Silent Hill 2: The Fourth Hour

Having just narrowly escaping Pyramid Head by running around in circles for five minutes and waiting for him to get distracted, I exited the apartment building to find myself in the alleys of down town Silent Hill. I immediately ran into the little girl from the apartments who had kicked away a key I was reaching for through a gate and I had failed, thus far, to shoot in the face with the gun I had scavenged. I tried calling her on her shit but she was being a snotty little brat, as is her M.O. She had been reading a letter when I approached. It was absolutely none of my business, and had no reason to believe the little girl's letter pertained to me in anyway whatsoever, but I decided to ask her about it anyway. She told me it was none of my business, really the most likely scenario in retrospect, and said I never loved "Mary" anyway. Mary?, I thought to myself, that is my dead wife Mary's name too. It must be a letter from her. She ran away from me, as though a near stranger had never approached her in an empty alley and asked her questions about her personal life. I metaphorically shrugged and proceeded to Rosewater Park, which is the next destination I imagined could be the "special place" mentioned in the letter I got from my dead wife, asking me to meet her. Why she choose not to be more specific about this meeting place I'll never know. Because she's dead. And can't explain what she wrote in letters. Or write letters. I reached the dock in the park overlooking Toluca Lake. And there was Mary! Or a woman who looked somewhat like Mary, so my first thought was that it had to be her! It wasn't her. Meet Maria. Her skills include dressing provocatively, making sexually suggestive remarks toward strangers, and housing keys to various establishments in her undergarments. I explained to Maria that I was looking for my dead wife. She took it pretty well and didn't ask any awkward questions about my current psychological state. Plus she reminded me that the Lakeview Hotel might have been the "special place" Mary was talking about. As I left to visit the hotel Maria freaked out on me for leaving her alone in a city full of monster. As if her safety is my responsibility somehow. As we left the park she nagged and nagged about me trying to leave here in the park where it was "not safe" because of all the "monsters" and suddenly I didn't miss Mary quite so much as I did before. On the way to the hotel I found a bowling alley! Awesome! I love bowling! I had to go in. Maria, the bitch, waited outside. What a nag. In the bowling alley I heard my new friend, Pukey-Eddie, talking to Laura, the key-kicker. Apparently Eddie is guilty of something or other, running away from someone for doing something. It was all pretty vague. Laura took off when I showed up. I decided I had to chase down Laura because of all the "monsters" in the city. I didn't want the kid blowing up at me the way Maria did a few minutes ago. I took a second to berate Eddie for eating pizza while the town got overrun by monsters, then I hoofed it back outside to chase down a little girl in a foot race through the streets of Silent Hill. I grabbed Maria on the way out and she pointed out which way the girl ran. We tracked the girl to a small alley that was too narrow for us to go through. Maria pulled the key to a near by "gentleman's club" out of her bra, and we cut through the strip club. Back on the streets we tailed the frightened little girl to the Silent Hill hospital. We followed the little girl into the vacant hospital. I with my gun drawn, Maria with keys stuffed in her underwear for no apparent reason.

Quickly Ending Nightmare

Neverending Nightmares was a very enjoyable 80 minutes.

Whilst I prepared to volley verbal shots at the game for its short duration, I realized it was pretty much exactly what it should have been. As much as I enjoy a good scare now and again, the fact of the matter is that a good horror game, that does its job correctly, is stress inducing. And Neverending Nightmares does do its job correctly with an atmosphere of dread, a soundtrack composed of frightening ambiance mixed with the screams of unseen tormented souls, and startling and gruesome imagery served up from beginning to end. From the very beginning I felt the desire to make Thomas run through rooms and hallways of the various environments, but with such a small amount of run stamina I felt compelled to slowly trod through the gloom, saving my stamina for the times I would actually need it.

The game had a good mix of disturbing imagery, a hallmark of quality horror in my eyes, and the sporadic boo or jump scare. The boo scare is an important tool in horror that is often overused. Lesser quality horror equates, or even defines, the boo scare with horror. Thankfully, NN does not suffer from this problem, and uses suspense and startles in a tasteful way that didn't leave me in a constant state of stress the entire game, but able to look at and enjoy the creepy environment filled with items such as dolls with shattered faces, paintings of a persons shoes through various stages of a hanging, or dead animals spilling their entrails on the ground. :)

What NN doesn't excel at quite as well is variety. About 20 minutes into the game, after the first big change in environment I found myself mostly trying to game the run stamina to get though rooms and hallways as fast as possible. Not driven by fear, but a bit of tedium. The middle, and to some extant the end, of the game suffers from many long hallways that look an awful lot like the previous 3 hallways you just jogged through with little going on and a very limited variety of the same handful of props scattered throughout.

All in all I was happy with the game, spending my 14 dollars on more of an emotional experience than a video game. I purchased the opportunity to be made uncomfortable, stressed, and slightly repulsed, which is why I enjoy horror games in the first place. And I got a little thrill at the end when, after the credits rolled, the game showed me that a small amount of branching pathways and alternate endings exist. However, this revelation was somewhat soured by the fact that I have no idea what influences these alternate pathways. Are they random? Does selecting a different door lead to different paths? Would I have gotten a different ending if the psycho with his eyes sewn shut had torn my throat out less often? I suppose a subsequent play through might help clear this up, but having just finished the game I do not get a strong feeling that replay-ability will be one of Neverending Nightmares strong suits.

Silent Hill: The Third Hour

Today was the day for meeting new friends.

After I claimed my prize from the smelly old garbage chute I decided to do a sweep of the first floor again. What I found was an abandoned apartment building with vacancies and all the amenities one could hope for. I'd already spent significant time poking around the laundry rooms and garbage chutes, but I had no idea the Wood Side apartment complex also hosted a drained swimming pool filled with monsters! I climbed down into the monster-filled pool and found a baby carriage holding another of the strange coins, this one showing a picture of a snake. I was starting to think there might be something more significant to these coins than purchasing power at the local Happy Burger.

I left the pool of monsters and tried all the doors to the apartments on floor numero uno. This is where I met my first friend of the day. While exploring another stranger's home without permission I heard noise I was sure were coming from a monster. I took a quick peak around the "foyer" and saw a man that appeared to have been killed by having his upper body slammed in a refrigerator door. Seeing nothing remarkable in the kitchenette of horrors I decided to check out the rest of the apartment. The monster noise turned out to be a man vomiting in the toilet. Like, a lot.

Turns out the toilet puker's name was Eddie. His first priority was to explain to me, between salvos of vomit, that he "didn't do it". I inferred that he was claiming innocence in regards to murdering Refrigerator-Boy. Eddie alleged that he ran into this apartment because he was scared of "the weird lookin' monsters", but he seemed pretty calm, other than the constant torrent of vomit escaping the man. Anyway, we said about all we had to say to one another so, after he explained that he was not from Silent Hill, I left him to his toilet puking.

Somewhere along my schlep through the apartment complex I'd picked up a key to the second floor fire escape. Having looted all the places I could get into I decided to check out the fire escape, since I still had not found a way to exit on the other side of the apartments. The "fire escape" turned out to be a door with a sheer drop to the ground outside. But it also happened to line up with the window of an adjoining set of apartments. Luckily the next apartment building was built about 18 inches away from the Wood Side Apartments so I just stepped over the opening into a second story window.

I found myself in the Blu Creek Apartment complex. The architect must have given a discount on these two buildings because the rooms were all setup roughly identically to the Wood Side apartments. Casing the first room I hit the jackpot, there was a wallet floating in the filthy toilet! I didn't even hesitate, just crammed my hand deep into the rust colored toilet water and pulled that baby out! Unfortunately, all I found was a scrap of paper with some numbers on it. I pocketed it anyway. This turned out to be a great idea since the main room held a safe. I turned the dial to hit the numbers on the scrap of paper with monster-shit scented hands. Open sesame, and a horde of ammo for my stolen pistol tumbled out. I locked, I loaded, and I prepared for some more good old fashioned breaking and entering. The room also had a sort of desk with some circular divots on it. It was engraved with a really thinly veiled riddle involving the coins I was finding. I placed the old man coin and the snake coin in there appropriate slots, but I was still missing a coin showing a woman.

I wanted to take a bottom-up approach to this building, which was significantly smaller than the previous apartment complex. Luckily, in the stairwell I found a complete map of this building. Using my trusty red crayon I began scribbling all over it so I could track the apartments I'd already broken into and looted. On the ground floor the only room of any interest had a mirror that was one entire wall. There was a small end table and some posters on the wall. And a lady laying on the ground, cradling a knife with suicidal enthusiasm. After a second I recognized her as the crazy girl I met in the cemetery earlier.

She introduced herself as Angela, with a dejected I-want-to-kill-myself sigh. We chatted about where her "mama" might be, after she suggested that I also want to kill myself and that we deserve to die. But Angela flipped out on me after I suggested her mother lived in the town in which Angela was roaming looking for her mother. Seemed like fairly straightforward logic to me, but she was acting like I was some kind of stalker knowing that her mother lived in the place that Angela said she was looking for her in. She also treated me like some kind of frightening head-case when I told her that the wife I was here looking for was already dead. Finally, Angela left. She offered me her knife as she left, but then brandished it at me like I was a sexual assaulter when I moved to take the knife she offered. In the end she decided to leave the knife on the table and run away saying "I'm sorry, I've been bad, please don't". I did not say goodbye. I did take the knife though and I found a coin with the image of a prisoner on it. Time to go back to the coin table.

Back in the coin table room I remembered that the desk didn't say anything about a prisoner coin, it referenced a coin of a woman. Not analyzing that fact too deeply I put the prisoner coin in the last slot. I found yet another key, this one for an apartment down the hall. I went to that apartment, crossed over to the next, locked, apartment, and found a key to the stairwell that would, presumably, let me out of this convoluted maze of apartment buildings.

I ran to the stairwell and threw open the door. Then I threw closed the door. Then I saw the extreme error in judgement I had made by failing to survey the room before entering and closing the door. There was pyramid face and he had one of the monsters bent over and was doing...something to it. He quickly lost interest in doing whatever he had been doing to the monster and started to come for me. I tried the door I had just brazenly swept through, but it was now locked. Of course.

I shot at triangle face, but it just made a dull THUNK sound that communicated to me that, despite 10 bullets being enough to dissuade him during our last "encounter", now bullets did not affect this big fella whatsoever. After realizing that the stairway had somehow been flooded with 3 stories worth of water I decided to run away and cower in the corner. For the next 3 to 3,000 minutes I ran from corner to corner to corner as red cone head shambled after me, swinging his Cloud Strife sized sword every couple minutes. In truth, it got a bit boring. After awhile I heard a siren ring out throughout the city. This seemed to be some kind of signal to triangle head, cuz he abruptly began lumbering away, down the stairs, through the water. Soon after, the water inexplicably drained from the stairwell and I followed the stairs down and out of the damned Silent Hill Apartments.

Silent Hill: The Second Hour

I used my gate key to get past the locked gate outside of the apartment complex. It was pretty much deserted, like everywhere else. Where the hell is everyone? The door leading to the apartments on the first floor was locked, so I decided to check out the second floor. It's dark as hell in here. I found a map of this apartment building, like it's a goddamn tourist attraction, but it's too dark to read the damn thing.

Luckily, I still have my busted-ass old timey radio. That comes in real handy when it starts to squeal and shit while the weird armless monsters come up and start puking shit on me. I beat them all to hell again with my trusty stick. After I dealt with the creeps I started to systematically check the door to every apartment. I didn't knock or anything, I just tried to waltz in like I owned the place. If anyone was home and wanted to give me shit, well...I had a big fucking stick to deliver to them, address: Their Face. 

First, I decided to check out the laundry room. I took a peek in a garbage chute because why the fuck not? There was some trash stuck in there. I couldn't reach it, but MAN I really wanted that trash! I figured I could find a bowling ball or a six pack or something to throw down there and knock the trash free. I started to find some rooms on the second floor that were unlocked. Finally, we're getting somewhere. But these places were Fucked Up! These people lived like animals. Furniture was all smashed up, blood was everywhere, and not a bowling ball or six pack in sight! This one room had this mannequin just sitting in the middle of the room. At least someone left a flashlight sitting there, BONUS! Now I can see and read maps and- HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!! Right there behind the mannequin was another mannequin, but this one was freaky as fuck! Oh yeah, and it was moving. It had no head (of course) and seemed like it was made entirely out of legs. I wasted exactly zero seconds bringing the Stick of Obliterating down on THAT fucking thing, I shit you not. 

I felt a little weird after my mannequin encounter so I decided to pick up the pace here and walked faster as I methodically checked each and every door in the building. The next room I found had one main room which was empty, and a room off to the side with a grandfather clock. I saw scratches on the ground that seemed to indicate the clock had been pushed around before. That seemed like a good use of my time, so I decided to give it a push too. But the damn thing wouldn't budge, and it was NOT that heavy so...I dunno, maybe I'll come back later and try to push it again. When I left the clock room I saw that the hallway going further into the building was blocked by a metal gate. But not like a normal security door or anything, just a series of vertical metal bars like some medieval prison. I decided I'd seen all that floor two had to offer and went back to the stairwell and went up to the third floor.

Most of the 3rd floor was inaccessible because of another prison gate, but I DID see a key on the ground just on the other side of the gate. I went to reach for it when this snotty little girl shows up and laughs in my face as she kicks the key just out of my reach! The girl ran off, which was lucky on her part as I was about to see just how far my pal Mr. Big Fucking Stick could reach through the bars. The only room I found I could get in had a shopping cart sitting in it. I was about to leave when I noticed that someone left daddy a present. I did a little shopping of my own and pocketed the 9mm pistol I found. Now it is on. I decided to go back down to the 2nd floor. Maybe I could find another way up to the 3rd floor and introduce that little girl to my new friend, Glocky the 9mm. Thankfully this apartment must have been full of NRA nuts, cuz there was 9mm ammunition everywhere! 

As I was aimlessly wandering the 2nd floor I heard a noise up by the clock room. As I approached I saw some dude standing on the other side of the gate. The guy was covered in blood, but he was also wearing some huge red cone on his head. I dunno what his problem was, but he gave me the creeps. But he wasn't doing much of anything, so I went about my business, and he, presumably, went about his. 

Now I know I went into this room before, but now there was more shit in the room now. An armchair was now in the room and a television showing nothing but static. Oh! And some dead dude too. He was just chilling in the lazy boy, large quantities of his blood painting the TV set. I also found a key on a shelf next to Chuckles and The Blood Tube. It looked like a key to the first floor so I went to check that out. Maybe I'd find something there to justify me creeping through this damn apartment building.

The only room worth a damn on the first floor was that of an avid butterfly collector. The bedroom not only had a wall full of pinned and framed and dead butterflies, but also a bunch of alive butterflies flying all over. I immediately wondered what butterflies ate and how much they pooped. There was a completely not-creepy hole in the wall, so I decided the prudent course of action would be to shove my hand in it and grope around. After all, there was about a 0% chance of anything uncomfortable happening in this strange deserted apartment building. Meh. Just a key for the grandfather clock. 

Back on 2 in the clock room I opened the clock face. I checked the wall where someone scratched a message that was a thinly veiled hint of how to position the clock hands. I didn't have a clue why I was here in a nearly-deserted apartment complex playing with some stiff's grandfather clock, but I imagined maybe I could still find that little girl and teach her what happens when you fuck with a stranger with a gun. 

The clock could be moved once the hands were in the right position. Not real sure how exactly moving the hands of the clock made the clock go from the weight of a dying star to pushable time piece weight, but whatever. I went through a hole behind the clock and came out on the other side of the gate where the cone head had been standing earlier. Nothing to see here so I headed upstairs. 

I found an open room on the 3rd floor. When I walked in I found the cone head fucking around with a couple of the freaky mannequins. He seemed real busy, so as to not bother him whilst he tried to forcibly insert two sentient mannequins into a garbage disposal I decided to see what was inside a nearby closet. With the door closed. Apparently I did not move to the closet expediently enough because cone head decided to come have a look-see in the closet once he was done playing with the mannequins. I decided now would be a good time to point Glocky at the closet door and pull the trigger a dozen times. 

Cone head did not seem to really mind the bullets that much. But I must have hurt him emotionally because he decided he wasn't welcome and strolled off, presumably to put more living things into garbage disposals. I came out of the closet (ha ha) and found the treasure I'd been looking for all along: a six pack of juice! I sprinted to level 2 (again) and tossed that six pack down the garbage chute so hard.

I headed down to the first floor, a grin of complete bliss on my face, finally I would get that trash from the garbage chute! I found the trash in a small alcove on the outside of the building. My hands, trembling, rested on the pile of trash I had dislodged from the second floor. It smelled of garbage and fulfilled dreams. In it I found a coin with an old dude on it, probably a president or something, and an article about a murderer, a Walter Sullivan, who had murdered two children. When arrested he claimed that he was forced to commit the murders by a "red devil" who was trying to punish Sullivan for unspecified reasons. It may sound strange, but just then I was reminded of Mr. Cone Head. Mr. Cone Head's cone was blood red, and he certainly had a taste for administering punishment, but usually more of the garbage disposal variety. Anyway, Sullivan committed suicide in his jail cell after being arrested, so no skin off my ass after all. Once I get out of this apartment building maybe I can go spend my old man coin at the Happy Burger down the street. Get a nice milk shake.