videogameblog

CW: mentions of self harm, suicide and sexual assault

I admittedly went into this not expecting much at all, given Konami's track record when it comes to modern Silent Hill content. However I was pleasantly surprised? it's nothing groundbreaking, but it's probably the best piece of Silent Hill content released in a long time. My theory is that it was only released as some kind of ploy to draw in some new Silent Hill fans before the SH2 remake comes out, though. It's free on PS5 and released on the day it was announced at the Playstation State of Play - it's clear Konami doesn't care too much about it. I'm completely guessing here, but it seems like Konami probably shelved this for a while, and then decided to release it now to build up hype and interest surrounding SH2 remake. The in-game date on your phone is set to early 2021, not sure if that's reflective of the development period or not.

The original Silent Hill games were far from subtle. The pistons thrusting in and out of walls of flesh in SH2 aren't exactly hard to connote meaning from. Even if it was blunt, the original games make use of horror imagery to effectively address sensitive topics like sexual assault. In comparison, A Short Message is extremely direct in it's presentations. As you navigate the abandoned apartment building the game is set in, There's these murals scattered around. They depict female characters with cherry blossom tattoos on different parts of their body. It's clear the cherry blossoms are supposed to be self-harm scars; it's explained that the cherry blossoms are supposed to represent healing. Later on, there's a mural depicting the player character with a cherry blossom on her arm. The implication of self-harm here is relatively subtle, in a way that's reminiscent of the original games. This would have been a great way to include it in-game. Instead, there's a cutscene earlier on showing the player character dramatically lifting a razor up to her scar-covered wrist with dramatic camera effects and scary music playing in the back. The player is always shown everything they should know explicitly. Alongside this, the pacing and overall treatment of certain topics feels a little underdeveloped. I think this is due to the adundance of issues they attempt to approach; there's ideas of child abuse, depression, bullying, suicide, self-harm, sexual assault, unwanted pregnancy, grief and guilt all present in a short 2-hour runtime. Some of these concepts get significantly more focus than others, leaving the ones that get less feeling a little shoehorned in. The themes of cyberbullying and social media pressure feel so underacknowledged that it almost feels like they left it in by accident - it's mentioned briefly in random scenes that feel completely disjointed.

Gameplay-wise ASM isn't too involved, you navigate an abandonded apartment complex as you overcome the grief of losing a friend to suicide. It partly feels like a tech demo to show off the PS5's capabilities (which again makes me think this was supposed to release a while ago). Narrative is the main thing that drives the player, gameplay isn't really present outside of some minor puzzles. It's clear the devs took inspiration from P.T at multiple points throughout, the 'looping' mechanic is present in a few segments. The only gameplay-heavy sequences present is in these annoying chases scattered throughout the game; you run down a corridor as a monster chases you. The design of the monster is really cool, it's covered in those cherry blossoms I mentioned earlier which gives it some nice narrative implications tied to it's visuals. The way it moves looks a little weird, I think the creepy effect they were going for didn't really land. It just looks like it's glitching around most of the time (I think they also took this from PT). The apartment complex itself has some really cool visuals too, I especially liked the sequence in the player character's childhood home. The post-it notes all over the walls felt a little corny though, another example of the game being too on-the-nose. Akira Yamaoka did the music and it's awesome, especially that credits song. The sound design carries the atmosphere so hard.

It's clear that Silent Hill: A Short Message is an attempt from Konami to make a Silent Hill for the next generation, hopefully netting some sweet new purchases of Silent Hill 2 Remake along the way. It vaguely captures the essence of the original games, but fails at even attempting to employ the subtleties that Team Silent approached sensitive topics with.