How bad was the HD Collection, really?

[inpurpleshadows]

The Silent Hill HD Collection is a compilation of SH2 & SH3 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The games themselves are generally ports of the original games to at-the-time modern systems, I assume as an attempt to make those horror classics more accessible to a wider audience and for Konami to get a big fat paycheck. What I find interesting is that this "HD Collection" is universally hated by Silent Hill fans. The collection itself received mediocre-to-negative reviews from critics, but the fan response was so negative that I can't find a single person praising it. I've seen footage from the collection and it looks lazy and the new voice acting is significantly inferior, but it doesn't look like an earth-shattering failure. I haven't played it for myself, so I can't really speak on its quality. Though, for those who have played the collection, is it really as bad as most people say it is or was the response overblown?

[V I D A L]

Simply put, Konami lost the shipping source code of both games. So the devs had to use beta unfinished code to port the games, which has a lot of inconsistencies and unfinished stuff. The HD collection is simply based on an alpha incomplete build.

[chris100185]

Didn't they remove the fog entirely, or at least pare it back so much that it killed the atmosphere and unhid the edges of environements?

[edwvee]

Please just play SH2 enhanced edition and sh3 PC/emulator version. And you'll be much better than playing this c_rap. PC versions are so much better!

[inpurpleshadows]

Originally posted by V I D A L:

Simply put, Konami lost the shipping source code of both games. So the devs had to use beta unfinished code to port the games, which has a lot of inconsistencies and unfinished stuff. The HD collection is simply based on an alpha incomplete build.

If that's the case, why didn't the devs use the code from the XBox or PC ports? Where they unable to find them or was the code from those versions the same as the one used for PS2?

[Bankai9212]

Originally posted by inpurpleshadows:

Originally posted by V I D A L:

Simply put, Konami lost the shipping source code of both games. So the devs had to use beta unfinished code to port the games, which has a lot of inconsistencies and unfinished stuff. The HD collection is simply based on an alpha incomplete build.

If that's the case, why didn't the devs use the code from the XBox or PC ports? Where they unable to find them or was the code from those versions the same as the one used for PS2?

Simple reason Konami is too lazy/cheap to ask the pc community despite how well they’ve maintained the pc version.

[HyperCynic]

Hijinx were simply incompetent. BluePoint who made the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection (and a bunch of others) reverse engineered the physical copies of the games, so they knew it was that specific release version to work with. They didn't ever rely on companies to maintain their own source code.

Hijinx also clearly had no actual familiarity with either Silent Hill 2 or 3, as they couldn't even put the right sounds in the right places.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wya4XhTPMcc

These guys are kind of cringy, but there is no better comprehensive review of the HD Collection from true fans of the franchise.

As someone who bought it on release, I ended up snapping the disc in half and smashing the box to pieces out of frustration. It's the only time I've ever destroyed something I owned rather than donated it or sold it.

[Bankai9212]

Well the remakes were made specifically for xbox and ps3, ps3 specifically being one of the odd games to port for. I think xbox version had less issues in general but I maybe wrong.

[@R+5]

Every Silent Hill Video Game Ranked From WORST To BEST by TripleJump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40mQ-L1AivU

imo, this remake shares similar design issues to "silent hill homecoming", which was suppossed to be an original game and failed in almost every aspect.

since this game should have been an "easy translation into a modern engine" (the original should have been used as a blue-print, and few modifications were actually needed), maybe this one is a bit worse. maybe bloober was also very limited in what they could do, and had to follow konamis instructions, so we will never know if most of the issues, in design and performance, come from them or from trrying to appeal to konami.

then, compared to previous "collections", which also had their own issues and silly changes (in part consequence of the indifference of konami to preserve their original files properly), those also are considered very poor versions.

the best option currently available to play silent hill 2, is the abandonware version using the "enhanced edition" mod, which attempts (in most cases successfully) to improve the game, and offer qol options.

if a group of devs could do something similar, at least for silent hill 1 and silent hill 3, it wouldnt matter if konami tried to push another mediocre remake or port.

[Bankai9212]

Well the combat is the same as homecoming. Thing is combat in both og and remake is serviceable difference is remake has more focus on combat. Otherwise the narrative and the puzzles are better then homecoming.

[cheetah1546]

Before SH2R the last Silent Hill I loved was 3 when it came out. Downpour was okay.

[LoSTsOuL]

It pissed off the father (original devs) of the series nuff said. It was so bad Konami offered refunds and a free game.

[hahaisfunny]

What I remember, the silent hill game disk is extremely expensive...
so...best suggestions is watching walkthrough on YT

[Bankai9212]

Originally posted by hahaisfunny:

What I remember, the silent hill game disk is extremely expensive...
so...best suggestions is watching walkthrough on YT

For 2 nah just download and patch the pc version.

[V I D A L]

Originally posted by inpurpleshadows:

Originally posted by V I D A L:

Simply put, Konami lost the shipping source code of both games. So the devs had to use beta unfinished code to port the games, which has a lot of inconsistencies and unfinished stuff. The HD collection is simply based on an alpha incomplete build.

If that's the case, why didn't the devs use the code from the XBox or PC ports? Where they unable to find them or was the code from those versions the same as the one used for PS2?

You need the source code, mate. The source code is the same for all games. All versions are developer from that source code. Without the source code, you can't port the game. Of course, source codes of old games are lost all the time and some devs do the massive work of reverse engineering the game, like the recent Turok 3 remaster.

But in this case, the devs were given whatever outdated source code Konami still had and they worked with it. Probably low schedule and budget didn't allow them the time to fix and complete the code in order to re-implemented whatever was missing.

There is a bit more to it, as some effects of the game were specifically coded to work with the PS2 hardware, like the soft shadows. Not even the Xbox supported that method, but the console was powerful enough to brute force the effect via software.

The fog effect itself made clever use of the PS2 hardware. So when porting old games to modern hardware, a lot of times many of the effects and things that were designed for that hardware simply won't work in newer hardware because things are rendered in completely different manner these days. So the devs need to do some extra work to recreate the effect for current hardware and APIs. Which wasn't done in that version. It was a straight up beta build port to newer hardware without proper tweaks.

[inpurpleshadows]

Originally posted by V I D A L:

Originally posted by inpurpleshadows:

If that's the case, why didn't the devs use the code from the XBox or PC ports? Where they unable to find them or was the code from those versions the same as the one used for PS2?

You need the source code, mate. The source code is the same for all games. All versions are developer from that source code. Without the source code, you can't port the game. Of course, source codes of old games are lost all the time and some devs do the massive work of reverse engineering the game, like the recent Turok 3 remaster.

But in this case, the devs were given whatever outdated source code Konami still had and they worked with it. Probably low schedule and budget didn't allow them the time to fix and complete the code in order to re-implemented whatever was missing.

There is a bit more to it, as some effects of the game were specifically coded to work with the PS2 hardware, like the soft shadows. Not even the Xbox supported that method, but the console was powerful enough to brute force the effect via software.

The fog effect itself made clever use of the PS2 hardware. So when porting old games to modern hardware, a lot of times many of the effects and things that were designed for that hardware simply won't work in newer hardware because things are rendered in completely different manner these days. So the devs need to do some extra work to recreate the effect for current hardware and APIs. Which wasn't done in that version. It was a straight up beta build port to newer hardware without proper tweaks.

Damn, that sucks, especially since the physical versions of Silent Hill 2 & 3 are expensive as hell nowadays. Like you said, source codes for older games are commonly lost, but in this case, it just feels neglectful. The way Konami treated the Silent Hill franchise since the mid-2000s is crappy, so I wouldn't be surprised if the source code for those games went missing due to incompetence. It could be due to stuff like data corruption or other factors out of their control, but the fact that Konami assigned a small team of people to work with an unfinished build yet barely give them any time to polish everything up peeves me.

Sorry, I'm a little cynical by how little most gaming companies care about preserving their games.