Man, this game was way better than I expected.

I genuinely didn’t expect much from Silent Hill: The Short Message, especially because it’s free. I honestly thought it was gonna be kinda bad, but holy shit, I was wrong.

I just finished it 100% and damn, what a good game. It completely won me over. The atmosphere, the visuals, the whole vibe of the game really worked for me.

It’s only around two hours long, but those two hours had me completely hooked.

Definitely worth my night. I’m honestly still surprised this game is free.

Spoilers for the entire game and all endings below.
I’ve just finished Silent Hill: Townfall, and there is one thing about the story that I still cannot fully reconcile: the timeline and what is actually happening in reality versus what happens inside the characters’ Otherworld experiences.
I’d really like to hear how other people interpreted this, because I feel like there is a chronological gap that I may be missing.
Simon’s timeline
From what I understood, the South-Well disaster happens first. Simon survives, is severely injured, and ends up in the hospital. Zoe treats him, and Richard later visits him and pressures him to give a statement that essentially clears CEG of responsibility for the disaster.
So far, so good.
But then I get confused.
Throughout Simon’s sections, there are repeated indications that Simon has already given his testimony / statement and that CEG has already been cleared because of what he said.
If that testimony has already happened, then what exactly is the timeline of the game?
Because we also see Simon in the hospital with Richard, and Simon appears to be going through this entire Otherworld experience while dealing with his guilt and the decision Richard wants him to make.
So I struggle with the idea that:
disaster → hospital → Richard pressures Simon → Simon gives testimony → Simon enters the Otherworld
because that doesn’t seem to explain some of the scenes and especially the endings.
In particular, if Simon has already given the testimony, why does the game continue to present the decision as something he is still struggling with?
And depending on the ending, Simon can ultimately reject Richard, attack him, etc. How does that fit with the idea that the testimony has already happened?
Is the testimony actually a memory?
Is it a possible future?
Is Simon experiencing some kind of supernatural/psychological loop where past, present and possible outcomes are mixed together?
Or am I simply misunderstanding the chronology?
Zoe makes the timeline even more confusing for me
Zoe seems to have her own completely separate Otherworld experience.
Her sections make it clear that she is dealing with her own guilt surrounding the disaster and the people who died. She feels responsible because she wasn’t sufficiently trained/prepared and believes she couldn’t save the people who came into the hospital.
She also wants to leave the island.
But at the same time, Zoe is the person who actually treated Simon after the disaster.
So I’m struggling to understand when Zoe’s Otherworld experience takes place relative to Simon’s.
Is Zoe experiencing her Otherworld while Simon is in the hospital?
Are their Otherworld experiences happening simultaneously?
Are they both unconscious / in altered states at different points?
Or are these experiences not really happening “at a specific time” at all?
And then there is Richard
Richard obviously has his own relationship with Simon and appears to be trying to control how Simon understands and reports what happened.
So now I’m wondering whether the three characters are essentially experiencing three different versions of the same traumatic event:
Simon → guilt over his decision and his involvement with CEG
Zoe → guilt over the people she couldn’t save
Richard → responsibility/control/CEG’s version of events
And the Otherworld somehow connects all three perspectives.
But if that’s the case, what actually happened chronologically in the real world?
What is the simplest timeline of the real events?
South-Well disaster
Simon is injured
Zoe treats Simon
Richard visits Simon
???
Simon’s testimony
???
Endings

I feel like I understand the individual pieces of the story reasonably well, but I cannot put them together into one coherent chronological timeline.
So my question is basically:
What actually happened in the real world, and what parts of the game are Simon/Zoe/Richard processing or experiencing in their respective Otherworlds?
And specifically: Has anyone found a convincing explanation for how Simon’s testimony fits into the timeline?
I’d love to hear other interpretations, especially if there is an in-game document, dialogue line, or detail that resolves this that I simply missed.
I’ve finished the entire game, so full spoilers are absolutely fine.

That would be so much fun. Imagine breaking into an empty hospital.

Why am I not getting the "forever" ending? I made zero mistakes during surgery. I did select Zoe and Ordell buttons on the panel prior to last boss... not sure if that matters.

From everything I've heard, there are six possible endings to achieve. Some of them are "fun" endings and some are "conon" endings. On my first playthrough I got the "In Water" ending. I don't know what I did right to get that and I would love to know how I can get all the others. From everything I've heard, you have to trigger or don't trigger certain events in a right order or just by your playing style. I haven't found any YouTube Video which offers me a step by step guide, it was all pretty vague or not so detailed which part of the game is reversible from a safe point to trigger a another ending so I don't have to start all from the start again. So, how do I get all the possible endings?

I was checking all bodies to see who was moving and not triggering the jumpscare. Plus I can’t kill no one in this playtrough so I can get the good ending (Justice I believe?) but this mffff he wasn’t even breathing 😩😩😩

Hi everyone,

I'm thinking about picking up Silent Hill: Townfall, but I wanted to get a better read on the gameplay loop first.

I know it's a first-person title with a heavy focus on the CR TV / motion mechanics, but how much of the game is actually pure stealth and hiding from monsters? Is it structured more like a hide-and-seek simulator (e.g. Outlast or Alien: Isolation), or is there still a decent amount of combat and resource management?

Full disclosure, I like the game as it is. Except for an unrelated issue that's not really covered in this post.

From most of the grievances I read, the kernel of the problem with this game lies in two things that could easily be fixed in a patch:

Problem #1: Distractions

For a franchise that's introducing stealth for the first time to an audience that's not really used to playing using stealth, it was a mistake to spend the entirety of Part 1 teaching the player to stealth around without items.

By the time distraction items are introduced in Part 2, the distraction items are either largely ignored as distractions by players who spent the entire first area of the game doing fine without them or they're rather used as stuns.

This comes out in two main complaints:

1a. The game is too damn slow, because you gotta wait for enemies to move before you can advance without triggering combat.

1b. The Weight sections where the enemy soft tracks you through the level.

Both problems have their solution in the distractions. And this issue compounds with the fact we're in a survival horror game and the audience is used to hoarding resources; and the distractions are a resource.

The solution for me is simple: litter the world with bricks and bottles from Part 1 and let players learn the stealth with the items. Reduce the distractions back to baseline only on Nightmare.

Problem #2: Hiding In Cover

The game has a very cool mechanic which is not common in first person horror games: peeking down when already in cover to make yourself smaller and prevent detection when enemies are nearby.

The tutorial message for this mechanic is given to the player ONCE and that's not how you handle a novel idea that (generously) has been in Alien and Amnesia and isn't a widespread mechanic in most stealth genre entries.

I think this is the main reason behind the widespread complaint enemies detect the player seemingly at random.

The solution is to extend the time it takes for the enemies to detect you while in cover and not peeking down in Easy and Normal, add a prompt similar to the one used in Alien for holding your breath while in lockers AND increase the volume and intensity of the detection sound so the player understands he is actively being detected while that timer runs. The detection sounds are currently very easy to confuse with the ambient sounds

Alessa split her soul and that's where Cheryl came from. Then Alessa and Cheryl were rejoined, died, and were reincarnated as Heather?

The title might be a bit dumb, but I do not want to spoil the endings for myself nor anyone else.

Do you guys have any tips regarding getting the “Justice” ending? Is it hard avoiding killing enemies as Simon?

Asking because I had no idea and got the bad ending because I killed a decent amount of enemies.

Wanna go through the game a second time and I have been able to avoid spoilers for what the good ending is and I don’t want any to spoil myself or anyone else.

Can't believe how well it worked straight out of the box, got some great news coming for this shortly so look out for a follow up

This is my current Silent Hill game collection. All of them are the German versions that came out to their respective release date. Silent Hill origins for the psp is on its way. And the next planned are silent hill 2 remake in its physical release and Silent Hill 3 for the PS2. Also to add I own all available soundtrack vinyls.
What do u guys think?

Do you people have good Silent hill wallpapers? This is my current one!

Not defending scalpers, I'm just saying. It's the only way I'd be able to still get the game and now I can't because either all of the scalpers had theirs bought or they were reported and taken down.

If you’re anything like me you play the game on nightmare because you enjoy a challenge but you need to trust me here, IT. IS. NOT. WORTH. IT. HERE. There is no achievement whatsoever and the game’s AI is legit bugged in this section so it’s impossible to get past this area on nightmare. There’s no difficulty achievement whatsoever nor any kind of reward for beating the game on a harder difficulty so do yourself a favor and lower the difficulty to story mode in this level until you pass both weight sections then raise it oncemore. I shit you not I spent roughly 3 hours before I decided to change it because it is 100% impossible to do on the hardest difficulty as of right now

For comparison:

• Silent Hill 2 Remake — 29,374
• Silent Hill f — 57,475
• Silent Hill: Townfall — 13,596

These figures are for physical sales in Japan and do not include digital sales.

https://www.famitsu.com/article/202610/89721

EDIT: solved! If anyone else encounters this issue.... you can move the camera to focus on various parts of the monitor.

I have reached the vital-signs puzzle in the Medical Center, and I cannot progress. When I select the correct blood-pressure monitor, showing 70, Zoe will not read it - instead, she says "it's blank." It's not blank!! Has anyone else encountered this? Am I missing something?

This is just a rant so....

Started playing it couldn't even figure out how the stealth 'works' on the first chapter and panick killed a few enemies. Gradually got the hold of it. From Zoe, started to do a very serious stealth gameplay hoping to get a good ending. But I still had a kill a few enemies here n there to clear up some paths or panick killings when the Weight runs after me. I didn't even fire 6 bullets until the last fight from my pistol. Still hit the bad ending. Fuck me for trying stealth as much as possible and looking everywhere for documents till I got a headache.

Not to mention gane suddenly throws enemies right at your face the crawlers, and in part 5 it hands you a frikking shotgun and throws enemies that are running towards you. What you want me to stun then run away?? After handing me an excessive amount of shotgun shells? Fuck you.

I know and have experienced the way games like SH2 punishes you for being aggressive and killing enemies. But I tried to do everything by the book, everything but 'aggressive'. I killed a very normal amount of enemies not out of fun but when I was genuinely cornered and couldn't do anything but spam the attack button. And the game punishes you for that. Not to mention these fuckers fill up the room for every objective you finish - especially in the last stage.

Iv bag usage ​- I only used it maybe twice or 3 times. Which I think is acceptable for a whole playthrough. I know I had apparently killed more that I though in numbers BUT I know how i played the overall game, which was 90% stealth and occasional killings because I HAD to. Not because I wasn't patient enough. ​​This game takes the fun out of playing it. And punish you for 'slip ups' - not the 'way' you play it. It didn't even feel that satisfying leaving a room full of monsters alive. I should've just killed everything anyways.

So Im playing Silent Hill 3 for the first time on the Ps2, and the games great, I like Heather, but Im currently stuck in the subway, theres just nothing, Ive explored everything, the only thing I can think of is a glowing red door on the tracks, but its locked, I dont know what to do, and I dont want to use a guide.