# A few notes about Silent Hill 2, the worst game ever made. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 8, 2003, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666 "2003-02-08T06:10:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/21 "2003-02-08T14:57:06Z")
See me, I have trouble finishing every game I ever played, so getting stuck is never an indication to me that the game is stupid, but that I am. I remember in one of the Zelda’s (don’t remember which) I spent upwards of three days trying to get into the sandcastle thingy before I gave in and got the book (how was I supposed to know I had to run headlong into a library stack?). And there was no way on God’s green Chanelwood I would have made it out of that train station without explicit directions. But Silent Hill 2 has that wonderful level for really stupid gamers like me. Silent Hill is really not for gamers who like the kill-verything-that-moves type game. But it sure is freakin’ scary. I love Silent Hill. **ICON** , have you solved the clocktower puzzle? ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/22 "2003-02-08T16:29:58Z")
> [@](#): > > I thought Extreme Paintbrawl was the worst game ever until I heard about the E.T. game. Yeah, but in that game the management decided to release it before they even got to the alpha build. ---
**Author:** ![Gomez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d78d45/32.png) [@Gomez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gomez)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/23 "2003-02-08T17:10:44Z")
While SH2 doesn’t live up to the reputation of its predecessor, it is infinately better than the contrived abortion of a videogame that is Resident Evil: Code Veronica. Here is a clue for the next installment: Capcom programmers take note. **The monsters in Resident Evil are, for the most part, piss easy to overcome. Those which are more challenging can be ovrecome by judicious conservation of ammunition. There are two ways to make the games challenging. That is to either (a) give us less ammo or (b) make the frigging puzzles _harder_.** Simply taking all the items we need to complete the game and haphazardly hiding them in various random locations does not a puzzle make. Damn, I flush more challenging problems than those in RE Code V after a bad Taco Bell. I’ve long since given up on that bore fest since it became clear that the only way one can complete the game is by scouring the gamescape (and it is a _big_ game) for all the objects without needing to put the slightest bit of thought into it. Resident Evil: Code Veronica is for the Playstation 2 what Michael Moore is for the American Tourist industry. :mad: Sorry for the hijack. ---
**Author:** ![Badtz\_Maru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e36b37/32.png) [@Badtz\_Maru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badtz_Maru)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/24 "2003-02-08T17:28:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Miller \* > \*\*[No, the worst game ever is E.T.](http://www.snopes.com/business/market/atari.htm) \*\* I actually liked ET. Never figured it completely out, but I could beat it on the easier difficulty levels ---
**Author:** ![Infectious\_Lass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e56c9b/32.png) [@Infectious\_Lass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infectious_Lass)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/25 "2003-02-08T17:28:50Z")
May I just point out here that I had the Atari E.T game when I was a kid, and I loved it! I played it over and over again and I remember it fondly to this day. There was just something about it…_sigh_ I clearly am the only person on Earth who liked it! But I did…I loved picking up the pieces and making the spaceship take off…when the spaceship took off it was the best! Yeah, it is just me, I’m odd I’m afraid 😛 ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/26 "2003-02-08T17:44:44Z")
Gotta tell you, I hate Silent Hill 2. I didn’t have the problems with it that Stinkpalm has, but I thought it was about as scary as a sunny day, and the “story” was uberlame. There wasn’t much game to it. ---
**Author:** ![Calredic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@Calredic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calredic)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/27 "2003-02-08T18:09:41Z")
If you think Code: Veronica was bad… stay far, FAR away from Resident Evil 0. Oh. My. God. The term “piss-fuckin’-poor” is not even _remotely_ adequate to describe the utter lameness of that “game.” Thank God I rented it before I bought it. If you ask me, they’ve never topped RE2–and that fact that it was four or so games ago in the series is _not_ a good sign… ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/28 "2003-02-08T18:31:17Z")
RE2 was definitely the peak of the RE series, no doubt about it. I lived and loved that game! ---
**Author:** ![Calredic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@Calredic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calredic)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/29 "2003-02-08T18:46:42Z")
TheICONiac, you need to find the gold and silver medals and put them in the clock tower in the court yard. The gold medal is easy to find (pour the acid from the chemistry lab storage room on the hand statue in the chem. lab). Getting the silver medal requires you to solve a puzzle in the music room (I think you might have to get the gold medal first), which involves the poem on the wall and the keys of the piano that don’t make any noise when tapped. I don’t remember the solution exactly, but it’s simple logic; I’m sure you can figure it out. After you’ve inserted the medals on the clock tower, you need to go down to the basement and start the boiler. Once that’s done, head back to the tower again and go inside. Be ready to enter a nightmare… ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/30 "2003-02-08T19:41:05Z")
The school of SH1 is the most disturbing area ever in any video game. I usually have to take a break right after the clock tower puzzle. God. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/31 "2003-02-08T20:10:47Z")
I am ashamed to say I actually owned the E.T. game (cut me some slack – I was _nine_, f’rchristsakes). It is, bar none, the worst game ever. I should know: I also owned _Outpost_ and played the _Daikatana_ demo (and I can’t plead age on those). If I’d only bought _Battlecruiser 3000AD_ I’d have the triple crown of PC suckdom under my belt. I still have no idea what was the point of those fucking pits that ET fell into every five minutes. Then you had to extend your neck to hover out. God it sucked. Personally, I think the ET game was subtle attempt by my parents to get my ass from in front of the Atari. I have heard nothing but good things about SH1; is there a port out there anywhere for us non-PS owners? ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/32 "2003-02-08T20:18:55Z")
☹ No ports that I know of, and I know I tried to play it on Bleem! back in the day and there were problems. I wish Konami would widen their horizons a bit, but I don’t know how hard it is to design for multiple platforms and PCs all together. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/33 "2003-02-08T20:26:54Z")
I think you may all be wrong. I currently plan to take a £20 hit on trading-in _Reign of Fire_ after buying this turkey of a game today. ---
**Author:** ![soulmurk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b782af/32.png) [@soulmurk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/soulmurk)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/34 "2003-02-08T20:27:04Z")
I bought the game having never seen _SH1_, but looking for something along the lines of _Clive Barker’s Undying_ with respect to it’s creepiness. I was really disappointed in _Silent Hill 2_, but to be honest I’ve been really disappointed in all games I’ve played for the PS2. I’ve never taken part in the console vs. PC game debate because I always played PC games, but now that I’ve got a console (perhaps not the best of the ones available), I find that the games for it just don’t have the same attraction. It’s an unfair comparison because consoles (to my knowledge) don’t have a game like it, but as an example, _Baldurs Gate II:SoA_ kept me enthralled for days and days and offered tons of replayability. I’ve yet to find a console game that can keep me interested for more than a few hours. I had higher hopes for _SH2_ but I find the storyline to be dull, the voice acting to be terrible, the linear nature of gameplay to be too confining, and the puzzles to be too awkward an attempt to make them difficult by the game designers and lacking in logic. Running about to get unconveniently placed (though convenient as far as advancing the storyling goes) clues to open a box with various locks on it so that you can get a strand of hair to tie to a rusty pin so you can salvage a key from a shower drain? Our protagonist is so dense that this is the only way he can fish a key from a drain? He’s got a pipe and a 2x4 and a pistol and a shotgun, and he needs the combinations to open the locks? A strand of hair? …what, a more readily available piece of string from say, his shirt, isn’t good enough? The same with the garbage chute puzzle. What’s wrong with pushing it down with your hands? The guy is covered in zombie goo and road muck, but he doesn’t want to touch icky garbage? Other than that, I found the game to not be creepy at all, but I’ll admit that I’m a bit jaded. The background music was more irritating than anything. The music is supposed to be a part of the game; blend in and add to the overall feel. Contrarily, in this game it stood out as separate from the game and made me want to mute my television. I could go on, but I don’t see the point. If you like this game, more power to you, but it’ll take an awful lot of improvement for me to even consider picking up a copy of _SH3_, should they ever decide to make it. ---
**Author:** ![Calredic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@Calredic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calredic)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/35 "2003-02-08T21:17:26Z")
Funny you should mention replay value, soulmurk… because the Silent Hill series happens to have a ton of it. In order to really understand the underlying story of either game, you’re practically _required_ to see all the available endings (well, moreso in SH1, but I had to play through SH2 twice before I really caught on to what was happening with James, Mary, Maria, etc…). I suppose if you hate playing the game at all, that’s not going to do much to entice you, and I realize some people hate stories that have to be pieced together, rather than just presenting themselves in a straightforward fashion, but that element is one of the things I love best about the series. All too often I see people dismiss both Silent Hill games as “not making any sense,” which is a real shame–because they _do_ make sense. In both games, all the major pieces of the puzzle are there. You just have to work at it a little, figure out what goes where, and use a little bit of intuition to stick it all together. If anyone’s interested, I wrote a rather exhaustive FAQ explaining the story of SH1 that I’d be more than happy to share (I’m in the process of doing the same for SH2 right now); feel free to e-mail me and I’ll send it to you, no strings attatched. Oh, and erislover, I _completely_ agree with you about the school in SH1. In fact, the grade school I went to as a kid looked disturbingly similar (no clock tower, though…). Needless to say, as a result I was more than a little creeped out playing that part… ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/36 "2003-02-08T22:39:58Z")
While not the worst game ever made I agree that it sucks. The only game that ever really scared me was not even intended to be scary. That was Thief. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/37 "2003-02-08T23:11:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Stinkpalm \* > \*\* 2) Video games that are not action packed do need some sort of story and direction. This game is as linear as it gets, but you have no idea where you are supposed ot go at the begining of the game and then you have the same feeling of “where now?” after you beat the pyramid guy. There is no story to follow, no characters guding you in the right direction. You just run run run, and try to open a million doors that are locked or don’t respond at all. There is NOTHING in the game that tells you to go to the apts at the begining. If you don’t stumble on the dead body with the key while aimlessly running around town you will never know that you had to go the apt. You find a key to an apt so all the sudden thats where you go? For no reason? Just because you found a key? After reading on Gamefaqs after I gave up I found that you are supposed to go to a bowling alley next. How the fuck is the player supposed to figure that out? This is the norm in this shitty game. \*\* Picture this: You buy a game that sounds pretty neat because it’s supposed to be about a haunted house. It installs fine and you begin to play. The game has a movie that ends with your car ending up in a lake, then you get to control the movement yourself. There’s nothing to tell you what to do once you get the character out of the car, though, so you ramble aimlessly through the house’s grounds, and eventually look around the house, but get no clues whatsoever about what you’re supposed to be doing. So in frustration, you consult the booklet that came with the game, hoping to at least get a sense of what the point of the game is. Instead of telling you the game’s plot, or god forbid offering some direction, there’s a clever little taunt about how telling you what is going on would spoil the game. So you conclude that the only way to play **Amber Journey’s Beyond** is to follow the walk-through you found on the internet. \ ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/38 "2003-02-08T23:11:55Z")
> [@](#): > > The school of SH1 is the most disturbing area ever in any video game. I disagree. The mental hospital in SH2 was creepier, for me. ---
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/39 "2003-02-08T23:15:05Z")
SPOOFE help me out here then. I just beat pyramid again and walked outside all the way to the park. After I get the girl there are no marks anywhere on my map. If I really DID miss something at hte begining can you tell me where it is? If I could just know where the hell to go the game might not be so bad. I do like the atmosphere, but the aimless running is killing me. ---
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2003, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666/40 "2003-02-08T23:21:13Z")
SUNUVABITCH. I concede that point SPOOFE. I just saw the mark you are talking about on the hotel. I have to zoom out to the full 2 page map of the town the see it. I will try to continue playing it. I still stand by all of my other points though. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-notes-about-silent-hill-2-the-worst-game-ever-made/153666.md?page=3)