and it shows. Her fantasy Harry grows weaker and confused as Cheryl's various delusions grow out of control and can't keep themselves straight as Kaufmann gets closer to the truth. Harry can't fight against the monsters anymore. The monsters themselves become as disjointed and irrational as Cheryl's fantasies themselves, and are revealed to be nothing but children attempting to cling to Dad like snowflakes, keep him from shattering the ice where he's been frozen in time for 18 years.

^^^^^dumb bullshit!!!!!!!!!!!!^^^^
Click to expand...
That was a pretty interesting read.
 
K

kman3000

Member
EmCeeGramr said:
okay dumb as hell theory time

Silent Hill 1 and 3 never happened.

If Fantasy-Harry knows all about his life before the car crash, why doesn't he instantly remember that he lives in Silent Hill, something he should know? Because for the last 18 years, he's been "in town on vacation" visiting Silent Hill, fighting demons, and saving his daughter. When the charade suddenly changes (as a result of the real Dr. Michael Kaufmann's work) he's confused because even his real life had been distorted. Cheryl has such terrible memories of Silent Hill that she denies that she and her father ever even lived there.

Dahlia wasn't just "a monster" in this game, depicted as both a slut and a pathetic senile old woman; she was turned into a monster in Cheryl's previous delusions, a cult leader who doesn't care for her daughter. That's why in Silent Hill 1, Harry's wife is almost an ideal: a woman who passed away a long time ago, with no identity. It's why Allessa Gillespie's father was never named. The idea of her loving father and terrible mother being together made no sense, so she seperated them. In her earlier delusions, Dahlia ends up dead, struck down by her own machinations; Cheryl's own desire to see her mother dead.

At the amusement park, Harry "saved" Cheryl from a dragon in the cut-out board. He tries to joke with her in flowery medieval speak about how he saved her from being "consumed" by the red horned winged beast, but Cheryl acts embarrassed and points out that it's just a painting, it's not real. But later, Cheryl herself accepts it as real. The cartoony horned winged beast becomes a much darker and twisted threat: the God of Silent Hill. Yet it's still just a paper tiger, a "painted dragon," not real.

The figures of Lisa, Kaufmann, and Cybil all stem from Cheryl's ambivalence towards the authority figures in her life: policemen, doctors, psychiatrists. They try to help her, but in the end they're just getting in the way. Lisa and Cybil may have been constructs that persisted through various states of her delusions, or were inspired by real people she knew. Kaufmann, heck, she might have just seen his name in a phonebook and found the evil doctor working with her mother to be a useful idea. Her mother is asking for a psychiatrist for her daughter? Well, those doctors must be against her too. The cops, too. They think they're doing the right thing, but they're just puppets of that horrible Dahlia.

Cheryl's own role in SH1, if it is indeed a delusion, is also telling. She "dies" and is "reborn" in a new form after Harry defeats the evil god. Of course she entered a new life: after Harry died when she was seven, her life totally changed.

SH3 may have been a more advanced stage of denial: no longer a child, she wasn't able to continue pretending that Harry was still around. So she invents a new, tragic, and heroic death for him: he was killed by the cult of Silent Hill, the symbol of her hated home (we know from her mugshot in Shattered Memories, where she's wearing clothes like Heather/Cheryl's in SH3, that she spent time away from the town) and of her mother. She personally defeats the evil this time.

At least, that's the delusion she presents to her previous psychiatrists. They indulge her, nod while she blabbers nonsense about how cultists tried to kidnap her and her father saved her from monsters. They may have suggested alternate viewpoints, which became the alternate endings of Silent Hill 1:
"Yeah, but Cheryl, your dad was still dead in that car crash wasn't he?"
"Cheryl, after defeating the god, your dad must have been abducted by aliens, right? Because that's about as believable."

"The other therapists didn't work out for you."

So the real Kaufmann takes a different tack. He focuses on Cheryl and Harry's relationship. Not on her and her father's imagined fights against evil, but her everyday life. He provokes her, cuts through the bullshit, and it shows. Her fantasy Harry grows weaker and confused as Cheryl's various delusions grow out of control and can't keep themselves straight as Kaufmann gets closer to the truth. Harry can't fight against the monsters anymore. The monsters themselves become as disjointed and irrational as Cheryl's fantasies themselves, and are revealed to be nothing but children attempting to cling to Dad like snowflakes, keep him from shattering the ice where he's been frozen in time for 18 years.

^^^^^dumb bullshit!!!!!!!!!!!!^^^^
Click to expand...
:O Dood you just blew my mind and confirmed why I like SH threads.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
also the doctor was a jackass but that just means he's a good psychiatrist

when he flipped over the inkblot that totally looked like a vagina and said "the mirror of sex... is death" and revealed IT WAS A NOOSE HOLY SHIT i was like "woah people in the wild west got strangled by vaginas" suddenly history makes more sense
 
T

ThatObviousUser

ὁ αἴσχιστος παῖς εἶ
EmCeeGramr said:
also the doctor was a jackass but that just means he's a good psychiatrist

when he flipped over the inkblot that totally looked like a vagina and said "the mirror of sex... is death" and revealed IT WAS A NOOSE HOLY SHIT i was like "woah people in the wild west got strangled by vaginas" suddenly history makes more sense
Click to expand...

I got a crashed car. :lol I thought it was fitting for the game.

Anyways Andrex's dumb theory:

One of my friend's believe that it still is probably canon to SH1 and SH3. I haven't played either, but her view is that SH1 said Harry died in a car crash, and that's what happened 18 year ago in this game.

Now, it may not sit well with people (it didn't with me at first) but I believe the Harry you play as in the game never existed. He wasn't a ghost, or the "real Harry" or anything. He was an entire fabrication by Silent Hill and Cheryl's mind. That means that for this game, you're playing as the town in essence, not the town playing you.

But why create some new guy that doesn't even exist? I think the game was also about Harry's interactions with other people. While I don't think young Dahlia really existed during the game, Harry's interactions with Michelle, Cybil, Lisa, old Dahlia, etc. were real and I think they'll remember him (sans Lisa obviously) even after the game is over and the town takes him back. I also think his interactions with them were what Cheryl hoped her father was like.

I don't think he's a ghost or anything like that, and instead a part of the town, because of Dr. Kaufman's last lines in the game. "The dad walking around in your head isn't even a ghost. He never existed." Silent Hill completely fabricated him from Cheryl's mind.

I didn't like they fact that the protagonist you played as the whole game never existed at all, but that's the conclusion I came to. It helped me when I realized Harry was a necessary part of Dr. K's therapy to help Cheryl finally overcome her denial.

I think SM flips the normal SH formula on its head a bit. Instead of the town messing with the protagonist over something guilty, it uses the protagonist to "mess with" and interact with other people, culminating in the confrontation of Cheryl's guilt.
 
S

scitek

Member
2ykxeew.jpg


Link

Nice catch EmCee.
 
B

brandonh83

Banned
EmCeeGramr said:
i have this long crazy theory shit that might be kinda like brandonh's (i dunno i haven't read his posts yet)
Click to expand...

I don't have those theories anymore. I stopped trying to fabricate ways to connect this game to the others in a pathetic attempt to like it more.
 
M

Miburou

Member
Heh, I wrote something similar to what EmCeeGramr wrote, but I guess people were busy whining about brandon's posts back then. :p

I don't necessarily believe in them, but I mentioned that there are ways to tie this game to SH1 and SH3. For example
SH3 happens one year before SM, and thus can be thought of as another of Cheryl's delusions, especially since her having been in Portland is mentioned in both SM and SH3. And of course there's the bad ending of SH1 where Harry dies in the car crash, tying it to SM . Dhalia and Kaufmann appeared demonized in SH1, reflecting Cheryl's view of them.

But Climax's own SH Origins would not fit with this theory, though.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
Scitek, you might wanna link that picture with a spoiler warning.

Anyway, some other stuff:

-I'm convinced that the teacher that Cheryl was seeing in HS is based on Harry's appearance in SH1. The gossip girls tellingly mention that he looks old enough to be her father, and he's got a similar hairstyle and what little face you can see is similar to how Harry looked in the CG cutscenes of the first game. If this game takes place in some alternate universe where my theory's correct, then Harry's imagined appearance in SH1 was based off of this romantic ideal that the teacher presented to her. Or vice-versa, Cheryl was attracted to the teacher because he matched Cheryl's fantasy ideal father.

-Tying into this, Lisa mentions during her walking segment that she's always, "falling for guys who look like my dad... and end up regretting it the next day."

-If this creepy Electra complex stuff isn't enough, I'm starting to think that the young Dahlia might be Cheryl's own idealized self, attempting to take her mother's "place" by Harry's side. At first I thought she was meant to be a negative portrayal of Dahlia as a slut, but now I'm wondering. She's a rebellious punk who has no problems expressing herself and her sexuality, she's got no inhibitions, and notably, she seems to know what's going on and is trying to convince Harry to "just let things be" by not seeking the truth and how he should just give into the fantasy.

yuck gross ew that's disgusting but then again this is the series with vagina-head worms and fetus demons and rape monsters soooo

speaking of which, when you're swimming towards the "lighthouse" island, the silhouettes of a pine tree and a pole next to each other freaked me out because when you squint a little they coincidentally look like pyramid head lol
 
R

rollingstart

Banned
Exactly how short is this game? Has more to do with my interest in replaying it since the game is supposed to turn out different each time, right?
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
Unrelated to the game itself, but there was something kinda ironic. I was looking at the 1UP review back when it came out, and the first comment had what seemed like a spoiler.

It was someone saying that they beat the game, and that Harry and the story "disgusted" them as a father and husband. I thought "oh shit no" and assumed that I had just been spoiled, that the twist would be that Harry was a terrible father who abused his family in horrible ways.

Of course, it actually meant that the commenter got one of the "bad" endings, where Harry is an angry drunk or a cheating bastard. Now, you gotta wonder whether he was being honest when he answered the questions.

His comment may have revealed more about himself than it did the game. :lol
 
K

Kiriku

SWEDISH PERFECTION
Just finished the game and it kept getting better story-wise and less boring as I got closer to the ending. I liked how the game got more and more crazy towards the end (SH style), and the ending itself which was a nice twist. Overall, it turned out worse than I had hoped for before playing it, and better than I imagined it would be at the beginning of the game.
The chase sequences were by far the worst parts of the game, and I was really excited about the idea (because it DOES have potential, I think). Some of the tips I got in this thread did help though, thanks for that, along with turning up the brightness on my tv to better see what was going on. But then, if I didn't had a map to follow it probably would've been 5 times worse. And when they asked me to backtrack that one time, I said 'no fucking way' and used a walkthrough. :lol
I have some faith in Climax now (if they're the ones behind the story and characters), that they actually can create something good story-wise with their own hands. If they only put some work into the gameplay parts as well, make more interesting puzzles and integrate the horror aspects in ways that make the player feel more uncertain about what's going to happen and when, they would truly have something special horror-wise.

EDIT: Just saw the UFO Ending , that has to be the most hilarious ending for a SH game ever :lol :lol
 
T

ThatObviousUser

ὁ αἴσχιστος παῖς εἶ
While I had some fun with the chase sequences (only got frustrated during the
forest
one, but I think that's because I was just starting to get a feel for them), they could have been unquestionably better.

I think after the first chase, each chase should have introduced some variation to the idea like
taking photos at the school
did. I believe that was one of the only parts of the game that could be seen as genuinely scary, since you had a goal you had to approach cautiously and with a bit of strategy instead of blindly barreling through doors.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
The
taking photos at the school
part was neat and introduced some nice variation. Then there was
having to look at the toucan mascot's beak to find the right colors
, but that can be avoided by having a good memory (or using your camera before you need to).

Looking stuff up online, I had no idea that
you could just fail to escape during the sinking car section.
 
D

Deleted member 30609

Unconfirmed Member
oh, wow. I didn't realise you
could escape the car.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
"Your denial of death, abnormal sexuality, don't you get it?

*teh door opens and OMG IT'S TEAM SILENT BUT I THOUGHT WHAT*

"An imaginary 'true sequel', made out of scraps of memories and old games replayed a million times. Team Silent is dead. They weren't knights in shining armor. Konami isn't the monster you make them out to be. But they're alive. You're alive. You need to live your life."

*camera suddenly cuts to the couch TO REVEAL THE SHOCKED FACE OF DUN-DUN-DUN*

214xt1l.jpg


*fake team silent walks up to brandonh, all super-sad*

"u... u've been wiff me for so long..."
"and I always will be~" *freezes into shape of Silent Hill 1 CD case, rly sad piano song plays*

































"Today in news, a local psychiatrist's office was burned down, apparently by a disturbed patient. According to witnesses, the patient burst out of Dr. Climax UK Kaufmann's office, carrying a CD jewel case and shouting, "you're still alive, we'll be together forever," before running off into the woods."
 
B

brandonh83

Banned
:lol

nice, but I did like the game. I think people keep ignoring that fact. Yes, I have a lot of issues with it, but it's not a total failure.

but, I know you're just messing, and I lol'd
 
T

TheCardPlayer

Likes to have "friends" around to "play cards" with
This game. Lord this game. Oh my...oh my. Oh my! OH MY! Everything that Silent Hill was meant to be...is this game.
 
T

tadcalabash

Neo Member
grandjedi6 said:
Hey, this game actually won a
Wii
Game of the Year award!
Click to expand...

After watching that it makes me tempted to borrow a Wii and play through this. I'm not a survival horror game fan (though I love creepy atmosphere in other games, stories, movies), but I think that's mostly because of the "survival" part. For example, I loved reading and listening about Silent Hill 2, but I could never play it myself.

I am however a huge adventure game fan, which makes this game quite intriguing. I think I could grumble through the chase scenes to get to the rest of the game.
 
adamsapple

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Oh god .. where the fuck is the PS2 version ? Does it even have a solid release date ?
 
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