A survival horror game series created by TeamSilent under Konami, famed for its unrivalled character development, detailed environments and its creepy atmosphere among other things.
There are currently 5 Silent Hill games (
Play Novel; a handheld version of the original game that is only available in Japan).
Silent Hill 1 was first released in 1999 on the Sony Playstation and was an instant success; being not only one of the scariest games of its
time, but of all
time.
Shortly after, Silent Hill 2 was put in to development, and was finally released in 2001. This game was also a huge
hit; with the full support of fans of the original game (however the story is completely
unrelated to the original) and an entire new generation of gamers backing it. This item of the series is famed particularly for the extremely indepth character development that has elements tied in to almost every aspect of
the game.
In 2003 Silent Hill 3 was released; this game is a direct sequel to the original however it takes place several years
later. It neatly
ties up many of the plotholes
left by the original, and is famed for its particularly gruesome monsters.
Silent Hill
4 was released in
2004 however it was originally developed for an independant game series, due to the extremely
low predicted sales rate, it was quickly tied up as a Silent Hill game in an attempt to boost its popularity. Despite this,
the game had a record
low amount of sales compared to all of the previous Silent Hill games.
The Silent Hill franchise has since expanded, and a movie (strongly influenced by the original game) directed by Christopher Gans is due for a worldwide release on April 21st 2006. Several comics are also available, although they are all produced independantly, one comic that does have the backing of Konami has been made and is awaiting release.