I’m Not Writing About Silent Hill Again

Okay. This is an official written warning. Yes, there are Silent Hill rumours again. No, I’m not going to bloody write about them. Enough is enough. Done. Period!

Long-time GamesReviews readers will know that over the last decade, I have written some 4,000 articles about Silent Hill returning. Mostly about whatever insider has seen absolute definitive proof that the next game is coming. God, imagine the emotional rollercoaster if you were a fan.

I am not a fan, and I don’t think many people are. In fact, people are more in love with the potential of Silent Hill than they are with the franchise itself, which was long past its sell-by date even in 2012. They want an AAA horror game that isn’t Resident Evil. Or, more likely, they want an AAA horror game that’s exclusive to PlayStation. Silent Hill is a useful marionette for that desire.

IF Silent Hill came back, and IF it was given the proper treatment, and IF it was designed by Hideo Kojima, and IF it was only published on PlayStation – well maybe, just maybe we’d get a good game.

Doesn’t sound like something I’d take a bet on, I’ll be honest. But people are desperate for it to happen.

Not Talking Silent Hill

So in the interest of not talking about Silent Hill, we will instead talk about the inevitable disappointment of hype culture. And again – I have to stress – this is definitely not about Silent Hill.

So a game franchise goes missing for a decade. Let’s call it Quiet Mount. It has a mid-70s average on Metacritic, but that is heavily weighted towards earlier games in the franchise. From 2004 to, let’s say randomly, 2012, it was on life support. Sales were low. Scores were lower.

Quiet Mount was overdue an incredible reboot or a couple of shotgun shells behind the barn. Its publisher, who for the sake of argument we’re going to say is Konami, chooses the latter option, because horror games are dead anyway. Resident Evil 6 sold gangbusters and it had zero horror elements in it. Just ditch the whole thing.

But then the rumours start. Insiders are certain that Quiet Mount is well on its way to some incredible return. On the other hand, there aren’t enough details to lock anything down.

Well, strap yourself in boys, because that sounds like the perfect train to pitch our hype wagon.

A Humble Admittance

Dear reader, I must admit something heinous to you. Although the title of this article says I’m specifically not writing about Silent Hill, and although I’ve cleverly led you to believe I’m actually talking about popular horror franchise Quiet Mount, I am indeed referencing Silent Hill.

I humbly apologise. Nonetheless, I tried my best.

I did it because Silent Hill doesn’t exist. Not in the way people want it to. It exists in the same way that the original Resident Evil games exist. If the Resident Evil movies hadn’t happened, and if Resident Evil 4 had been a disaster. Today’s Silent Hill is the anti-Resi.

But in the minds of people who didn’t even support the games when they had the chance to it exists as a massive IP just waiting to return. Give it that Sony razzmatazz, with a sprinkle of Kojima and what do you get?

Nobody knows. And we’ll probably never know.

But what we can assume is that insiders will keep insiding – for desperate want of a better phrase. And hypers will continue hyping.