Are the Hills Silent again?

So, a few years ago, Konami decided to stop making video games. They had just released the incredible P.T. on Playstation 4. P.T. stands for playable teaser/trailer and was basically a tech demo for their upcoming game Silent Hills.

P.T. was an incredible horror game, short as it was. It became an instant hit on every game channel that did horror, and you can still find it on Youtube. If you like scary stuff, go find a playthrough that you like and enjoy.

As an aside, PS4's that have P.T. on the hard drive go for big money on Ebay, that's how popular it is, as the mini game is no longer available for download.

Then Konami announced that it was canceled and that going forward, they would only make pachinko machines.

In case you haven't heard of pachinko, they are a kind of arcade/gambling machines exploiting a loophole in Japanese gambling laws. The machines pay out small balls, which you can't redeem for money in the arcade, but go around the corner and you'll find a shop that will happily buy them from you for cash.

The fan base was understandably upset that there would no longer be any Silent Hill or Castlevania games going forward, but now Konami has started searching for staff to produce two new Silent Hill games, a soft reboot and an episodic game.

A soft reboot means they are not trying to remove or undo the already existing games, but instead start up a new continuity within the Silent Hill universe. Not a bad idea in itself as long as they still cleave to the esthetic and the idea of what Silent Hill is.

They called the episodic game “Telltale like” which is an unfortunate turn of phrase. Telltale's early games were very popular and well liked, but later on they suffered from both creative stagnation and an inability to actually release the new chapter in their game lines. This made Telltale a bad word in the gaming community.

But an episodic, release by chapter horror game in not necessarily a bad idea. The human brain is basically incapable of being scared for too long. What starts as frightening and tense can quickly turn frustrating and then just annoying. By releasing the game in chapters, you can enjoy the scary bits while they are still fresh and creepy.

Of course, episodic releases are notoriously finicky and in Konami bungles it, they should be prepared for considerable vitriol from the fans.

See this video by YongYea for more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu-1zuWtQns&t=525s

That's all he wrote, so until next time, have a great week!