8 Ways Silent Hill 2 Remake Can Make Over The Original

Voice Acting

It’s no secret that the voice acting in Silent Hill 2 is a big point of contention among fans. Many of them say that the dry, emotionless way many of the lines are delivered is on purpose to fit the game’s general tone and atmosphere. Some people like it, but others say it takes them out of the experience because some parts sound too silly or fake.

The remake should try to keep the stilted tone of the original lines, but it would help a lot if some of the more awkward bits of dialogue, like Angela’s “Lost?” line, were cleaned up or taken out to make the conversations more appropriate for modern audiences.

Easier Puzzles

Survival horror games have had puzzles since the first Alone in the Dark game came out in 1992. Silent Hill 2 went a little too far with its puzzles, though, and while players can change how hard the puzzles are, this can make them either too easy and easy to forget or too hard and frustrating.

Fans of the first book will never forget how they had to use a crate of canned juice to push a coin through a garbage chute or race around the scary Brookhaven Hospital for hours just to open a locked box with one strand of hair in it. There’s no question that puzzles should be brought back, but making them a little bit easier would help the game’s pace a lot.

Tighter Combat

Some players would say that the very stiff and clunky combat in the first Silent Hill 2 adds to the feeling of oppression and dread that the game is trying to give the player. However, when each Mannequin or Bubble Head Nurse can take over ten hits with a melee weapon before they go down for good, it can be more frustrating than anything else.

Bloober has already said that they will take a page from Resident Evil’s book and use a third-person over-the-shoulder camera, which should make it a little bit easier to hit single targets. Since James is still a normal person, it makes sense that he still has trouble fighting the strange monsters he meets. However, the game could be a lot better if it focused more on the battle and let James move while he was attacking.

Greater Weapon Variety

Since James has never shot or used a gun before, giving him assault rifles and submachine guns might make the game less realistic. However, adding secret weapons to find or melee weapons with different power and speed stats could add just enough variety while still making the player feel vulnerable.

Secondary weapons, like a pocket knife or a bomb to break up big groups of Mannequins, would also be nice, as long as they are hard to find in the game world and hard to find.

Side Missions

At the start of the first game, James isn’t the only one who goes to Silent Hill. Eventually, he meets a few other characters who are also there. Each of them is dealing with some kind of trauma, which makes them see the town and the monsters in a slightly different way.

In the original game, these people are mentioned, but James is only able to talk to them briefly during cutscenes or boss fights. Some extra side tasks could be a great way to give these characters more depth. They could also be a great way to learn more about James and the things he said about his life in the original game, like how much he liked to drink.

Radio Changes

James only has a map and a radio to help him get around Silent Hill. This is to make the game as realistic as possible. The radio lets him know when an enemy is about to jump out from around a corner. Team Silent used this very smart feature to keep the player guessing about what enemy they would face next. It will definitely be back in the remake, but it would be a waste not to make it even more useful by adding some new features.

For example, the radio could make a faint noise when the player is close to an important item they need to move forward, or it could even tell when Maria is being attacked or hurt. There are many ways they could improve the radio while still keeping Eggy Car grounded and real.

Encourage More Exploration

Even though Silent Hill is a big place with a lot of creepy buildings to explore and a lot of features that help place it, the original game can be very limited in how much the player can explore. Once Maria joins James on his journey, she will scowl at him if he starts running away from the main mission. This makes it impossible for the player to go back at some places.

Some parts of the game make it so that the tasks have to be done in a certain order. For example, the door to Angela’s apartment will be locked until the player starts the Eddie cutscenes in a different room. This makes sure that the player plays the game exactly as the developers intended. Giving the player a lot more control over how they want to explore Silent Hill can make the place feel much more real and alive, and it can also give James more files and notes to look for.

Improved Companion AI

As the recent Resident Evil 4 Remake showed, changes to companion AI have made escort missions, which used to be something players feared, much more fun. During a lot of Silent Hill 2, James will be with Maria. How much damage Maria takes can have a big effect on how the game ends.

Since she often runs into enemies or falls behind at random, the bad AI makes it too easy to get a bad ending. The remake would be much better if she stuck closer to James and moved and acted a bit smarter. She could even give James things and resources as the game goes on, which would make her feel more like a real friend and less like a tag-along.