Content material warning: This overview discusses Silent Hill: The Brief Message’s story, which incorporates references to self-harm.
As a lifelong horror fan and longtime horror critic, I did not count on to overview a free Silent Hill recreation that launched, PT-style, only a few minutes after it was revealed. And I definitely did not count on it to be as forgettable as it’s. After greater than a decade away from consoles, Silent Hill: The Brief Message revives the sequence as the primary of a number of video games over the subsequent few years. I sincerely hope future installments within the franchise can rekindle the long-absent magic as a result of The Brief Message doesn’t do this. In additional methods than one, it is not the playable teaser Silent Hill followers hoped for.
Silent Hill: The Brief Message is a first-person horror recreation constructed on the thought of a time loop wherein its tormented principal character is trapped. If that sounds acquainted, wait till you play it. The sport is blatantly impressed by PT (or “Playable Teaser”), Hideo Kojima’s guerrilla demo for the never-released Silent Hill title he was as soon as engaged on. The Brief Message is just not Konami operating again PT’s story with out its director. It is a brand-new entry into the sequence meant to be one thing of a jumping-on level for gamers uninitiated with the beforehand hibernating horror sequence. It is neither tied to any previous entry, nor a teaser for a future installment.
Clocking in at about 90 minutes, its time dedication is temporary, its monetary dedication is non-existent, and but I nonetheless cannot suggest it as a result of it winds up feeling like a caricature of itself and should solely sour–or bitter further–one’s recollections of what was, for a time, the style’s finest sequence.
The Brief Message does not happen in Silent Hill, nevertheless it explains why that’s and tries to inform a narrative that checks all the standard containers. Important character enjoying the position of an unreliable narrator? Examine. Horrors which are heightened at any time when that character descends into the supernatural Otherworld? Yup. A twist that recontextualizes every little thing you’ve got seen earlier than it? In fact. These may very well be seen as non-negotiable parts of any recreation sporting the Silent Hill identify, however the formulation felt contemporary in Silent Hill 2, was nonetheless pleasant in Silent Hill Homecoming, and was obvious–but not, I suppose, game-ruining–in Silent Hill Downpour. In The Brief Message, nevertheless, it simply feels performed out, prefer it’s writing a ebook report utilizing solely the Spark Notes, understanding Silent Hill to be a metaphysical jail for a tortured wrongdoer, and taking the shortest potential path to inform that story.
Referring to an in-universe worldwide incidence coined “The Silent Hill Phenomenon,” the sport explains that locations of despair have been recognized to be enveloped in fog earlier than issues get even worse. Mainly, the sport suggests, you may have a Silent Hill wherever, even within the unusual German city filled with Japanese teenagers the place the sport is ready. It looks like a foolish addition to the lore when, beforehand, Silent Hill has by no means actually been thought of as being in the identical bodily place anyway. Silent Hill wasn’t precisely a city a lot as a vibe, however The Brief Message confuses that strategy, or maybe intentionally reimagines it for the more serious.
These superficial particulars of what Silent Hill has been and, as I infer it, “ought to be,” are worsened by a script that lacks subtext or subtlety to a groan-inducing diploma. Characters converse their thoughts with such precision that they depart nothing unsaid, ever. Because the participant, there is not any room to misconceive, to ponder a personality’s intentions, or to be misdirected in any means aside from the a method it does attempt to, which is probably going the plain one you will see coming after just a few minutes within the recreation.
The Brief Message does search meaningfulness in its narrative, telling a darkish story about self-harm, bullying, and a condemned constructing affected by routine suicides amongst younger ladies. There is a kernel of one thing price exploring there, nevertheless it must be performed deftly. Somewhat than paint in vibrant colours to create one thing poignant that each spooks its viewers and carries its meant message to the end line, the sport looks like a firehose with two settings: platitudes and nonsense.
With frequent frame-rate drops that see the sport endlessly floating between 40 and 60 frames per second, the sport additionally feels suboptimal on a technical degree. Given the strictly linear strategy and the restricted environments or results, it strikes me as odd that the sport cannot keep constant efficiency.
However enjoying it is not only a technical eyesore. It is an all-too-familiar haunted home story that takes the seeds of PT however bears solely rotten fruit. In actual fact, The Brief Message is indistinguishable from the last decade of PT-likes which have crowded Steam and different platforms since Kojima’s top-secret demo hit PS4. It is truly worse than a few of the many others I’ve performed given the way it retreads a lot acquainted territory however to a much less spectacular diploma.
For instance, environments can morph within the instantaneous you flip away from them, meant to supply the sport with a way of disorientation a la Layers of Concern. However whereas that recreation enhanced this function with phantasmagoric Dorian Grey-inspired shows, the place up was down and its setting just about got here to life across the participant, The Brief Message tends to merely swap one hallway for an additional. Nearly the complete portion of the sport that takes place exterior of the Otherworld exists in decrepit hallways filled with graffiti the place each hall appears the identical. Occasional live-action scenes solely re-color the monotony because of how each scene staged with actual individuals unfolds in the identical featureless white area.
The Brief Message additionally makes use of disembodied voices to recall recollections you will unlock by selecting up notes and different clues throughout the story. Although that is fairly customary online game fare, I nonetheless suppose it may be performed properly, reminiscent of with the Amnesia sequence. However the high quality of each the writing and performing can typically make these moments in The Brief Message inadvertently comical, reminiscent of once I interacted with a pizza and was scolded by the reminiscence of a annoyed mom.
PT-likes seldom disguise their influences, selecting as an alternative to lean into them to attempt to catch hearth the way in which PT did, however within the case of The Brief Message, the story and gameplay each depart it in a decidedly worse place than different copycats. It presents the broad strokes of PT–a time loop, a haunting, some claustrophobic hallways, and even a child in mortal danger–but not one of the dizzying terror.
Simply because it misunderstands what made PT particular, and what made so many video games making an attempt to fill that void subsequently forgettable, The Brief Message appears to not perceive Silent Hill’s personal well-established successes. Within the previously iconic Otherworld, you will flee an unkillable monster with no means to defend your self aside from your potential to dash. This is applicable a contemporary horror recreation trope to a sequence that when proudly invented the muse for a lot of video games to come back, and in flip hurries gamers by means of what has typically been the sequence’ finest facet. Not solely are you able to not discover a lot of the Otherworld, which in previous video games has helped create a dire temper befitting of the style, however you may’t even cease operating. The monster is at all times chasing you in these scenes till you clear an invisible threshold, escape, and kick off the subsequent cutscene.
Even when that is how it should be, I am not uninterested in the horror style’s monster chases once they’re performed properly, however The Brief Message fails to take action. These sequences are frequent within the recreation and shortly develop tiring given how they have an inclination to have one proper path and several other improper paths, resulting in many trial-and-error failures with checkpoints that ship gamers again to begin.
Whereas at first I discovered these moments elicited a little bit of pressure in me the way in which an efficient horror recreation ought to, I quickly succumbed to frustration each time the hallways would flip into the burnt-orange Otherworld, as a result of I knew it meant extra guesswork with extreme penalties laid forward. The tough industrial music organized by sequence legend Akira Yamaoka and a sincerely creepy monster draped in cherry blossoms, designed by the equally lauded Masahiro Ito, are the sport’s solely brilliant spots and assist make these in any other case irritating sections a bit extra memorable.
Nonetheless, a brand new Silent Hill must be greater than a soundtrack and a cool monster. The sequence’ finest efforts include unforgettable tales that really feel as if they function on mystifying dream logic that lead gamers to query what they’re seeing at each flip. The Brief Message is determined to be understood and devoid of novelty, leaving no room for interpretation, no sense of lingering thriller, and no sturdy impression for anybody who could also be enjoying a Silent Hill recreation for the primary time. Its unintended quick message finally ends up feeling sadly apparent: Don’t obtain.