Silent Hill f

Entrusted to the Taiwanese team at NeoBards Entertainment, Silent Hill f marks the return of Konami’s legendary horror saga to the hands of an Asian development team, after seven consecutive chapters conceived and created by studios straddling Europe and the United States. The event was significant enough not only to convince the developers to set this new installment in Japan, but also to entrust its writing to Ryukishi07, one of the most acclaimed visual novel authors on the Japanese indie scene, two choices that could have easily turned the project into a fresh beginning for the franchise, shaping it both aesthetically and thematically.

Unfortunately, Silent Hill f suffers from fundamental design and writing flaws that ultimately set it on a far humbler trajectory. Presented as a return to exploring a dreamlike world that blends the series’ signature horror atmosphere with the beauty of pastoral landscapes and traditional Japanese temples, the game places us in the role of Hinako, a young student living in a remote village called Ebisugaoka in 1960s Japan.

From the very first moments of the story, which opens with a dialogue between Hinako and her sister in traditional bridal attire, the themes the narrative aims to address emerge with great intensity. Silent Hill f's narrative, in fact, embraces multiple themes, contextualizing them coherently with the chosen setting. Hinako is a protagonist portrayed as a strong, non-conformist young woman, incapable of tolerating the verbal and physical violence her father subjects her to within the walls of their home. Simultaneously, she despises the passivity of her mother, subservient to her partner and an echo of a traditional femininity that no longer has a place in the world Hinako wishes to forge for herself.

Counterbalancing Hinako's complex family situation are her two friends, Sakuko and Rinko, and the young man Shu—the only one who seems to understand and support her needs, yet who unwittingly sketches the outlines of a love triangle with one of her companions. The plot is set in motion when the four teenagers notice the village has suddenly been emptied of its inhabitants, with mysterious, monstrous-looking creatures now roaming its streets. Hinako is forced to confront these monstrosities armed only with an iron pipe, as reality begins to merge with imagination, pulling her into an illusory dimension where only a man with a fox mask seems to offer comfort.

The ingredients are all there, those we expect from a Silent Hill title: a deeply personal conflict rooted in unspoken past events, grotesque monsters that embody the protagonist’s fears and frustrations, and a varied supporting cast whose subplots, told through allegory, dissect their relationships with Hinako with brutal honesty. 

Shu, Sakuko, and Rinko are a cast of complex characters.

However, Silent Hill f attempts to deliver all of this through a narrative structure borrowed from the world of visual novels, where the first playthrough serves merely as a prologue, traditionally culminating in a “bad ending” (or a “fake ending”). In truth, one might even be satisfied with how the script decides to end Hinako's trials, but the unanswered questions are many, as is the player's feeling of disorientation. Lacking any real agency, the player is reduced to a passive observer as events unfold, as if tied to a chair in an old cinema while the film rolls on the screen until it concludes and begins to burn.

Only by replaying the story from the beginning—and unlocking additional or simply different cinematic scenes—do the contours, often blurred between impenetrable metaphor and a journey into the absurd, begin to make more sense. This is where the game's structure—now, and only now—allows the player (and therefore Hinako) to choose her destiny.

This process isn't even delegated to in-game branching paths or choices the player can make organically—such as following one direction over another or selecting dialogue options. Instead, it is explicitly signposted in a menu section at the game's start, which explains exactly what is required to unlock every ending. It's a decidedly inelegant solution that makes experiencing the adventure feel extremely schematic, robbing the player of the immersion and sense of agency that narrative games have fortunately cultivated over the last two decades.

Don't expect a transformative approach like the one used in Nier: Automata, where each subsequent playthrough offered a genuinely different experience (a new perspective, altered gameplay, or a continuation of the previous story). Silent Hill f seeds its "new" narrative content only at key story points—well past the midway mark—merely enriching the early parts of the adventure with a few enigmatic text files and little else. The storytelling structure implies the player must repeat the adventure up to four times to discover the "truth" awaiting them at the experience's conclusion, despite the fact that the story being told feels thoroughly satisfying long before this point.

Ultimately, the script’s final reveal focuses on a narrative thread only hinted at in the previous endings—one that connects only tangentially to Hinako’s personal journey (the true core of the mystery) and instead leans into Silent Hill f’s folkloric nature. This grand “final metaphor” once again speaks too bluntly about Hinako’s liberation, lacking the subtlety and narrative restraint that the series’ best entries mastered. It’s an additional layer that seems more like an awkward homage to Shinto tradition, clumsily placed alongside the pagan inspirations of previous games, and yet it’s the only part that truly comes close to feeling like traditional Silent Hill.

Ebisugaoka is a beautifully rendered location inspired by existing rural villages in Japan.

The script also falls into the trap of hammering its key themes repeatedly through dialogue, turning scenes that could have been powerful and impactful into something more akin to a youth-oriented social awareness campaign.

Even the new addition of a personal diary for the protagonist, consultable as the story progresses, fails to extricate itself from this lack of grace and refinement in the writing. While it characterizes Hinako's past and that of other cast members, its pages are filled with descriptions and reasoning that annul any ambiguity in staging or character characterization, serving the thankless task of being a literal "explainer" for anyone who failed to grasp what was already evident. A real shame, as this novel addition could have created interesting situations, such as introducing an unreliable narrator or closely tracking the shattering of Hinako's psyche; Silent Hill f completely lacks subtlety, which is not what one expects from a Silent Hill title (let alone from a script penned by an acclaimed author like Ryukishi07).

Still, the story is staged with masterful cinematic direction and exceptional visual quality. The direction and cinematography are consistently effective, and if one were to simply get lost in the game’s aesthetic coherence without questioning its narrative consistency, Silent Hill f could still be considered enjoyable, perhaps even a respectable entry in the series.

This is aided by the subtle contributions of veteran composer Akira Yamaoka, here supported by a team of musicians including Kensuke Inage. The musical score, while effective, follows the usual formula of industrial tracks and noise soundscapes interwoven with more classical, melodious samples—here inspired largely by Japanese musical tradition and the Showa historical period. Nothing truly memorable, but the audio and musical components succeed in highlighting the story's staging and making the exploration feel more unnerving, as one would expect.

Yet one major question remains: the quality of the gameplay. 

The inclusion of a diegetic diary is brilliant, but sadly handled in a disappointing way.

In this regard, Silent Hill f is vulnerable to a host of criticisms. Its structure doesn’t reinvent the wheel but flexes the muscles of a competent exploration system. The highly praised graphical detail and impressive 3D modeling offer a richly explorable world, supported by level design that’s complex without being labyrinthine. Exploring despite the presence of assorted monstrosities rewards curious players with text files that expand the story’s mosaic, useful upgrade items for Hinako, and access to optional areas—important for unlocking additional endings in subsequent runs.

However, Silent Hill f is also heavily combat-oriented, whereas traditional—and generally more beloved—Silent Hill games favored a more subdued approach. In older titles, monsters and their strategic placement were meant to hinder the player’s progress and immerse them in a suffocating, terrifying atmosphere. Here, combat is purely melee-based, with multiple layers of mechanics and health bars designed to sustain the player’s engagement across the entire game (and the three playthroughs required to unlock the “canonical” ending).

Hinako has up to three weapons at her disposal, categorized as light, medium, and heavy. These degrade with use, and positioning oneself intelligently relative to enemies is key to surviving encounters. The protagonist can also rely on a dodge system—limited by a stamina bar—which, if timed correctly just before an enemy strike, results in a slow-motion animation allowing her to strike adversaries from behind. Finally, by focusing on a creature and holding the shoulder buttons, she can perform critical hits at the cost of her sanity meter.

Boss fights are solemn and dramatic as you would expect, although they seem a little to akin to From Software's games in their presentation.

On paper, this combat system sounds promising, and when paired with the faith-based upgrade system and the use of traditional ema charms, it could provide a varied and engaging experience. In practice, however, fights, especially against multiple enemies, are plagued by stiff animations, ineffective hit feedback, and chaotic camera work caused by the frequent use of narrow corridor environments. The camera does its best to keep the action readable but often fails, compounded by jarring clipping of enemy models into walls and doors.

Mastering the focused attack mechanic early on can make progression faster, despite the tutorial explaining it only superficially. Yet the game’s balance further compounds the problem: Silent Hill f initially allows players to avoid most encounters, just as one would expect from a traditional Silent Hill, but for reasons unknown (perhaps thematic or narrative?), nearly all fights eventually become mandatory. The second half of the game devolves into a series of clumsy combat arenas that must be cleared before progression is allowed.

This insistence on mandatory combat leads to two unintended consequences: first, the game’s final act becomes deeply frustrating—not because of difficulty (which is adjustable), but due to sheer repetition, as the enemy roster remains painfully limited. Second, the overall tension collapses once the player realizes there are only three enemy types and that the game showers them with resources in its final stages.

It becomes clear that Silent Hill f does not aim to make players tremble or immerse them in a solitary, terrifying dimension. Instead, it prefers to act as a stage for Hinako's growth, who, by maturing and gaining awareness (or sinking deeper, depending on the moment), coherently ends up shredding her demons with increasing ease and ferocity. However, I remain convinced there was certainly a more elegant way to convey this idea or its message without forcing the player into long sessions of combat against the same three or four monstrous figures for the entire duration of the adventure's final portion. Especially when the ambition was to entice the player to retrace their steps after the credits roll.

Callbacks to previous Silent Hill games are included!

And perhaps Hinako's story, while sincerely interested in saying something important, isn't intriguing enough to justify subjecting ourselves to such a tortuous path, artificially rendered irritating to complete.

The refined direction of the cinematics, the evocative and historically accurate setting, and the willingness to intertwine modern Japanese history with the series' signature psychological themes are undoubtedly strengths, as is the audacity to attempt a more experimental, layered narrative approach. However, in the face of these insights, the overall experience crumbles under the weight of questionable ludic choices, an excessively redundant structure, and a script that, instead of suggesting and unsettling, prefers to explain and simplify, after having captivated us with a graphically stellar presentation. The result is a title that is ludically weak, only partially successful in restoring the identity and emotional depth of the name it carries, and one that might have worked better had it simply been more fun to play.