Silent Hillis a renowned horror series, though also one that has gone through many different phases. Unlike Resident Evil, which has managed to reinvent itself after every slump, Silent Hill has struggled. Every game after the fourth entry shifted to different developers, all of them with very different interpretations of what the series meant.
One thing that has been strikingly consistent across the games, however, is just how damn loud they are. Nothing is scarier than a sudden loud noise, and wondering where ti came from. But in Silent Hill, half the horror comes from the protagonists themselves. Sometimes it is reasonable, loud footsteps in an empty building. But some of these people ar just too damn loud.
The idea of the Silent Hill series is often coloured by Silent Hill 2, though this was a version of the town very unique to James Sutherland. In the very first Silent Hill,Harry is not particularly drawn to Silent Hill himself. He is dragged in by the town itself in search of his daughter, and he is otherwise a decidedly normal man in this regard.
He is out of his depth, though is otherwise bizarrely calm. He is incredulous when in conversation with anyone from the town, though keeps his mouth shut in all other scenarios. Not a word when a demonic beast appears, not a yelp when he is struck by otherwordly beasts. Really, the only notable noise Harry makes is his incredibly loud stomps through Silent Hill.
American truckers have a certain reputation attributed to them. Free souls, crude but caring. Loud but loving. So in that sense, trucker Travis Grady is likely the last person you would envision as the protagonist of Silent Hill. Yet he has plenty of demons of his own, and is a man that mostly keeps to himself otherwise.
He’s a bit like Harry in that regard. The town is bizarre to him, but he’s a man of few words all the same. Sure, he has some loud footsteps, and he isn’t afraid to leave out a heavy grunt when he’s pummeling a monster into submission, but he is much quieter than the town itself in every other scenario.
Silent Hill 4: The Room was a big departure from the style of earlier Silent Hill games, and was the last one made by the original development team, with all others outsourced to international studios. This change is a fun one though,shifting between first and third-person segmentsfor a literally unique perspective.
And off the bat, Henry has a face that just looks talkative. Yet oddly, he’s quite quiet. Though he talks a decent amount, he is literally quiet. His personal volume is incredibly low, making him seem comparatively meek. That said, he is still louder than those who came before just by merit of talking so much more.
Silent Hill f is the first mainline game in the series to be developed in Japan since Silent Hill 4: The Room.
The face of the series despite only having a single game and a remake, James Sutherland is a man with a much more personal story with Silent Hill. His journey in Silent Hill has plenty of dialogue, and that is what ranks James above of the others here. In regular gameplay, he doesn’t actually make much noise, other than obscenely noisy footsteps.
But he meets a lot of people. Maria, who becomes a frequent companion he speaks with, Eddie and his own demons, Angela and her constant discomfort. James isn’t afraid to speak up and at times even raise his voice. He talks a lot, and his volume can definitely go a bit higher than others have before and after him.
Silent Hill: Homecoming was the beginning of a new set of mainline games, picking up new stories to take place within the town of Silent Hill. Divisive games in all regards, they also started to incorporate more conventional gameplay design elements to attract a wider fanbase. And that meant louder protagonists.
Despite being a discharged US Army soldier, Alex Sheperd is a oddly quiet man. He is talkative, though not as loud as you might expect. When it comes to combat though, the military instincts kick in, and this is when he’s at his loudest. However, Alex also has an issue of talkng to himself a lot, remarking on his surroundings and monsters, a quirk most in the series beforehand avoided.
One of the few games in the series to do so, Silent Hill 3 acts as a direct sequel to the events of the original Silent Hill.You play as Heather Mason, the daughter of Harry Mason, our beloved and quietest protagonist of the original Silent Hill. Heather doesn’t talk after her father entirely though, being one of the loudest protagonists in the series.
It would be easy for Heather to fall into the trap of the damsel-in-distress, screaming at every moving shadow. Quiet the opposite though. Heather is just sick of everything that is going on, and is happy to scream and shout her displeasure. She is by far one of the most spiritied protagonists in the series, and isn’t afraid to voice her feelings. Loudly.
The latest Silent Hill game that could be considered mainline, Silent Hill: Downpour continued in the tradition of Homecoming in adopting many conventional gameplay systems, and that made Murphy not just talkative, but so damn loud. In fact, everyone is incredibly loud in Silent Hill: Downpour. You might not hear the monsters over them.
Seriously, Murphy comments on everything. Not a step is taken without him having something to say. Seemingly every conversation degrades into shouting matches and profanities. It’s just loudness all over the place. They may as well name the town Loud Hill at this point, since everyone can’t keep their damn voices down anymore.
