When you're talking about Psychological Horror in video games,
you pretty much won't get around mentioning Silent Hill.
And in the same way, when it's about movies and literature,
Stephen King's name will come up eventually.
His writing has spawned so many horror cult classics
that his name is inseparably intertwined with this genre.
So it's actually not that big of a surprise
that Silent Hill, too, drew a lot of inspiration
from King's works and themes.
There are, for instance, some quite obvious
nods and references scattered over the games.
The "Bachman Road" in Old Silent Hill for example,
hints at Richard Bachman, King's pseudonym he used
between 1977 and 1982 for novels such as
"Roadwork" and "The Running Man",
to see if his works would be successful
even without his established name attached to it.
Also, In Silent Hill's Café 5to2, we can find a poster of
Stephen Kings "Study, Dammit!",
while the pinball machine in the Café
is a reference to "Children of the Corn".
There's also movie posters for Carrie and Pet Sematary
hanging on a wall across Green Lion Antiques.
And in one of the back alleys in Bloch Street,
we find the word "Redrum" smeared in blood on a garage.
But it gets more interesting when we take a look at
some of Silent Hill's themes and plot outlines that were,
either openly or at least very obviously,
influenced by King's stories.
Starting with the fact that the town of Silent Hill itself
is most likely located in Maine,
which builds the setting for a large part
of Stephen King's books.
A lot of evidence in the game hints at that,
for example The Book of Lost Memories,
which states that the town is located in New England.
Or the Gillespie House, where Alessa grew up
was based on the actual Olson House from
Andrew Wyeth's 1948 painting Christina's World -
which is located in Maine.
Also, after Harry Mason leaves the town
at the end of the first game,
he moves with Heather to Portland.
The city of Portland, Maine just so happens
to be Stephen King's hometown.
But back to that Redrum bloodsmear.
You know what story that's from, right?
Right. The Shining.
The story of a writer that goes mad
during a winter he spends in an
abandoned hotel with his family.
But not only the iconic anagram on the door
and a lot of the eerie, looming and sterile atmosphere
were direct influences for Silent Hill.
In the movie by Stanley Kubrick,
the Hotel is built upon ancient Native American burial ground.
The tribe that inhabited the land was
fought off by settlers and up to this day
the wrath of their spirits haunts the place
and causes people to go mad and
get plagued by demons and hallucinations.
And according to Silent Hill's Timeline
mentioned in "The Book of Lost Memories",
before settlers came from Europe,
the area was a holy place for Native Americans
who conducted "mysterious rituals" on this sacred ground
because the land seemed to passess a mysterious power.
But they were also fought off by settlers.
And like in "The Shining", the place's ancient powers
have caused mysterious incidents over the centuries
and it served as a spiritual estuary between
the real world and the spirit world.
Centuries later, the nihilistic cult called "The Order"
employed Alessa Gillespie as a catalyst to
gain control over the town's ancient powers.
And her story happens to share a lot of
similarities with Stephen King's "Carrie".
Both girls were raised by an abusive, overly pious cultist mother,
both grew up as an outcast for being different in school
and both developed poltergeist abilities,
such as telekinesis, telepathy and projected hallucinations,
during their teen years.
But they don't only share mental powers
that manifested through a childhood of intense mental abuse.
It's also noteworthy that both girls projected their soul
to inhabit a newborn child at the end of the Story.
Carrie occupies the unborn fetus of Sue
right before she dies, because she finds out
- via telepathy -
that Sue has been the only person that
never meant her any harm.
Sue's child is later shown to develop the same kind of powers;
only now growing up in a happy and joyful environment.
With Alessa... Well, let me explain.
Alessa's soul is actually split in half;
the other half living inside of Cheryl,
the protagonist's adoptive daughter.
At the end of Silent Hill 1's canonical ending,
Alessa realizes, also telepathically,
that Harry was good to her -
or rather to her soul's other half in the form of Cheryl
and transcends their reunited soul into an infant.
This baby grows up to become Heather,
the protagonist of Silent Hill 3.
And like Carrie, in this incarnation,
Alessa's soul lives on to grow up in the
happy and joyful home she never had in her former life.
Now, when most people think about Silent Hill,
they think about Fog... or Mist...
and yes, "The Mist" by Stephen King happens to be
another major influence for the setting of the game.
Because as we all know, Silent Hill, or at least
the fog world, is covered in a thick layer of mist
with lurking monsters and evil creatures.
Well, in "The Mist", a peaceful coastal town in
- surprise - Maine,
gets suddenly overtaken by an unnaturally thick mist
filled with malicious creatures that attack
and kill the town's inhabitants.
And the fog gets even announced by a loud fire siren
alarming the population
- just like in Silent Hill.
And I'll be damned, but the very first encounter in the book
is a Pterodactyl creature that breaks into the supermarket
and attacks the people hiding in there.
Sounds familiar?
Yes, the first monster in Silent Hill is actually a
Pterodactyl-ish creature that breaks through
the café's window and attacks Harry.
Silent Hill shows that it's like in movies:
Stephen King as an influence can make for some
outstanding video games;
as long as he's not directly involved in the production. *cough*
Seriously, try out F13, the game by Stephen King
that came out at about the same time as Silent Hill.
It's... an interesting play to say the least.
Thanks for watching Monsters of the Week.
Now it's your turn to choose where the path leads.
Until then.
Remember.
The Truth Is Out There.