This is what a remake should look like! The game can be recommended to anyone looking for a horror game that focuses on atmosphere rather than cheap shock effects, and also tells a good story with room for interpretation. Suitable for everyone, whether you're new to Silent Hill or want to relive the classic with cutting-edge graphics and well-designed modernized controls. Great and iconic soundtrack!
If we get the old one's as well...GOD DAMN WE GONNA BE EATING GOOD. I've played both versions and the remake in my opinion is better than the original in some ways like the combat, enviroment design, character design and overall it expands in the sad and twisted lore of this game and it's characters. Yes, the new voice of games is worse than the one in the hd collection on PS3 but i prefer having more expanded areas and more intelligent puzzles than having to figure out that i had to put was,a horse shoe and a lighter together to open a hatch floor door. Overall, i like this game and it's a hell of a trip and half. If you are able to play the old one i highly recommend you make your own opinion but for now, this is a great way to get introduced in the francise. Big W from GOG here for allowing us to fully own this game and get these goodie's along with it.
Great remake, really well done, surprisingly so, given Blooper Team's somewhat average previous games. But if you played them, you could kinda tell that they were really big fans of Silent Hill, you could easily see stylistic, narrative, musical and gameplay cues that they took more or less directly from older Silent Hill titles, so it was a rare good decision by KONAMI to let them handle the remake.
And, again, I think they did a great job, and to have it here, DRM free, is really good, great job GOG. I only ever cleared the original Silent Hill 2 once, but I appreciated the changes made here, and I really thought that they managed to transfer the atmosphere of the original game nearly flawlessly. I enjoyed the updated designs of characters, especially Maria, and I really like the audio - it features music by Akira Yamaoka, the series' stalwart composer, but reworked. Also, the voice acting - a contentious thing in the original, is, I think, vastly better here, if only because the audio quality itself is much clearer.
The performance is.... a mixed bag. I am using an AMD 7900XT , and I do not use frame-gen, running it at native 3440*1440, and it struggles to maintain 60fps on medium-high. With tweaks I am sure you can get stable 60fps especially with frame gen (credit where it's due, it supports FSR 3.1), but I feel like there are stutters that have to do with the CPU side that are still going to be there. I will dock point/half a point for performance, considering the game looks really very very good.
Also, the game sticks quite close to the original, with all its limitations - e.g. repetitive combat and exploration, imaginative but very few enemy types, awkward camera. For some it's good that these things are as they were, for some it will be a problem.
Also, the Deluxe only comes with a "sample" version of the OST - just 10 tracks (the full version has 90). I am not expecting to get 90 for the price, but having more than 1/9th of would have been nice.
First before i start, i have to say that this game is a masterpiece very faithful to the OG, but not a 1:1 remake either (which is great)
The game is longer, have expended areas, a revamped gameplay, the music got remixed and reworked, one new enemy and two new endings. The story was reworked a bit too.
Now here's the cons, because there's a lot of cons because of the engine used (Unreal Engine 5 sigh..) The game vanilla has huge stuttering issues and lower-end PC will get crashes too probably.
Here a list of issues the game has and what i recommand
- Ultra+ mod on nexus (For performance issues and stutters)(doesn't fix all of it obviously)
- Ray reconstruction + Ultra Quality DLSS support (Check PC wiki for the guide or my GOG forum thread about it)
- Skin unlocker on nexus (Unlock the missing mask from pre-order and PS5 exclusive)
Here's what the game hasn't restored or removed (contains spoilers you are warned)
- Ranking system is gone (all it's rewards is also gone)
- Born From A Wish DLC
- Great Knife from Pyramid Head (is in the game, but not usable as a weapon)
- Hyper Spray is there as an easter egg and not a weapon (rank system upgrade is gone too)
Now what i wished would have been added into the game..
- Ranking system and all it's rewards
- More NG+ content (weapons , items and locations)
- Costumes to unlock and to use
- Unlockable artwork and music
- BFAW DLC obviously
My review of the game is simple : Buy the game, Bloober and Konami cooked. The game is as good as the OG, the music is a bit inferior to the original especially when you compare Theme Of Laura and Theme Of Laura ll.
The story is well expanded, well written and more endings to experiment. I can't recommand enough this masterpiece.
SH2 Remake is the amazing breakthrough success that launched Bloober into the upper echelons of gaming that they are enjoying now. Before that, they were best known for walking simulator type games that were average at best with average quality writing in their stories. The SH2 Remake successfully recaptures much of the magic from the original, with Bloober also applying their own magic to add some unexpectedly welcome additions like more endings, more places to explore and additional puzzles.
All the characters are well portrayed and very comparable to their original versions. The voice acting solid, though with Maria being the weakest link. The story is amazing as ever, and wonderfully recaptured from the original. The combat is very serviceable and by far the most advanced in the series and a great evolution altogether. The setting and environments are incredibly well done for exploration and immersion. Bloober did a wonderful recapturing the magic from the original SH2 into updated graphics and gameplay.
Bloober successfully defied all doubts and negative expectations with the massive success of SH2 Remake. They are now on the rise as a new major player in horror gaming that they have spread their wings further starting with Cronos the New Dawn, which is a surprisingly good game itself, along with a SH1 Remake in the works, and other projects in development. Congratulations to Bloober and best of luck to their long term future.
