Silent Hill: HD Collection Xbox 360 (SH3)

The ugly cover is only the beginning...

I finally got around to really giving my time to SH: HDC. Why’d it take so long? At first, I waited for the patch. Then the patch wasn’t coming for the Xbox 360. I did Downpour and Homecoming, and then this one. When I started I was in the middle of my third move the 2012 year. I had to leave people I have become attached to, and it was particularly hard. My comfort is not found in chocolate or ice cream or chick flicks. It’s in my favourite video games. One of my all time favourites is Silent Hill 3. To stop thinking of my shitty life, I dedicated a week to getting all the achievements. Since you can easily play SH3 in about 2 hours and 30 minutes, getting all the achievements was not as hard as I was expecting. If you’re an achievement whore, this game is easy, but you also have to get all of SH2’s achievements to get them all. As of posting, I still haven’t gotten the achievements for SH2 on Hard Mode. And yes, I know that this post is long overdue, and it was difficult to organize between the two games, new and original, and the console differences.

  

Disclaimer: I love SH3. I love SH the universe. If I could only play one series for the rest of my life, this would be it. I still have my PS2 copies, and I will always love these games. I’m not opposed to change, but it better be change for the better.  

Graphics

            HD remakes of PS2 games are not the kind of things that I get very excited for, especially if there is not going to be new content. That being said, the HD graphics are...alright. Necessary? No.

Yay! Now we get to see the PH rape scene in HD! And the scene where James puts his arm into the disgusting toilet without even rolling up his sleeve!

Well, now I can die happy! </sarcasm>

            That being said, the graphics still leave something to be desired. The fog has been redone. Previously, the fog was used to hide the environments loading on the streets of Silent Hill. Additionally, it added to the creepy atmosphere-you can never quite see far enough ahead to feel safe. Now, the fog seems to be further away, giving you a larger area that you can see. But I don’t think they changed how the game loads. Outside, it is easy to run too fast for the game, causing lag and moments where you can see the environment building itself before it can be hidden by the fog. My Xbox froze 3 times outside on the streets. I have a new model Xbox, less than a year old, and as far as I recall, it has never frozen on me before this. Why does lag (like what happened in SH: Downpour) happen in games? While it wasn’t as bad as SH:D, it shouldn’t happen.

Post PS3 Patch

The patch did fix some graphical issues (but the patch was only released for the PS3). If you want a comparison, go to Youtube and do a search. The patch gives noticeable results, but not enough for me to care. However, there are still a myriad of graphical issues on the PS3, even with the patch. So in the end, an Xbox 360 patch wouldn’t have done much good anyway, because Konami gave us a Band-Aid when we needed duct tape. And Konami blatantly ignored one whole console.         

What’s funny is that the current god of the SH franchise is Tom Hewlett, who basically blames the glitches on the data they were given to port. He claims that they were given incomplete archive data, so you know…totally not their fault for delivering a broken game. However, everyone is citing the fact that Blue Point Games (who did the HD ports for the Metal Gear HD Collection, which is multiple orgasms on a disk) takes retail versions of the games and uses that data, so they always get the final version. Oh hey…that makes way more sense than using incomplete archive data! So...why didn’t anyone tell Tom Hewlett how to do this? *Face palm.    

Gamespot PS2 versions of SH2 and SH3 VS SH: HD (prepatch)

Voice Acting

            This is probably what everyone is talking about. And I’m going to talk about it because while I am a rabbit, I wear sheep’s clothing.

How do I feel about the new voices?

            The voices are...meh. I don’t know WHY this game needed new voices. Oh, wait, yes I do. It’s because Konami figured recording new voices would be cheaper and they probably didn’t expect Guy Cihi (original voice actor of James) to raise a fuss. And Mary Elizabeth McGlynn and a few others wanted to carve their names into the fame that is SH2 and SH3. And quite frankly, I used to be a fan of McGlynn. Her vocal tracks for the Silent Hill games are phenomenal and they will be songs that will probably stick with me forever. I love her songs, but I cannot respect the woman. The arrogance of this woman that oozes from her statements about the original and new SH voice actors is astounding. And she mistakenly calls Mary/Maria Marie. At least try to pretend that actually care like you say you do. You can watch a clip of her talk on Youtube, two sources being here and here. At the very least, I think they should have included the option to have the original or new voices on both games, not just SH2. I have to wonder, what was keeping them back on having the original voices on SH3? Heather’s original VA was, in fact, easy to get a hold of, contrary to the rumour that was circulating that they just couldn’t find her.     

            For the next part of the review, I will be focusing on SH3 of the HD Collection. I will post the SH2 portion at a later date.

Silent Hill 3 (HD Collection)

Hi, I consumed Ester's
high school experience.

SH3 Graphics

At times the graphics appear to be washed out when compared to the original. In the PS2 version of the amusement park dream, there is a sepia-colour fog rolling about. It is not in the HD version, reducing the atmosphere quality. Overall the lighting is better, removing the black splotches that the shadows made. It makes the setting more naturalistic, though I liked the surreal quality of the lighting. You’re trapped in/infected by the Otherworld, a whole different reality. Making the lighting naturalistic blurs the lines between the safe reality and the uncertain and dangerous predicament that Heather is dropped into. Overall the whole thing is just meh and unnecessary. 

SH3 Voice Acting

"Is every person here a mental case?"

Heather

What I liked about Heather’s character was that she is a very normal character. She’s quick to anger, loves her father, and is determined to get revenge, even though at one point it would be totally easy to drive away and not go to Silent Hill. Heather’s new voice, played by Amanda Winn-Lee, sounds so nasally. You know what it sounds like? A grown ass woman trying to sound like an anime character. The old Heather, Heather Morris, sounded much more natural, and the new Heather lacks the enthusiasm in key moments (i.e. “Don’t talk about my dad like that!”-of course, the noise of her hand hitting the door is absent, killing the intensity of the moment). She was alright during the climax at the apartment, though I dislike that they altered Heather’s speech to Claudia. OMG, they added a swear, now Heather means business. Like no one took her seriously before. Don't try to fix what isn't broken. 

"You know that only God can
save us."

Claudia

The new Claudia, voiced by Laura Bailey, is bland. I feel like she lacks the conviction of old Claudia, played by Donna Burke. She does try to sound like the old Claudia to no avail. Claudia is a religious fanatic. She knows, without a doubt, that she can bring God. God will come and purify the world with fire and usher in a new paradise. She will create a new world that is free from all suffering. Her convictions are unwavering. When she set out to do her task, even though she knows that her sins are too great for redemption, in her heart she knew she is right to do it. And I feel like Bailey just doesn’t convince me of these deep aspects of her character. Most of the time she sounds bored. This character is integral to the plot. She is the antagonist and has an emotional connection to Heather. She orders an atrocious act that shatters Heather, causing her to switch from her “let’s escape from all this crazy BS” to “let’s vivisect Claudia” mindset. With her new voice, she is basically as threatening as a cardboard cut out. Story complexity just went down the toilet.

"Monsters? They look like
monsters to you? Don't worry.
It's just a joke!"

Vincent

Vincent. Oh, god, poor Vincent. His old voice revealed just how messed up he was. It was unsettling. The new VA, Yuri Lowenthal...isn’t creepy. His voice lacks that certain nuance that makes you unsure about him. He holds all the answers, but he is clearly lying and quite possibly mentally unstable. With him, you’re never quite sure if you should trust him. Everything would be so much easier if Vincent would explain everything to Heather. But...as she says, “There’s something wrong with you too.” I feel like the new Vincent tries to play down what made Vincent’s character so awesome. It’s like putting eyebrows on Claudia-it’s part of the character, don’t mess with it. I know that they thought the original acting was weird. And it was, in a very good way. This new voice actor sucks phallic imagery. And you'll know him as the VA who does Sasuke Uchiha's voice from Naruto.     

"That's fine. Nobody's gonna cry
over my grave anyway."

Douglas

The original VA of Douglas, Richard Grosse (who sadly passed away before the game was released), was fantastic. The new VA, Kirk Thornton, sounds more gravelly, like the VA was pushing the “detective” stereotype. The old Douglas sounded natural. The new VA is trying to emulate the hardboiled noir guy. He tries too hard and it shows. If I had never heard the original VA, overall I would say that the performance was fine. Nothing to be excited about voice acting wise, but alright.

Sorry, Heather, the good points aren't
up here,either.

Judgement

Don’t buy the game for the graphics or the new voice acting. Don’t even buy the game new. Borrow it. Rent it. Buy it used. Don’t support a team of arrogant jerks. In the end, I don’t know why they bothered other than to have a piece of SH pie with their names on it. SH3 is watered down and subpar. Good for achievements.

*Note: Most of the pictures came from the Silent Hill Wikia. 

Silent Hill Homecoming-Short Review

*Minor Spoilers Ahead!

Welcome home, Soldier...

I don't want to do a whole review for this. Quite frankly, I like it a lot. Yes, we all saw the end coming. I think it's more pertinent to make Alex realize the truth, and the player needs to find out why Alex can’t see it like we can. The graphics are great, I liked the interaction with The Order, and I liked the story with Shepherd’s Glen. I’m tired of people exclaiming, “OMG YOU LIKED THIS GAME?!” Yes, I do. It’s why I got all the achievements for it. It’s why I’ll play it a billion more times before I die.

There are a few things I'd like to post though. You know who my favourite character is? This guy:

Curtis Ackers

People cite him as one of the main antagonists, second to Judge Halloway. I don’t really consider him a main, more like a mini-boss, and I’m not convinced he’s always been evil. I don’t think he was part of The Order until after you find his shop all locked up. I think they took him then and he converted.

What I find intriguing about him is his focus on fixing and maintaining. He runs the scrap yard/repair shop and he sees how people can neglect their possessions. With The Order, he “finds clarity.” I’ve been wondering what his clarity is. He isn’t part of the four families of Shepherd’s Glen, so I am uncertain if he was part of that religion too. His clarity might have been religion. And since he seems to be a grumpy guy who prefers to be alone, perhaps he found the people of religion to be of his social taste. And they gave him a new job-to fix...broken people. With a circular saw.

You know who I hate? This lady:

I'm busy looking for my son. Oh, wait..no I'm not.

Totally useless. Yes, I get her emotional trauma. She had to pick one son, but she gave birth to both. She’s mentally unstable now, but you know how short/different the game would be if she was like, “Oh, hey, about your brother...you know [insert plot reveal], right? Remember? Oh yeah, I guess you’ve forgotten [other big plot reveal]. Guess you have to go to Silent Hill now instead of meandering all over this town. Bye!”  

I could go on, but I think I'll leave it at that. 

Silent Hill Downpour, Post Patch

There Be Spoilers Ahead!

Silent Hill Downpour has been out since March 2012, and I intended to do a review around that time. There were some lag issues and Vatra promised to patch that. And because I love the Silent Hill franchise that much, and because I strive to be a fair person, I decided to wait on the patch. I didn't think that it would arrive only a few weeks ago, about eight months later. Last night I got all the achievements for the game, which is huge for me. I usually don't bother. I did it for Alice: Madness Returns on the old account that I once used, and that's it. Until now.

Patch

The patch was designed to fix the framerate issues, save issues, and bugs concerning the "Homeless" mission and the subway system. I've only had a save issue happen once, and since the patch, it has not happened again. I didn't do the Homeless mission or use the subways before. However, I did post-patch and I noticed that passages that were supposed to be open in the subway were not. If I found locked doors and I had to leave the area and come back on the reload and the door would be opened. That was annoying.

The above issues are minor annoyances, considering the frequency of occurrence. My concern is the framerate issues. The patch didn't eliminate them all, no. But it lessened the degree of lag. There still is lag. It's not the end of the world though. I didn't consider the pre-patch game unplayable, and less lag is still better. Although, I might have to remind the world about why I hate the way the gaming industry relies on patches instead of making a functioning game to begin with.

Praise

I do have to say that I did enjoy the game. Downpour gets a lot of unnecessary hate, especially from old fans. And I am an old fan (from about 2001) and I enjoyed it enough to play through it multiple times for the achievements, and I am not an achievement whore.

I am a cult enthusiast. Cults fascinate me. Especially magic cults. If someone invited me to a cult that claimed they could do magic, I'd totally hop right into the sketchy van. Yet, I do like how Downpour did a story set in Silent Hill, a town basically run by old gods and the cult that follows it, without the cult element. Yes, DJ Ricks alludes to it when he says that they are always listening. Though he could be alluding to the monsters in general, or the old gods. But no where in the story does anyone stop Murphy and say, The Order is behind this. Mostly because, I think, they aren't. Yes, the old gods have deemed it necessary for Murphy and Anne to figure out their issues. The Order is busy doing other stupid shit. I like to think that they aren't concerned with Murphy and his troubles.

Officer Anne Cunningham 

After playing through this game over and over, a few things have become apparent to me. And as a disclaimer, you can disagree with me. The great thing about the SH universe is that most of it is unexplained spookiness. I tried to watch the first Silent Hill film with my friend and with all his questions about how the universe works, I had to give up. It's magic, ok? The normal laws of our world don't always apply. It has its own rules. And he was totally fine with that answer. Or at least he stopped asking questions.

Anyway, I've been thinking about the meat of the story. It is about revenge.

Anne: "My father was a good man. He didn't believe in revenge. But I do."

Murphy also wants revenge. It's what got him in prison. His deal and development is super easy to see. What I've been thinking of is whose story this actually is. Today I am feeling that it is really Anne's story and Murphy is tangled up in it, in his own way. That the gods of Silent Hill wanted to give the darkness festering in her heart the opportunity to get revenge, or forgive. She mentions the "sick" things she had to do to get Murphy under her watch. Murphy already got his revenge and he was probably going to rot in prison. Anne had yet to get hers, but she had to pay for it before she even got the opportunity. Yet he was already technically "paying" for his crimes, but it wasn't enough for her. As with the sequence of final scenes when Anne shoots Murphy in the showers, he is her Boogeyman. She is fighting her monsters. Murphy is fighting himself, running away from himself.

What would be really awesome is if Anne could get her own game, or at least some DLC for her story. It's alluded to that she hasn't just been frolicking in the streets until she runs into Murphy or DJ Ricks. Too bad this will probably never happen. This definitely sucks because the series needs more strong female leads.

Old E3 Trailer 
Does anyone else remember the old official E3 trailer from 2011? It's interesting to see the changes that they made. I remember first playing it and waiting for the kids to push me and run past me. I guess they were supposed to be the kids you keep seeing in the paintings? I thought it was dumb that they were never really given a mention, they just appear in the art all the time. They were probably supposed to be part of something and they were cut completely. I'd love to play a version  of the game before the changes.

Silent Hill: HD Collection-No Xbox 360 Patch Rage

(Updated with new from August 12th 2012 at the bottom of the page.)
(Updated August 22nd 2012 below the previous update.)

I originally found the news here at Inner Fear and double-checked with Joystick over here.

The Xbox 360 version of Silent Hill: HD will NOT be getting a patch. But the PS3 version will. What the flying ass fucking fuck?

They can’t because of "technical issues and resources."

Ok, let me take this over. I got this one. You can all thank me later.  

Dear Konami,

Are you telling me that I used my resources (money) and traded for a product, a flawed product at best, and now you're telling me that you don't have the resources to fix this? But you have the resources to fix it for the PS3? 

Fuck you.

Love,
Ester York.

If the fact that SH3, my favourite, most beloved SH game of all time, got the SHITTIEST, MOST ANNOYING redub WITHOUT the option of switching to the original voices was bad enough, this is. SH3 of the HD Collection is broken as fuck. Not unplayable, no. Some will say that it is, but it isn't. But I'll tell you one thing. I WILL be playing my PS2 version. It is my "go-to" game that never gets old. I don't particularly give many shits about it being HD. Maybe just one shit, but definitely not two. If it never happened I would not have noticed. I'm not one of these pre-pubescent pansies who have nervous break downs over pre-HD quality game graphics. SH2 of the HD Collection is broken to a shit- filled hell too.  Unlike most of the Silent Hill fan base, SH2 isn’t my favourite SH game. Not my least favourite, but it’s down there. It doesn’t hold a particularly special place in my heart. Do I still want to see a glitch filled pathetic HD update of it? No. If you’re going to make something, do it right.   

Why the fuck do game companies release broken as fuck games? Yes, we can download patches. Though I have to remind you that there are, in fact, places in the world that have shitty internet connections. Up until a few months ago my parents, and therefore my younger siblings, had dial- up, and it was the slowest dial-up I’ve seen and completely unreliable. For a while they had no internet at all. They bought a game and played it as is. Game companies have to stop releasing games full of bugs to patch it later. Why don’t they, I don’t know, make a product to the best of their ability? Something that they can be proud of? If a game is rife with bugs, here’s a radical idea: DON’T FUCKING RELEASE IT. DON’T TAKE MY MONEY. Hang your head in shame and hold it back. Let’s face it, SH games are pushed back all the time. Video games in general are pushed back all the time.

What also pisses me off is that they don’t have the fucking RESOURCES. Oh, and there are fucking TECHNICAL ISSUES. Well then. Those are totally good reasons </sarcasm>.

#1. RESOURCES. I gave you my fucking money. You gave me a piece of shit not worth my time (as stated, I’ll be playing my PS2 version instead). I gave you my fucking resources in exchange for goods. Suck it the fuck up. At this point, this is your fucking fault. When I worked in a coffee place, if I made your coffee wrong and you brought it back, I apologized and made another one. You eat the fucking cost because YOU royally fucked up. I didn’t go “Shit, no can do, yo. That would cost more money.” You know, I didn’t shrug my shoulders and give up because I have an IQ above a fucking shoe box full of rocks. And because I’m not a morally deplorable dip-shit.   

#2. TECHNICAL ISSUES. The whole fucking product is a technical issue. IT’S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU RELEASE A PIECE OF SHIT. Did they port it and not even test it? Did they get a four-year-old to test it? Who the fuck can’t see these glaring issues? Who the fuck at Konami looked at the final product and thought it was passable? Fuck you and your technical issues. Oh, these are just too fucking hard to fix, eh? Boo fucking hoo. Why don’t you release a game FREE OF ISSUES so you don’t have to fix these TECHNICAL ISSUES AFTER WE GAVE YOU OUR MONEY? Oh, fuck, is this concept just too hard?      

So what, all Xbox 360 owners are shit out of luck? Sure, we could trade in (taking a loss, btw, because trading in NEVER gets a decent return) and get a PS3 version. Except, you know, for those of us who don't own a PS3. And I guaran-fucking-tee that if they don't have the RESOURCES to fix these issues, they don't have the fucking RESOURCES to buy me a PS3.

Conclusion: Making a patch just for the PS3 and not the Xbox 360 is ass-fucking Xbox 360 owners with something long and sand-papery. Don't release broken pieces of shit to begin with. Thank you Konami for taking my money and giving me a piece of flaming rat shit in return.     

Update: Konami has released that they will exchange the Xbox 360 version. IF YOU HAVE YOUR RECEIPT AND BOUGHT IT NEW. Not only that, it isn't a refund. It's an exchange. 90% of the games on the list (you can find it here along with the news) are crap (at least to me). It's like you buy a new TV. You get it home and it's ok, but you look at the resolution and it just isn't that great. Not as sharp as it claims to be. The audio kind of sucks. It's not worth the money you paid. Maybe it's just broken. You bring it back and instead of giving you your money back or fixing it, they offer to give you something else. A radio. Well, fuck me, that's not what I want. If I wanted a crappy game from your list, I would have bought them myself. Hell, some of the games, like Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, I already have and it was a disappointment too. If I order a burger and you make it wrong, don't offer to take my burger and give me only an apple pie. Apple pie is fantastic, but it isn't what I paid for. It isn't what you promised to deliver when I gave you my money.

Update: Konami still has not offered to buy me a PS3.