Toluca Prison

[Spooky Bunyip]

IS it just me or does the game really start to overstay its welcome by the time you get to the prison?

[Large Tomatoes]

Originally posted by Spooky Bunyip:

IS it just me or does the game really start to overstay its welcome by the time you get to the prison?

I did start to fatigue in the last 1/4 of the game, but I spent a full weekend playing it from start to finish. The prison was way too combat focussed in my opinion, this is where the wall climbing mannequins got introduced and the first couple of them that surprise you from above are terrifying. I think they should have made this section more about suspense than action, maybe just a handful of well placed spider mannequins.

[jfunk1993]

Went through it Wednesday and Thursday. As I was going through it I did think "boy, this is taking a while. And I'm only half way done". Stopped there and resumed the next day, proceeded to blast through the second half of the Prison then finished the Labyrinth and Hotel.

Looking back, I think part of what made it feel long was that I took my time getting to the Historical Society and explored the town as much as I could. So by the time I was half way through the Prison I was playing and streaming for three hours already and called it quits there.

[JUDY]

Originally posted by Alveriel:

For me its when the game really picked up. The atmosphere of that level is what i was looking for in a horror title.

Really? I would say what atmosphere? Playing on an OLED is almost unbearable. Pitch black, uninteresting level design and youre really just repeating what youve just had for the last 6-7 hours prior in terms of enemies and puzzles.

To OP, yes it's a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ slog at this point. The game over staying its welcome has gone from GOTY to boredom and annoyance for me now.

[Frag Maniac]

Originally posted by JUDY:

Playing on an OLED is almost unbearable. Pitch black...

Any OLED worth it's salt anymore should have Filmmaker mode and adequate HDR. The Dynamic Tone Mapping on mine keeps a lot of dark areas from looking too dark, and it's one of the more affordable ones.

That said, there ARE of course places where it's intended to be very dark, like the prison, but you still have the lights that can be activated by lever, which keep them on long enough, but not so long it ruins atmosphere.

[Thanathos]

The only depressing portion of the Prison is that the layout doesn't make sense, like silent hill just creates and layers all these locations into one that make it hard to grasp the true size of it. I'm just curious where the real toluca lake prison is located on the map. The best section for me was the abstract daddy chase sequence and the freezer.

[Large Tomatoes]

Originally posted by Frag Maniac:

That said, there ARE of course places where it's intended to be very dark, like the prison, but you still have the lights that can be activated by lever, which keep them on long enough, but not so long it ruins atmosphere.

This was the best bit for me, you could hear the enemies but you didn't know where they were. It was extremely tense.

[Thanathos]

Originally posted by Large Tomatoes:

Originally posted by Frag Maniac:

That said, there ARE of course places where it's intended to be very dark, like the prison, but you still have the lights that can be activated by lever, which keep them on long enough, but not so long it ruins atmosphere.

This was the best bit for me, you could hear the enemies but you didn't know where they were. It was extremely tense.

MY CHURRO lololol (Ritual) not going to lie that bathroom ambience by the warden's office got me good and I was expecting it also lolol

[Large Tomatoes]

Originally posted by Thanathos:

MY CHURRO lololol (Ritual) not going to lie that bathroom ambience by the warden's office got me good and I was expecting it also lolol

Right!!!

Bro was feeling snacky.

Only clip I could find
https://www.reddit.com/r/silenthill/comments/1g49k3a/cell_f15_at_toluca_prison/

The mannequins in general really did a number on me, even in good light they hide really well. I'm waiting for Bloober to fix the crappy performance then I'm playing it in VR, that is going to be something else!

[V I D A L]

I'm getting this feeling as well... For me, it's when the mental health problems start being too obvious. Up till the hospital, the game still more grounded... sure, you go to the "other side" for the second time, but it's still the same area you were in, just rotten.

But the game start losing the sense of placement after you go to the historical building and jump down too unsurvivable holes in the ground. That did take me out of the experience a bit. It made absolutely no sense that James would just jump down a random hole in the ground and somehow survive landing on flat ground.

I know it was like this in the original, but changing it and put a ladder he goes down through would do wonders for the immersion. It's just so dumb that he just jumps down to his death in a senseless leap of faith. It made me roll my eyes. They could have made a ladder that takes him down just far enough until you can see where you land, then jump off from there, so you can't reach back up. Same final result, much more convincing way to get there.

The prison was a cool location, but not getting there as part as the connected world spoils the immersion for me. Now I'm in the labyrinth and any sense of a real place is gone, which for me kinda takes me out of the experience further.

That's why I've always like Resident Evil better. The context get lost in Silent Hill for the sake of craziness , which is just a matter of personal preference. Same reason I end up disliking The Evil Within. It's immersion breaking to me, having the feeling that nothing around you is real.

Silent Hill 2 really does get worse and worse as you play. The most interesting and immersive part is the very beginning.. going down the dirt road by the forest, crossing the farms, getting into town and exploring it.. the apartment building is great and it peaks at the hospital. Then it's down hill from there. It probably should have wrapped it up after the hospital.

[Ghastkill]

completely agree! For me it is more the fact that it gets too repetitive and so becomes less scary and just boring/grind like. people so it is consistent with the horror, I disagree. In order for there to be horror there needs to be light/restbite and then something makes you afraid and it starts again, because otherwise you get used to it. Like the most annoying sound in the world will be drowned out if it follows a simple pattern, but, make that pattern unpredictable and it will truly be haunting. So basically, there needs to be more breaks in the horror to make it feel more horror, but there are not any, and somehow the character remains terrified, but the play just becomes used to it/bored.

[Wolfman-RIP]

Originally posted by V I D A L:

But the game start losing the sense of placement after you go to the historical building and jump down too unsurvivable holes in the ground. That did take me out of the experience a bit. It made absolutely no sense that James would just jump down a random hole in the ground and somehow survive landing on flat ground.

I know it was like this in the original, but changing it and put a ladder he goes down through would do wonders for the immersion.

The prison was a cool location, but not getting there as part as the connected world spoils the immersion for me. Now I'm in the labyrinth and any sense of a real place is gone, which for me kinda takes me out of the experience further.

That's why I've always like Resident Evil better. The context get lost in Silent Hill for the sake of craziness , which is just a matter of personal preference. Same reason I end up disliking The Evil Within. It's immersion breaking to me, having the feeling that nothing around you is real.

If they removed the jump into the hole's the fan backlash would be unreal. A big part of at least 3 of the Silent hill games is jumping into darkness filled holes. It's a way of showing that the character is starting to understand that they are no longer in the real world and that they have to risk everything to move forward. There is enough clues pointing to this for the characters. The prime example is "there was a hole here, its gone now" It's also symbolism for "decent into madness" or "the darkness inside someone's heart"

“There was a HOLE here. It’s gone now.” would become a meme for fans hating on this game if they removed holes

I wouldn't consider Resident Evil to be immersive at all. Resident Evil 4 for example is a arcade game with large arcade style spinning icons for bullets & items, zombie enemies drop these silly icons, they are also mostly slow moving shooting gallery targets.
Resident evil 5 carried on this trend but with Chris punching 5 ton boulders in a volcano and the less said about 6 the better.

The resident evil games are not really a horror game as there's no slow build to suspense, each area is a shooting gallery with a puzzle tagged on. Resident evil isn't exactly know for its great voice acting, writing or dialog either.

I was a big fan of resident evil 1 and 2 on playstation 1 as them games had slower more atmospheric sections of the game with genuine scares, more realism and good lore building. After that capcom turned the games into dumb action shooting games with zero immersion, zero realism and really DUMB story lines.


They tried returning to the spooky horror element with the RE 7 but its still too arcadey with its collecting loot to sell, shooting gems out of objects and when its made clear that the main character can't die or lose limbs at the start of the game it removes any scene of dread.

Resident Evil makes Silent Hill look like a master of immersion and horror by comparison.

Originally posted by Ghastkill:

completely agree! For me it is more the fact that it gets too repetitive and so becomes less scary and just boring/grind like. people so it is consistent with the horror, I disagree. In order for there to be horror there needs to be light/restbite and then something makes you afraid and it starts again, because otherwise you get used to it. Like the most annoying sound in the world will be drowned out if it follows a simple pattern, but, make that pattern unpredictable and it will truly be haunting. So basically, there needs to be more breaks in the horror to make it feel more horror, but there are not any, and somehow the character remains terrified, but the play just becomes used to it/bored.

There is a long part of the game with no monsters before the prison where you can learn more about the Town and a scene about Angela.

[Derivat949]

Nah, it was pretty good. the one thing they could've turned down a bit was the dozens of mannequins crawling on the walls

[Frag Maniac]

Originally posted by Large Tomatoes:

The mannequins in general really did a number on me, even in good light they hide really well.

Yeah I'm probably going to have to take them MUCH more seriously on this Hard playthrough I'm on now, even WITH the chainsaw.

[Kenzie]

I only felt that through Labyrinth. But, then I looked at myself who suffers from clinical depression. It never let's go, does it? So I kept quiet and chugged on. The ending I got was cathartic, I just wish it was like that in real life.

[Large Tomatoes]

Originally posted by Frag Maniac:

Yeah I'm probably going to have to take them MUCH more seriously on this Hard playthrough I'm on now, even WITH the chainsaw.

It is your decision whether or not you allow yourself to be immersed in the story and game play. You have the power both figuratively and literally, to not scream "this game is f****ng s**t" every five minutes while playing, you could even stop playing if it bothers you so.