In case you didn’t read the interview with Video Games Chronicle and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama talking about his upcoming project with Bokeh Game Studio and Slitterhead, the topic of Silent Hill inevitably came up (as did Hideo Kojima’s P.T.). The topic turned to the long-rumored remake of the survival horror classic, and in light of Capcom’s success in revitalizing of the Resident Evil series, how Konami would fare in their efforts.
According to Toyama, he felt that Konami would have a more difficult time with remaking Silent Hill, due to “the gameplay as a concept” being older. “It’s not an action game where you can just refine the action as in Biohazard. To bring Silent Hill up to current standards or to polish up the graphics, the fans wouldn’t be satisfied. That’s not what it was about – how beautiful it was. I think you’d have to rethink the concept to make it interesting to fans.”
Toyama also shared his thoughts on the concept of remakes, saying that, unlike films and remakes, game remakes “are difficult to enjoy as in the original state.” He elaborated by saying that in addition to the original platform being a barrier, “as time goes by game mechanics, especially in usability, lack rationality and sophistication. Visually speaking it’s clearly not made for modern equipment, so I absolutely don’t have any objection to modifying an original essence to fit the modern era which we live in today.”
Konami might have realized this themselves as far back as P.T., as according to Guillermo del Toro while working on Silent Hills with Kojima, famed Manga artist Junji Ito would have been involved. Manga artist Suehiro Maruo also had that cryptic Instagram post a few years back that teased his involvement in a Silent Hill remake.
Adding up to all of this was del Toro’s not-so-subtle jab during The Game Awards asking for a new Silent Hill game. Will we see one, is the question. After all, it’s now been almost a decade since we had a full Silent Hill game, which is when handheld title Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and the last mainline entry Silent Hill: Downpour were released.
Toyama is keeping busy in the horror space at least, as his new studio Bokeh Games revealed the off-kilter Slitterhead at The Game Awards. While that isn’t looking like any kind of spiritual successor to Silent Hill, it certainly whets the appetite for more horror from its creators.