With the recent Silent Hill Transmission unveiling newer things surrounding Silent Hill 2, a wave of cautious optimism is sweeping the fans, hinting at a promising future for the franchise. However, many still find it difficult to adjust to the innovative changes the remake brings to the series’ pivotal entry.
There are many things that the remake is doing right, but there are just as many things that team Bloober needs to iron out or outright change. According to a few fans, one of those primary issues is the game’s combat system.
Silent Hill 2 Fans Are Not Happy With the Remake’s Combat and for an Excellent Reason
Silent Hill games have always deprioritized combat to emulate how an everyman would combat the monstrosities the town throws at them. Barring Silent Hill: Homecoming, this simple rule has remained a core tenet of the franchise’s gameplay structure.
Now that we’ve had our first good look at how Silent Hill 2‘s remake plays, including the game’s combat, some fans are questioning whether Konami and the Bloober team wish to uphold the tenet or not. The problem boils down to a simple issue—in the remake and during combat sequences, James can now seamlessly switch between melee and ranged options and dodge incoming attacks.
James' actor says "he's not an action hero by any means" while James is instantly switching shotgun to melee weapon, doing a combo, evades the hit and finishes nurse off like it's nothing. Shit's more action packed than Homecoming.
— Gubila's Lair (@gaming_ribbon) May 31, 2024
On paper, this change feels natural and part of aligning Silent Hill 2 with modern game design standards. However, people who have played the series’ previous entries, especially the first four titles, can immediately tell how much this changes the flow of combat.
In the original Silent Hill 2, players were encouraged to skip combat and not take on the monsters directly whenever possible, focusing instead on surviving each of the game’s story sequences. Keeping that in mind, many are understandably upset with the changes.
At the same time, it may still be too early to judge how the remake will present its combat to the players and whether the community’s predictions will hold until the release date.
Silent Hill 2 Remake Still Has a Long Way to Go Before the Community Positively Receives It
Even though fans are slowly changing their perceptions of the Silent Hill 2 remake, the Bloober team must remain hard at work before the game’s release on October 8th this year.
With the latest set of reveals, many complaints surrounding the remake’s rendition of side characters have arisen, mainly centered around the in-game models of Angela and Maria. Not only that, but the game is still running choppily on the PlayStation 5, with many worried that performance may go down to the levels that The Medium‘s dual-screen areas, Bloober’s previous project, presented.
However, it is also essential to understand how much Silent Hill 2 means to team Bloober and how they’ve been listening to community feedback to improve the remake. It’s clear that the developers hold the original game near and dear to their hearts and truly want to see it succeed.
So, for now, all one can do is pray that things go well for the series and we see a successful rebirth of Silent Hill in gaming. That said, what are your thoughts on the latest reveals? Are the changes made to the combat good or bad? Let us know in the comments below.
