Silent Hills: A legendary game that was gone too soon

Halloween is a time of terror and fear, but horror can take different forms; personally, I feel that the horror of the human heart is a pretty effective theme. Mourning can be an aspect of this, as to mourn is to lay to rest something you may have held near and dear. There have been very few times in my life where I’ve mourned over a product that never came to be. One was Prey 2 and the other, more painful period of mourning was when Silent Hills was canceled. It was a beautiful dream that was never meant to be, as it had everything that could’ve potentially made it one of the most ambitious and terrifying entries in the Silent Hill series.

Not only did it have Hideo Kojima at the helm, fresh off of the successful Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, but also the involvement of Norman Reedus and film director Guillermo Del Toro. When we finally saw that this all-star team was assembled, there was plenty of excitement in the air. Silent Hill was finally going to make a comeback and it was going to be glorious; Hideo Kojima is going to come in and save the series from its untimely death. How innocent we were in those days. How ignorant we were of the biggest tragedy in all of gaming that was to take place.

Let’s take a quick trip into the horror of untimely mourning.

Restless hallways

After all that preamble, you’re probably wondering what exactly hyped up the announcement of Silent Hills so much. Well, in true Kojima fashion, he released a preview of his new project under the guise of a demo for an “indie” game. P.T was released on the PlayStation Store on August 12th, 2014 right after the announcement of a “new” horror project at that year’s Gamescom. As soon as the demo of said game was unleashed to the gaming populace, it was obvious that something was up. Despite being an “indie” game created by “developer” 7780s Studio, it looked absolutely gorgeous, as the visuals made the disturbing hallway look near photo-realistic.

The technology was far beyond the scope of a modest indie team, but it wasn’t immediately clear who could’ve been behind this strange beast of a demo. It didn’t really matter at the moment as it proved to be extremely engaging all on its own; you, an unnamed protagonist, were walking through this endlessly looping hallway that got progressively creepier the more you played. Doors shut on their own, cockroaches crawled about all over the floor, and the entire time you were being watched by an entity only known as “Lisa.”

It made for a terrifying experience, as the loops that you’d encounter would change something in the hallway drastically; all the while, Lisa got restless, as she’d begin to follow you incessantly in later loops. It kept ramping up the scare factor to a near fever pitch, as you’d swear you’d seen it all up until something newly messed up happened right in front of you. The ever-mounting mystery of P.T‘s contents and its mysterious developer slowly unraveled as the entire internet started to piece together the method to solve the looping hallway that perplexed many.

And let me tell you, they took their time figuring this one out.

The best description of the game comes from YouTuber, NakeyJakey, who describes the nature of the game as being akin to “The Ring,” as almost being a cursed object that is here to distort and ruin our sense of reality. This comparison is pretty apt as the experience of playing the game could’ve bordered on obsessive at some points given the obtuse nature of its plot and puzzles. The fact that the entire internet had to band together to figure this game out is only a testament to how absolutely genius this entire game was.

The main puzzle for everyone to solve was P.T‘s looping hallway; it seemingly had no rhyme or reason, only presenting itself as chaotic as a means to creep you out. If you paid attention, however, you’d notice a larger puzzle whose solutions were just out of reach for someone to grasp. The final loop was the key, as it was where the game primed everything to be put in place to finally allow the player to leave the hallway and end the loop indefinitely. This final loop was where the creepy ghost that’s been lurking around, Lisa, is at her most frightening. She actively sought you out and if you were caught before you completed the puzzle, you got to do it again.

One streamer, Soapy Warpig, was the first person to complete the puzzle and reveal the true nature of P.T and let me tell you, it was a hell of a surprise.

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The boss shows how it’s done

Once everyone caught wind that Kojima was the madman behind P.T and the newly announced Silent Hills, the excitement for a new entry in the Silent Hill series was unlike anything before. Theories of what the game’s story would be like arose overnight, with one particularly well-known theory tying in Kojima’s feelings to the few bits of a story we get in P.T. What sort of feelings you may ask? Well, let’s just say that after Kojima was done with MGSV, Konami was more than ready to finally show him the door.

Up until the release of their biggest cash cow yet, Konami had made it clear that Kojima was not wanted at the company anymore, despite being the man responsible for arguably their most successful franchise. Despite being revealed as in charge of Silent Hills’ development, Konami was already shooing Kojima out of the company and attempting to delegitimize his legacy at the company at the same time. While never completely confirmed publicly, it’s clear that Kojima’s departure from the company was not a happy one.

Regardless of what kind of intentions Kojima had for Silent Hills, it was evident that Konami didn’t care for any expertise that would be brought into the dormant franchise. So when they announced, in a statement to Polygon, that “The embryonic Silent Hills project developed with Guillermo del Toro and featuring the likeness of Norman Reedus will not be continued…” the internet collectively screamed into the void in disappointment.

The fact that P.T‘s immense level of quality was done despite the kind of working conditions Kojima and his team were working under is nothing short of astounding. It goes to show the high grade of professional decorum he was able to maintain despite his old bosses actively showing their contempt, even well after the release of one of his best-selling games of all time. This particular sentiment from Konami came to a head when they legally barred Kojima from accepting his award for MGSV at the 2015 Game Awards, for no other reason than sheer spite.

But Konami couldn’t just kill and bury a horror masterpiece like P.T, they had to add insult to injury and let their spite immolate the last good thing they ever had going for them.

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So long, creepy ghost mom

Kojima’s departure from Konami was quite the spectacle that was dressed up as being mutual but was plainly messy to everyone in the gaming populace. The cancellation of Silent Hills definitely hurt everyone involved, but Konami just wanted to be thorough in burning every single bridge they conceivably have. Despite being their golden boy for so long, they had to just kick Kojima to the curb in such a disrespectful way. But to add insult to injury, they also had to announce that P.T would also be removed from the PlayStation Network after some time, officially locking the game away from any interested players in the future.

This ticking time bomb of an announcement opened up the market for people to sell their PS4s on eBay with P.T installed on them for a princely sum. It didn’t last very long as eBay ended up removing those listings fairly quickly, but it was indicative of how people were handling the loss of such a gem. People had to now take care of the PS4s and not risk losing the now precious data that was stored in the hard drive. It really was an anxious time, given that any little mistake could result in the loss of your precious installation of P.T. The loss of such an influential piece of media would really hurt anyone who had to wipe their hard drives or change their console for whatever reason.

P.T, despite not being a full game, is widely credited with influencing many modern horror games as of late. Lisa following around the player and being a general terrifying presence throughout the hallway has become one of horror gaming’s most iconic moments. The game is so fondly remembered that it’s been revived in several forms, most notably in the Unreal Engine by just one developer. Unreal PT is as close to playing the original P.T that you’ll get in 2021 and for a passion project made by just one guy, Radius Gordello. It’s astounding how close this game gets to the original; It’s missing details like the cockroaches in the initial encounter with Lisa, or the different encounters you have with her throughout the game, but is ultimately a nice way to experience some of the magic.

Nothing will ever replace the original experience that was P.T, as it really was the gaming event of a lifetime that you had to experience for yourself. Its loss and the cancellation of the potentially amazing Silent Hills was a tragedy that we still feel to this day (at the very least, I still feel it). When looking at old gameplay and the excitement of players that figured out the entire puzzle of the hallway, you feel a sense of catharsis when that one particular YouTuber figures out the very last part of the game’s puzzle, which is a bit of a crapshoot when you realize that no one has ever known how to consistently finish the game to this day.

We’re still getting amazing horror games right now, as the indie space has done well to foster a strong community of horror creators. However, the absence of Silent Hills and the destruction of its only living legacy is nothing short of tragic. Konami should feel pretty ashamed of not just doing its own legacy a disservice but also should feel ashamed for contributing to the loss of relevant video game history. Mourn the loss of Silent Hills if you’d like to join in on that, but enjoy the plethora of horror media that exists now in spite of P.T‘s absence and because of what Kojima achieved with it years ago.

Rest in peace P.T and Silent Hills. You were both just too beautiful for this world.