Silent Hill: The Escape

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Silent Hill: The Escape is an entry in the survival horror video game series Silent Hill for mobile phones.

Silent Hill[]

Silent Hill series is a horror media franchise centered on a series of survival gothic. What makes this game special from other games in this series is that this game is for mobile gaming devices.Since it is for mobile gaming devices, the gameplay mechanic it uses is called "gesture technology" which is a method of controlling the actions in the game via image feedback from the mobile device's built-in camera.^[3]

Creator's History[]

Silent Hill: The Escape was created by Keiichiro Toyama in 2007. It was developed and published by Konami and made the series Silent Hill horror video games. After graduating from Tokyo Zokei University, he became a graphic designer and character designer and then he became a director, writer, and background designer when he created the Silent Hill series. According to Jason Schreier, this was due to an argument and problems with Konami, the Silent Hill series came to an end.^[4]

Game Information[]

Unlike the other games in the Silent Hill series, this game is not just a puzzle/adventure horror genre but rather a first-person shooter game. The game objective is for the player to make their way through ten levels by finding the key and bringing it to the locked door at the end of each level. The player must slide their fingers to move the character in a first person perspective and tap the screen to shoot enemies (such as Evil Nurses and possessed Wheelchairs as well as a monster similar to the Butcher and Pyramid Head). The game mechanics also include the ability to tilt the device in order to change the camera perspective. This is used in more ways than the perspective. It is also used while reloading the player's revolver, as you must align it correctly in order to reload.

Background[]

Genre Background[]

The Silent Hill series as a whole is an example of a survival horror game with it being not only the genre of horror videogames but also Gothic fiction. Horror video games like this series use Gothic themes throughout games. Inorder to achieve this gothic theme, this series relies on dramatic cinematic sequences, like cut scenes, and photo-realistic aesthetics to achieve its effect. According to Kirkland in "Gothic videogames, survival horror, and the Silent Hill series", the psychoanalytic significance of cut scenes, puzzle objects, monster design, player exploration and game space, all contribute to the Silent Hill series as exemplifying Gothic themes evident in survival horror and videogames in general. According to Kirkland, the use of designing the graphics to look like the walls were rank and rotten and floors rusty can provide that the Gothic is relevant for expanding horror elements to the game.^[5] With gothic games, there one main resemblance is with its narrative being about how a protagonists is haunted by mysterious secrets from the past and with this structure, ideally suits videogames where players piece together embedded narrative fragments with "both the story to be discovered, and the story of their discovery".^[5] With the game being centered around the town of Silent Hill, the series has typical Gothic tales regarding religious cults, repressed memories, uncanny doppelgangers, murder, betrayal, and according to Kirkland, incest. With these stories, especially with the titles of the Silent Hill series, involve different characters that the audience can play. With these different character and narratives the only thing that connects them is the relationship with the town of Silent Hill. By having the story setting as this, it allows the audience to analyze how the different titles and themes may relate together and form theories about it as a fandom.

Game Format[]

With these type of games, the main goal is to survive, therefore it is introduced as a horror game since you are made to be afraid that the monster will trap you. Perron from his chapter Gamers' Terrifying Exploration of Silent Hill in "Silent Hill: The Terror Engine". ^[6] describes the video game aesthetics an "aesthetic of repetition" because the gamer has to understand how to cope with the game world and its inhabitants. With these games like Silent Hill, the gameplay emotions created by survival horror is focus primarily on the initial phase of the learning sequence. Meaning that even with the emotions of terror and horror thrown on you as you play the game, you are expected to learn the patter of the initial motive of the game to understand where you need to go. With Silent Hill, horror survival games are much different than survival-based games. According to Krzywinska,^[7] with horror survival games, it interferes with player performance by taking away the power to see what is coming and remove the players ability to remain as focused when horror is involved. As mentioned by Perron in Silent Hill: The Terror Engine, the gameplay of Silent Hill is typical of the survival horror genre. While facing a threat, you have to discover ways to get to places while roads are blocked, locate keys to unlock doors, find items to get those keys, and solve puzzles to know how to get those items or keys and how to move on from there to the next level. When it comes to the format of how the player would be scared, they provide jump scares, or in this case first person facing the monster. When it comes to the horror scenes, the perspective is shot that way that makes you feel as if you were in the situation the character is in.

Characters[]

Each character is unlocked after beating the game with the previous character.

Human: an unidentified person who does not remember how they got there, the human would be seen with neutral facial expression and is usually a male character.

Alien: A grey alien investigating the cause of the abnormalities in the town of Silent Hill.

Mira: The Shibia Inu

Robbie the Rabbit: Only appears in the tutorial level of the game. ^[8]

Monsters:

Bubble Head Nurses

Wheelchair ghosts

Frog-like monsters

Ceiling monsters

Flying insects

Hooded monsters

References[]