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Silent Hill HD Collection |OT| Programmed in Smoke Signals

B

BocoDragon

or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
I love how this botched HD collection has given me the incentive to play my PS2 copies, and the re-frame of mind to appreciate them (even though SD).

My new plasma does a great job with SD content anyhow.
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
Revolutionary said:
"No fog at all" is pushing it but so are the claims that "it has plenty of fog".
Click to expand...

Plenty of fog compared to what I saw in Silent Hill 3 and expected from 2? Yeah, I'd say so.


Keep in mind I've just started Silent Hill 2, so based on what I've seen up through Rosewater Park, I've seen a lot more fog than I expected.
 
Nemesis_

Nemesis_

Member
Been playing for a few hours now.

The graphical problems are not too bad - but really only noticeable when you compare them to the original games (except, of course, the water on the boat). I suppose the sidewalks do look too clean. They've obviously been touched up.

The audio, however, is beyuond fucked up. How the fuck did this happen or get past testing? During some scenes, music will cut out, then start again, but then even a second track gets played ON TOP of that so you've got this unsynced mish-mash of the same track being played at different times. Even the item pick up noise has changed - it's so weird why they would do that (when Downpour had it). All of the enemies seem to be making different noises too =/ It's really odd.

Not sure how I feel about the new voice acting just yet. James sounds too much like Snow from FFXIII (they share a voice actor) and Angela has been cast so that she sounds much younger than she looks which is also a bit shit. I wish McGlynn wasn't Mary or Maria. She suits Claudia more.

It's so bizarre
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
Silent Hill 2 or 3?

I know your comment applies to both games, but I'm just curious. It seems a lot of people are starting with SH2. I personally couldn't wait to replay Silent Hill 3.


It wasn't a great experience. Not because of the game itself, but the fact that I was playing an inferior product.
 
Nemesis_

Nemesis_

Member
RadioHeadAche said:
Silent Hill 2 or 3?

I know your comment applies to both games, but I'm just curious. It seems a lot of people are starting with SH2. I personally couldn't wait to replay Silent Hill 3.


It wasn't a great experience. Not because of the game itself, but the fact that I was playing an inferior product.
Click to expand...

Silent Hill 2. SH3 is my favourite so I want to return to that when I am not so busy. Right now I've got a lot on but I find SH2 more manageable right now.

I seriously think I've only beaten SH3 about twice. =/ I've completed SH2 at least 20 times I reckon.
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
Nemesis556 said:
Silent Hill 2. SH3 is my favourite so I want to return to that when I am not so busy. Right now I've got a lot on but I find SH2 more manageable right now.

I seriously think I've only beaten SH3 about twice. =/ I've completed SH2 at least 20 times I reckon.
Click to expand...


Silent Hill 2 was always my favorite as that's the one I started with, but playing SH2 now is making me remember everything I love about SH3. I still love the second game, though.

Personally, I find Silent Hill 3 easier to get through because it's so linear compared to SH2. I tend to get lost in the apartments and the town itself compared to what you find in SH3. As for number of plays, I have played both games a lot because that's pretty much all I played for almost two months in my freshman year of college. I don't have anywhere near the amount of playthroughs you have, but I think I've completed Silent Hill 3 at least ten times. I unlocked everything (except t-shirts and Extreme levels 2-10) and viewed all endings on both versions. As for Silent Hill 2, I got all the endings available on the black label release, and then replayed it again for the UFO ending in the "Greatest Hits" re-release. I've lost track of my SH2 playthroughs, but it's pretty close to Silent Hill 3.

Chriswok said:
Don't confuse me! :(

Why not?
Click to expand...

Because the HD Collection is a terrible port of both games with botched sound mixing, missing effects and textures, and an overall lack of care when porting these games. If you can't play the PS2, Xbox (Restless Dreams) or PC versions for whatever reason, then go for it. Find it used and cheap if you can.
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
I know there aren't many of you whom have completed Silent Hill 3, but do any of you remember "I Want Love" playing during Heather's conversation with Douglas in the amusement park. I was thinking about the song the other day, but couldn't remember if it was actually in the game or not. I just checked and it's definitely in the original game. Strangely, I can't remember if it's actually in this collection despite having completed it at least four times in a row.


Chriswok said:
That seems a good enough reason as any not to bother. You've saved me money. I shall waste it on a drink in your honour.
Click to expand...

Maybe someday we'll get a patch that will actually make this a respectable collection.


Then "Team Silent" will reunite for Silent Hill 5.
 
M

Mr. Luchador

Member
I hope so, as this is one of those franchises I just never bothered with when I was younger, and feel like I've missed something.

Same with Parasite Eve.
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
Chriswok said:
I hope so, as this is one of those franchises I just never bothered with when I was younger, and feel like I've missed something.

Same with Parasite Eve.
Click to expand...

I didn't start playing Silent Hill until the second game and I was in college at the time(2007). Probably good too because I'm sure these games would have absolutely terrified me when I was younger. My earliest experience with Silent Hill was through a gaming magazine I happened to look through when I was in eighth grade. This was back in 2003 and several months before SH3 was released in the US. Anyway, there was a little review or something about it and it had a screenshot of Heather standing in front of the Robbie on the bench in the amusement park. I just remember looking at that and thinking how scary that game looked. I might have even thought that I would never play such a game.

It's kind of funny when I get nostalgic over that while playing Silent Hill 3.
 
F

fabricated backlash

Member
Revolutionary said:
"No fog at all" is pushing it but so are the claims that "it has plenty of fog". Have the comparison pictures of James meeting with Maria been forgotten already? They've only been posted a hundred times in this thread.
I noticed it myself but in another, earlier scene: the one where you see the shadowy figure in the fog when you first enter the town. In the HD collection, it's pretty damn clear that it's some creepy ass monster that you're about to follow. In the original, the fog obscured it a lot more and it was therefore harder to tell what it was (though the animation was a dead giveaway).
Here, I youtube doubled the scene for both versions:
http://youtubedoubler.com/?video1=h...www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Rch4ZRO6oU&start2=13
Click to expand...

My N64 called and had a hearty laugh. Hell the fog border is just pathethic. Even on the N64 they managed to get a better transition from fog to geometry border. It boggles my mind how they were able to fuck this up so brutally. It's like an amateur youtube recreation of a movie. Sure they got the basic framework the same, but are missing all the little touches of finesse.

It's like one of those horrible Bluray transfers where they clean up the image to an extent where you can see all the props and studio equipment.

It's disheartening to see such misguided attempts at making a game HD and not putting in the extra work to keep the look intact.
 
M

Mr. Luchador

Member
RadioHeadAche said:
I didn't start playing Silent Hill until the second game and I was in college at the time(2007). Probably good too because I'm sure these games would have absolutely terrified me when I was younger. My earliest experience with Silent Hill was through a gaming magazine I happened to look through when I was in eighth grade. This was back in 2003 and several months before SH3 was released in the US. Anyway, there was a little review or something about it and it had a screenshot of Heather standing in front of the Robbie on the bench in the amusement park. I just remember looking at that and thinking how scary that game looked. I might have even thought that I would never play such a game.

It's kind of funny when I get nostalgic over that while playing Silent Hill 3.
Click to expand...

How does the PS1 port on PSN hold up?
 
R

RadioHeadAche

Member
Chriswok said:
How does the PS1 port on PSN hold up?
Click to expand...

There's a weird and pretty nasty sound glitch if you play it on PS3. For me, whenever I shot the rifle it would distort the sound and the proper sound wouldn't return until the credits started rolling. It's been a while since I've played SH1 on my PS3, but I remember having that happen just before the final boss. It should be fine on PSP, though.


It's possible that it's been fixed, or could be fixed by changing the audio settings. It also may only affect certain PS3 models. I'm not sure. It's not game-breaking, just annoying. Like I said, it happened to me pretty late in the game so it wasn't too bad.

It's only $6 or so which definitely is worth it regardless. Plus, you'll be ready for Silent Hill 3 whenever you get a chance to play that.
 
I

impact

Banned
I guess with how quiet Tommy has been there's no chance for an actual PS3 patch? Konami just straight stole $40 from a bunch of people =/
 
L

Lime

Member
Para bailar La Bomba said:
Which is the case with most games on PCSX2.

Surely the PC version is the preferable way to go, no?
Click to expand...

I'd say the PC version, but only due to widescreen, anti-aliasing, AF, and lack of bugs.

Para bailar La Bomba said:
So how do you play it on PC? Keyboard only?
Click to expand...

Controller.

faceless007 said:
Pretty sure. I downloaded the sh2pc.exe from your post, ran the Respatcher in the same directory as it (not the game dir), it said Res set to 1920x1200 and created a backup sh2pc.bak, then I copied the new sh2pc.exe to the game dir and ran it. Still 1600x1200.

Maybe the Settings are supposed to be set a certain way for it to work?

BTW, I appreciate your post, but I think step 1 might be unnecessary; sh2patch.exe replaces sh2pc.exe with a new official one (dated 10/23/2002), which is then replaced with the fixed one in step 2. As far as I can tell, the Konami patch doesn't change any other files.

Edit: After some googling I found the problem. For some reason the in-game setting has to be set to 640x480 for the Respatcher to work. After that it ran at 1920x1200 fine. However, I couldn't get AA and AF to work following your directions. I alt-tabbed out and forced them in Nvidia Control Panel, but it still seemed to have lots of jaggies.
Click to expand...

Nvidia has some issues with overriding AA on the fly. I'm on an AMD card, btw.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Para bailar La Bomba said:
So how do you play it on PC? Keyboard only?
Click to expand...

Controller. And if you don't have a controller, it's keyboard only, which sucks massive amounts of horsedick.

Edit: How would I go about to use a DS3 to play SH3 on PC? It doesn't support the 360 controller out of the box I assume, so I can't use MotionInJoy to emulate the 360 controller, right? I guess Xpadder might be the best option..

Edit 2: As for SH1 on PSN, I can't remember having any trouble playing it on PS3, but it's a massive pain in the arse on PSP since shooting gets mapped to the analogue nub + square or something like that due to the lack of L2/R2 buttons. Fighting the first boss in SH1 on PSP was nothing but misery.
 
D

Dascu

Member
Combichristoffersen said:
Controller. And if you don't have a controller, it's keyboard only, which sucks massive amounts of horsedick.

Edit: How would I go about to use a DS3 to play SH3 on PC? It doesn't support the 360 controller out of the box I assume, so I can't use MotionInJoy to emulate the 360 controller, right? I guess Xpadder might be the best option..

Edit 2: As for SH1 on PSN, I can't remember having any trouble playing it on PS3, but it's a massive pain in the arse on PSP since shooting gets mapped to the analogue nub + square or something like that due to the lack of L2/R2 buttons. Fighting the first boss in SH1 on PSP was nothing but misery.
Click to expand...
SH3 PC recognized my 360 controller, actually. Though the button layout was kind of wacky.
 
S

Snaku

Banned
impact said:
I guess with how quiet Tommy has been there's no chance for an actual PS3 patch? Konami just straight stole $40 from a bunch of people =/
Click to expand...

Honestly, I don't think Konami was truly aware of how bad a job Hijinx Studios did. It's quite obvious they really don't give a shit about the series anymore, and I'm sure their only real demand of Hijinx was to have it out in time for Downpour. I wonder if the backlash will be extreme enough for them to take notice and actually try and fix the games.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Para bailar La Bomba said:
Oh, boy. Looks like I'm gonna have to track down PS2 copies of 2 & 4. And "1" and "3" on PC.

Thanks, dude.
Click to expand...
There's no official version of 1 for PC, but there's an ISO floating around the web that lets you install a pre-configured PS1 emulator + a SH1 disc image, so that you can run SH1 like any other PC game. It's obviously against the rules to give out links to that on GAF, but you should be able to find it via google.
 
L

Lime

Member
Para bailar La Bomba said:
Oh, boy. Looks like I'm gonna have to track down PS2 copies of 2 & 4. And "1" and "3" on PC.

Thanks, dude.
Click to expand...

I would probably argue that the differences between the PS2 version and the PC version of SH2 aren't as important as playing a PS2 version at 480p without AA/AF compared to 16:9, 1080p and with 8xSSA and 16xAF. But that's just my opinion.
 
D

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Combichristoffersen said:
Not that I know of.

As for those cut scenes, they did the same thing in SH4 PC where the cut scenes were locked at 20 or 30 fps, while they ran at 60 fps in the PS2 version IIRC.
Click to expand...
The cutscenes weren't locked at a lower framerate, they were simply poorly encoded. The scenes that ran at 60 on PS2 were all FMV. When they ported the game to XBOX and PC they used much lower quality videos which ran at a lower framerate.

I would probably argue that the differences between the PS2 version and the PC version of SH2 aren't as important as playing a PS2 version at 480p without AA/AF compared to 16:9, 1080p and with 8xSSA and 16xAF. But that's just my opinion.
Click to expand...
How exactly did you achieve 8xSSAA with SH2? I've never managed to make it work (or any AA, for that matter). Heck, the PC version of SH2 seems to be locked at 30 fps even. It really looks like shit (unlike SH3, which has a great port).

Furthermore, viewing the game at 1080p on an LCD is a much worse experience than playing the PS2 version on a proper CRT. The horror factor is definitely sacrificed when you bump up resolution and use an LCD.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
dark10x said:
The cutscenes weren't locked at a lower framerate, they were simply poorly encoded. The scenes that ran at 60 on PS2 were all FMV. When they ported the game to XBOX and PC they used much lower quality videos which ran at a lower framerate.
Click to expand...

Ah, right. Explains why the videos in SH4 PC looked like blurry shit.

Edit: Combat in SH4 is also nothing but a pain in the ass with m+kb.

Edit 2: I think SH3 PC might actually be one of the best console to PC ports I've ever seen.
 
L

Lime

Member
dark10x said:
How exactly did you achieve 8xSSAA with SH2? I've never managed to make it work (or any AA, for that matter). Heck, the PC version of SH2 seems to be locked at 30 fps even. It really looks like shit (unlike SH3, which has a great port).

Furthermore, viewing the game at 1080p on an LCD is a much worse experience than playing the PS2 version on a proper CRT. The horror factor is definitely sacrificed when you bump up resolution and use an LCD.
Click to expand...

AMD's SSAA solution overrides the game through CCC. Nvidia users seemingly have more troubles applying AA to the game, but there were some solutions as far as I can recall.

If you want to take a look at how my playthrough last year went on 1920x1080, 8xSSAA, 16xAF, all settings on, here's my .bmp album. I played without noise filter, so the graphical details are more noticeable.
 
M

Mr. Luchador

Member
RadioHeadAche said:
There's a weird and pretty nasty sound glitch if you play it on PS3. For me, whenever I shot the rifle it would distort the sound and the proper sound wouldn't return until the credits started rolling. It's been a while since I've played SH1 on my PS3, but I remember having that happen just before the final boss. It should be fine on PSP, though.


It's possible that it's been fixed, or could be fixed by changing the audio settings. It also may only affect certain PS3 models. I'm not sure. It's not game-breaking, just annoying. Like I said, it happened to me pretty late in the game so it wasn't too bad.

It's only $6 or so which definitely is worth it regardless. Plus, you'll be ready for Silent Hill 3 whenever you get a chance to play that.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the comments, RHA. Think I'll give it ago.
 
D

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Lime said:
AMD's SSAA solution overrides the game through CCC. Nvidia users seemingly have more troubles applying AA to the game, but there were some solutions as far as I can recall.

If you want to take a look at how my playthrough last year went on 1920x1080, 8xSSAA, 16xAF, all settings on, here's my .bmp album. I played without noise filter, so the graphical details are more noticeable.
Click to expand...
I'm using a GTX580 and attempted the various workarounds without any luck.

The game doesn't look bad on the PC, I suppose, but the clean visuals with missing visual effects actually DO work against the game. It really is best played on a proper SD CRT on PS2 if you're looking for the best horror experience. I just played some of the game on a CRT and my PC just the other day and the contrast was more extreme than I had anticipated. The game was a whole lot more intense when played on a good SD CRT on PS2 in a dark room. The atmosphere simply shines in a way that is difficult to experience with modern displays. I then played some of the PC version on a 27" LCD at 1080p and, man, it just isn't the same.

Not only do the LCD and cleaner visuals spoil the atmosphere but the high resolution actually reveals the various tricks and flaws in the visuals for what they are. For most games, this isn't an issue, but for Silent Hill it really does have an impact on the experience.
 
P

plagiarize

Banned
dark10x said:
I'm using a GTX580 and attempted the various workarounds without any luck.

The game doesn't look bad on the PC, I suppose, but the clean visuals with missing visual effects actually DO work against the game. It really is best played on a proper SD CRT on PS2 if you're looking for the best horror experience. I just played some of the game on a CRT and my PC just the other day and the contrast was more extreme than I had anticipated. The game was a whole lot more intense when played on a good SD CRT on PS2 in a dark room. The atmosphere simply shines in a way that is difficult to experience with modern displays. I then played some of the PC version on a 27" LCD at 1080p and, man, it just isn't the same.

Not only do the LCD and cleaner visuals spoil the atmosphere but the high resolution actually reveals the various tricks and flaws in the visuals for what they are. For most games, this isn't an issue, but for Silent Hill it really does have an impact on the experience.
Click to expand...

3 looks damn good on PC at 720p on the HMZs. can't force it into 3D though.
 
C

Commanche Raisin Toast

Member
do either of the pc versions support rumble on gamepads? i have been meaning to pick up a logitech f510 for an emulator for a while now and just remembered that i have both of these on pc somewhere.
 
A

Arkham Inmate

Neo Member
Does anyone know whether any improvements have been made to the European release? Based on the views here, I'm planning to go for the X360 version.
 
A

afternoon delight

Member
Would you all recommend Xpadder for using a 360 controller for SH2 and SH3? Going to be doing a run through of both and I'd love to ditch the keyboard, though it's not essential.
 
R

Ridley327

Member
afternoon delight said:
Would you all recommend Xpadder for using a 360 controller for SH2 and SH3? Going to be doing a run through of both and I'd love to ditch the keyboard, though it's not essential.
Click to expand...

IIRC, SH3 recognizes the 360 controller straight away, but you'll have to configure button settings as the default layout is a bit nonsensical.
 
kunonabi

kunonabi

Member
Mr_Zombie said:
Thanks. It seems there are more minor (useless) changes in dialouges.
I laughed at the "Shut your mouth, you stinking bitch!" instead of "Shut your stinking mouth, bitch!".

And I agree, Vincent's voice is alright. But I still prefer the original one ;).
Click to expand...

I still can't believe they rearranged entire music tracks like this. Serious amateur hour shit.
 
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