When it comes down to classic horror games from the early 00’s one of the few high profile games that stand the test of time two decades later is Silent Hill 2 which was released for the PlayStation 2, Xbox and Microsoft Windows back in 2001. Silent Hill 2 was developed by Team Silent and published by Konami and was the sequel to the original Silent Hill game from ’99 which was released for the PS1. When it comes down to various video games within the Silent Hill series the ’01 installment is considered to be among the best; mainly due to its graphical improvements in comparison to the first game. It should also be noted that the main story for Silent Hill 2 was not connected to that of the first game and had a darker atmosphere and really played up the element of psychological horror which was considered to be a strong positive within the game. Despite, the positive reception that Silent Hill 2 has received over the past two decades the game had a few drawbacks including its short story length since player can complete the entire game in under 12 hours. Also, Silent Hill 2 was considered to be one of the most difficult installments within the entire series depending on who you ask. The storyline was intriguing and revolved around the main protagonist James Sutherland who is haunted by guilt of the death of his wife Mary who died of an illness three years prior to the start of Silent Hill 2. James had not only received a letter from his late-wife Mary years after her death but he also runs into a woman named Maria who highly resembled her. The funny thing about James meeting with Maria was the fact that had never seen or heard of Mary and had a personality that contrasted that of his wife’s.
Maria ended up following James around in fictional town that resembled an area located in Maine as they were hunted by a monster known as Pyramid Head. The Pyramid Head creature as basically a physical manifestation of Sunderland’s guilt for his late wife Mary’s death. Also, one of the most interesting twists in Silent Hill 2 is the fact that players eventually discover that Maria was a mere manifestation of Sunderland’s imagination and ends up being revealed as one the main antagonists of Silent Hill 2. Despite, being a playable character in Silent Hill 2: Born from a Wish Maria being an antagonist in the game was something many people did not see coming which made the story of the game that much better in many people’s eyes. Silent 2 had about six different endings which added to the game’s overall replay value opposed to being a non-linear video game with only one conclusion. Despite, not selling as much as the original installment from ’99 which reach over two million on the PS1 Silent Hill 2 was able to reach over one million copies in sales which was better than Silent Hill 3 from ’03. The Silent Hill 3 game failed to reach 750K in sales despite being a decent survival-horror video game for the PlayStation 2. Silent Hill 2 is definitely one of those games that deserves a current generation remake for the PlayStation 5 or the Xbox Series X but it seems unlikely to happen.
Gaming Hearts Collection 