Silent Hill has been going through a sort of revitalization in recent years. After leaving it dormant for far too long, Konami is finally doing what I’d like to see with more legacy series – letting talented external studios take a shot with their vision of what the series could be while having creative freedom. While Bloober Team did a faithful (and fantastic) remake of Silent Hill 2, NeoBards and writer Ryukishi07 made something truly special with Silent Hill f, which was an original story that was true to the series’ core tenets. Sure, there have been absolute misses like the laughably bad movie adaption and a spinoff game in The Short Message, but hey, at least ideas are being thrown out there. However, I’m happy to report we might just have another banger on our hands with the latest example of the franchise’s revival: Silent Hill: Townfall. I only saw a hands-off gameplay walkthrough this time, but now I know that it’s tapping into the style of horror we know to be Silent Hill with the tension of a slow-paced first-person thriller.
Townfall takes place in a port town called St. Amelia in Scotland, which is the home country of developer Screen Burn. The team was formerly known as No Code and made a splash with the eerie space adventure game Observation, and it seems that it’s taking its horror-tinged strengths, applying them to Silent Hill, and also drawing from its own real-world inspirations. As expected, Townfall drops you in without much explanation and asks you to piece it together as you go along. You play as Simon Ordell, who I’m not even sure what he’s doing in the St. Amelia cobblestone streets, covered in a fog denser than what Scotland’s coastal community of St. Monans would normally face.
One of the games Silent Hill: Townfall’s director Jon McKellan previously worked on was Alien Isolation, and it shows. Yes, there is combat in Townfall, but it is a very dangerous endeavor and a last ditch effort if you’re caught by the town’s deranged, grotesquely transformed humans. From what I saw, he only has a small complement of melee weapons, one of which is just a wooden plank wrapped in barbed wire. Townfall heavily emphasizes stealth, and it appears better for it – especially if it’s drawing from Alien Isolation.
The key here is Simon has what’s called a CRTV, a handheld radio with a screen that also visualizes incoming signals. A big part of what you’ll be doing gameplay-wise is tuning the CRTV to figure out where to go, find solutions for puzzles, and track enemy movement through walls. It’s not as easy as hitting a button to scan your surroundings; rather, the CRTV must be directed toward them and you have to pay attention to the little screen on it as it works like an ultrasound. I watched the demoist follow the enemy patrol pattern around the corner of a building to then time their movement to dash safely in order to progress.
It’s a neat and clever way to make the core gameplay diegetic, giving you a more intimate way of engaging with the world itself while fitting into a story that takes place in 1996. For example, tuning the signal will feed you images of where you’re supposed to go and you have to really pay attention to the environment. Are you looking at the right building, going through the right alleyway, or banging on the right door? All that is shown in static images on the CRTV as seen in the live demo. I think it adds to the tension and atmosphere when you have to rely on an in-game tool’s function instead of having a HUD or markers; it’s a sensible approach for Silent Hill’s brand of horror.
Stealthing your way through terrifying situations and piecing together clues about where to go is only part of the deal. As with other Silent Hill games, there’s a deeper mystery that deals in subtleties, and all we really know so far is that Simon’s investigating the past to figure why St. Amelia has been completely abandoned. The hints lead him to the house of a nurse named Zoe Ellis, who initially contacts Simon through the CRTV, and here is where Townfall goes into more of an exploration/adventure style of game where you’re carefully inspecting your surroundings – reading notes left behind, digging through cabinets and drawers, going through files on a DOS-based PC, listening to old phone messages, etc. And if you’re stuck, instead of being shown what you need to do directly or having Simon talk to himself to give hints to the player, he’ll have thought bubbles off to the side to both show what he’s thinking and perhaps give you the nudge you’d otherwise need.
This was a brief demo, so the more horrifying elements and headier puzzles are still under wraps – and I can only imagine how terrifying it’ll be to explore the town when the skies turn a blinding red, as shown in previous trailers. I’m still curious about what all the dropped protest signs in the town square imply about St. Amelia’s demise; it’s easy to theorize that either a corporation or governing body overran the townsfolk for an initiative that had a grave impact on their environment. Maybe the IV stuck in Simon’s arm the entire time, and the fact that Zoe’s a nurse, foreshadows where this seemingly sad story is headed.
This is the kind of storytelling Silent Hill has historically done extremely well, and seeing it played as a more tempered first-person horror-adventure has me as intrigued as when I first saw Silent Hill f before its release. We won’t have to wait long, since Silent Hill: Townfall is set to launch on September 24 for PlayStation 5 and PC.
Michael Higham is an editor at IGN who regularly contributes with reviews, previews, features, and news in written and video form. He’s usually entrusted with covering long RPGs and tech products, but he’s got range when it comes to games. You’ll also catch him at events and hosting video content, including IGN’s weekly podcast Unlocked.
