On the surface, the latest entry of the psychological horror franchise teaches about securing the right to choose when to marry, but the real lesson is rooted in cognitive bias and acknowledging moral complexity.
Premise
Silent Hill f is a spin-off (only because Konami themselves can't decide if it's mainline or not, and fans can't decide if it's a retool or a prequel) entry of the Silent Hill series, developed by NeoBards Entertainment and released on September 25th, 2025.
It blends Psychological Horror and Action Horror. Hinako has to go from point A to point B while allegorical enemies are placed throughout the way, which she can try to avoid or destroy. Each significant area has at least one puzzle that blocks progress, and cutscenes that provide exposition.
The game has five endings. The first one you get no matter what, after which it becomes apparent that it's not the true story and consequent playthroughs provide shortcuts, extra collectible notes, and altered dialogue with additional context. Two of the endings depend on certain conditions. The true ending requires seeing at least either of the earlier two. And there is a joke ending for fulfilling a certain achievement.
Story
The following contains spoilers.
The game can be inferred to be taking place in 60's Japan, in a secluded rural town of Ebisugaoka. Hinako Shimizu is berated by her drunk father and cowardly mother for being disrespectful and she goes to catch some air, but oddly there's almost nobody in the town. She meets Shu Iwai (a heir to the village clinic), Sakuko Igarashi (daughter of a shrine priest), and Rinko Nishida (class president), who she's supposedly friends with, but their interaction is very awkward. Hinako is a tomboy, which makes her very unpopular with everyone due to traditional gender norms, and Shu is the only one who respects her. She's also upset that her sister Junko left to marry. Very abruptly, the town gets covered in fog, Sakuko literally dies to trypophobia, and a shadowy monster chases the others.
Going East
Making her way through the doll enemies, Hinako returns to give Sakuko some semblence of a burial. Then passes out and wakes up in an otherworldly Shinto shrine, where a man in a fox mask guides her through. By guiding meaning just leaving, then appearing to praise her after she solves the puzzles while avoiding monsters, something she strangely doesn't find suspicious. Then she passes out again and returns to where she was. From there on, a doll from her childhood also keeps reappearing to provide some warnings.
Hinako finds Shu and the two figure that Rinko must be hiding at her own house. Hinako has to solve the puzzle at the field filled with living scarecrows, and the description is phrased quite tellingly like Rinko hating Hinako with burning passion. They find Rinko, who clings to Shu, and later appears to push Hinako down the stairs when they are alone.
Hinako has to navigate the Dark Shrine again, after which a monsterized ghost of Sakuko appears as the first boss, and the Fox Mask exorcises her only after Hinako has already dealt with it. And then he makes her drink spring water, which to her appears and feels like molten metal.
Going West
Back in the real world, the bridge is gone, so Shu suggests taking the highway that is past his house. Rinko refuses to be separated from him even for a second, and Hinako doesn't want to comment on it. Due to monsters, they detour to their middle school, and Rinko cryptically tells Shu that Hinako is dead and that he should forget about her. Along school memories, one stands out where Hinako helps some boy who got bit by a fox. After finding the key to the backyard, Hinako is allowed to take a nap.
There is something wrong with the dream Hinako, as she keeps forgetting her own name and now complies with what the Fox Mask tells her. Specifically, by going over manifested memories of her friends, Sakuko's loneliness, Rinko's jealousy, and Shu's loyalty, and brutally disposing of them.
Back in the real world, the squad leaves the school, but the fog monster makes them split up again. Among the notes, we learn that the nearby Divine Tree was struck by lightning, causing people to abandon it and go to the Fox Shrine instead since it was closer, which is in no way a foreshadowing. Making a detour, Hinako discovers a shed where white flowers, which are explicitly described to have hallucinogenic properties in one of the notes, were ground by Shu into pills that Hinako has been taking the entire time, which is definitely not a hint about anything. Reaching Shu's house, the fog monster with now visible fox arm throws Hinako to the ground.
Dream Hinako obediently participates in a wedding ceremony where she graphically saws her own arm off and this masked ikemen grants her a furry fox arm, which replaces her weapons. And also her face is literally peeled off and is replaced with a fox mask. Rinko's burning ghost shows up as the second boss and is promptly extinguished.
Going North
Completely losing the objective, the real Hinako decides to visit own home while at it, which has the Dark Shrine bleed into the reality(?), and making it quite apparent that the battle of two religions has left quite a mess. Hinako meets her other self, who spells out that indecisiveness of accepting her marriage has shattered her mind into two. Junko also shows up and bluntly asks "that side" to die for being afraid of the marriage. After the fight with the visions of her abusive parents, they get disposed of by the other Hinako who starts to mutate, which turns out to be the true identity of the fog monster.
Hinako respond to the death of her parents by berserking and going though the horde of enemies. Then sike, we see the dream Hinako a bit earlier in time also going though a redundant gauntlet and fully embracing her giant monster form in the Shiromuku dress. The two meet at the town center and duke it out in the depths of the Dark Shrine. The real Hinako wins. But then we hear a police report that a bride in her 20's overdosed on drugs, suddenly killed three people at the wedding party, and is arrested.
Looking for the truth
After that, the game unlocks NG+ and asks to go through everything again, but now with extra dialogues that make it clear that the entire thing is a long nightmare. There are also new notes as well, such as her parents being in debt, Sakuko being unable to distinguish Hinako being bought by the Tsuneki family from her abandoning her, Rinko lashing out on Hinako for leaving Shu in a pitiful state, and Shu being aware that the pills he's made are poisonous. We also learn that the fox man is Kotoyuki Tsuneki, their classmate who wants to take Hinako to his rich family.
You'll have to pick between either route while avoiding Red Capsules, and I recommend doing both even if it means going through the game one more time. If you don't pick the Sacred Sword from the Divine Tree, white Hinako wins the final confrontation, embraces being Kotoyuki's wife, and destroys the Doll that has been manipulating you and Shu to undermine the fox faith. At the ending, Shu and Kotoyuki make up and agree to "share" Hinako, which no matter what anyone says is messed up. If you have the Sacred Sword, which is clearly evil from how Hinako moves with it, then the black Hinako wins and defeats enraged Kotoyuki. She then runs away with Shu before the town is drowned in poisonous sulfide gas, which you've kept reading about. Or if you want to stay metaphorical, the town gets killed by the Divine Tree unsealing the Water Dragon in revenge.
For the final ending, Hinako rejects the support from both deities, and two Hinakos agree she is simply not ready for marriage. This pisses off both the Divine Tree and the Nine-Tailed Fox (implied to be Kotoyuki's grandfather who paid Hinako's parents), so both Hinakos beat them up respectively. Even Kotoyuki admits that he's been rushing things. At the end, everyone just goes separate ways to take more time to think about the situation, leaving the problem on an unresolved note.
Gameplay
As a game, it's a fairly standard over-the-shoulder adventure. Hinako roams around and either picks up items or bashes enemies. Unlike the other entries, there are no guns, not even any ranged weapons, so all encounters have to be solved in melee. Let's get the joke out of the way, this is basically Dark Souls. An enemy will hop around Hinako, before suddenly launching at her, you have to dodge, and either counter or spam the attack button. Boss enemies have ranged attacks and like to spin, so reaction time and memorizing when the window of opportunity opens is crucial. Though it's not that difficult and you will likely beat the game with no deaths even on a higher difficulty.
Attacks costs stamina. Dodging costs stamina, except if timed correctly. So you're encouraged to get close to enemies, who like to alter when they charge, and you get punished for having poor timing. You can also focus to slow time a bit and do heavier attacks, but it depletes the sanity bar as well. Both are restored at checkpoints and with certain items.
You start with 8 inventory slots, and can get upgrades for more later. The inventory includes the hands, so what to keep with you is a matter of priorities. Items like the healing Red Capsules can be assigned to hot keys.
All weapons (except key ones) have durability. This means that the more you fight, the more risk you take. There are plenty of weapons lying around, so it's your choice between stacking up repair kits or hoping to find a replacement.
Special items can be sold at save points for Faith, which is used to buy upgrades. Again, you'll have to make decisions if you want to occupy pocket space with valuables, and if you want to sell some healing items as well.
You also have a menu for Omamori charms, which act like perks, and you start with one slot. They have very varying bonuses, so you should experiment with loadouts.
All puzzles follow a pattern of giving you a very vague poem, and you have to take or place items in the correct slots.
Presentation
The developers are pitching the game as being about "beauty hidden in terror" and vice versa. I can say that an attempt was made. Ebisugaoka is quite a labyrinth of a town, with every house being filled with hyperrealistic detail. You can really get the sense of it being lived in with all the props scattered in yards and interior. The forest areas are similarly detailed and would be nice places to take a walk at... after you get rid of all those monsters. Over time the town progressively gets covered in this grotesque red moss, which isn't very varied, so you'll get tired of it in the first 15 minutes of the game. I'm not sure if it's because the game is made in Unreal Engine 5, but the best visual part of it is the trailers and the journal sketches.
The soundtrack provides fitting ambiance for a horror game, but aside of the opening theme I can't really say anything stood out. Aside of the sections where Hinako loses sanity to the mist, that thing is loud.
The best part is certainly the narrative, Ryukishi07 definitely shows his expertise in puzzle plots. The main question is what is even going on, and every picked up note provides some background on the town or the characters. The game doesn't loredump you with answers, so even after getting to the endings, you have to work out how everything fits together on your own. As you pile up clues, it becomes apparent that even simple conflicts may have a roller-coaster of motives in the background and be not what they seem.
Themes
Monsters and puzzles
Following the traditions of Silent Hill, all enemies represent something. Dolls are manifestation of Hinako viewing herself as a decorative puppet. The mother of a thousand young monster is what Hinako thinks pregnancy feels like. An ugly ape is what Hinako sees in men. A mini-boss with a giant sword reflect Hinako's trauma of her dad playing with a knife.
The bosses especially are all about the metaphors. For example, "burning jealousy" is integrated everywhere in the Dark Shrine Priest's design. The two final bosses are amalgams of various traditions that were practiced in the town over the centuries, and you can tell which each refers to if you were paying attention.
The puzzles deserve a special mentions, because the poems are highly contextualized and differ between playthroughs. The scarecrow puzzle isn't being subtle that Rinko always had a thing of Shu and plans to dump Hinako into a riverbank. On NG+ the puzzle changes to Rinko warning Hinako about her intrusive thoughts. nEar the end of the game there is a series of three puzzles, the scales, arranging the medals, and the panting. In the first route, both black and white figures are placed in negative spots. In the fox route the figures of friends are removed, the white medal is presented as triumphant and is placed in a cage. In the sword route the figures of the family need to be removed, the black medal is victorious and is placed away. In the true ending, all sides are balanced. Because of the changed wording of the poems, you have to do 4 versions of the same three puzzles that reflect Hinako's current state of heart and hint at which god is involved.
On traditional gender roles
The game doesn't sugarcoat that being a woman in Showa Japan kind of sucked, and even provides a disclaimer about it at the start. This is the time period where being a housewife and having lots of kids is seen as a happy ideal. By everyone who isn't Hinako or Shu. The notes tell how Hinako was completely alone because she didn't like "girly" things, so both boys and girls were avoiding or ridiculing her. Rinko is completely drowning in this behavior even if it doesn't look this way on the surface. She tries to appear as presentable and sees Hinako as a competition no matter how bluntly Shu tells that he's not into romance, this gets kind of pitiful after a while. Hinako's parents also have a master-slave relationship that gets creepier every time they talk.
But, and that's something that most players ignore, all of that is from Hinako's point of view. Once you get to NG+, it quickly starts to get deconstructed. Yes, marriage is scary, but it's not a complete loss of freedom. Wives can and should be demanding sometimes, and the household is kept by both adults equally. Everyone has great expectations from Hinako, but that's just how they know a secure life is, with the topic of poverty increasingly often being brought up. While Hinako appears respectable on the first playthrough, one the second she comes off as a contrarian when others start explaining their points, and in the final ending she admits that marriage is about taking risks of who are you going to share your life with.
On delusions and perception
The game does a very clever trick by presenting you with details on the situation and some moral dilemmas, which appear to be fairly black and white. But the first ending then suddenly reveals that how the problem is presented is heavily influenced by Hinako's biases and her account of the people ends up completely unreliable.
The town is now what it appears to be
How it's presented: Ebisugaoka is an old mining town that has accumulated generations of various traditions. It's not very busy because it's not a city and the coal mine operations have closed down. It's relaxing with not much to do, but the townsfolk can be unpleasant when it comes to stereotypes. Suddenly, everyone has vanished and the monsters invade the town.
How it ends up being: The town is constructed from Hinako's memories and the monsters are all in Hinako's head. Aside of the important people in Hinako's life, there's no reason for anyone to show up because they haven't left an impression due to Hinako's isolation. While the villagers don't sacrifice maidens to a god, something of that effect is used by the public narrative to keep everyone united. The Tsuneki family effectively have it under control and may just be yakuza, since everyone who questions their authority is found dead in gruesome ways and the police don't open investigations.
Hinako Shimizu is not who she appears to be
How it's presented: Hinako is a schoolgirl about 15-17 of age, who dislikes dolls and dresses. Because of this, she got bullied by her peers and parents, which causes her to double down due to finding their gender expectations unexplainable. She has a strong independence-based morality, but is noted to be afraid of speaking up her mind. She has a sour opinion of her sister Junko due to her leaving to marry instead of protecting her. She imagines that being a wife means blind obedience, because she only has her mom as reference. Hinako liked to roleplay with Shu as space cadets when they were younger.
How it ends up being: Hinako is already in her 20's and imagines herself as a tragic heroine. Because she's paranoid that Kotoyuki will make her subservient and that pregnancy will make her ugly, she equated marriage with death and was unsure what to do, though her fears were not really rational. Her parents have apologized for their wrongdoings, but she found their abuse so inexcusable that he forgot that detail. When Kotoyuki asked her parents for her, she assumed that's just how things are and gave up, accepting the marriage without consulting with everyone. Then lashed out when her friends complained that she's planning to leave without talking to them. Due to stress, she's been regularly getting headaches, and started to address them with Shu's home-made medicine in progressively increasing amounts, which turned out to laced with mindbreaking toxin. She also has a rare blood type, which the Tsuneki family sees as valuable. In the ending she apologizes for not being open-minded and asks to give her more time.
Sakuko Igarashi is not who she appears to be
How it's presented: Sakuko is an airhead with a habit of not explaining what she is talking about. She calls Hinako a traitor for some unclear reason. Sakuko's family operates a Divine Tree-aligned Sennensugi shrine and she likes to help as a miko priestess, but is also interested in trying other activities. She has mentioned that she hears whispers of an old god being furious that the Inari faith is stealing his followers, but nobody, including Hinako, took her seriously. She also has a fear of the dark, which is considered childish by many. At the beginning of the story she is unceremoniously killed off.
How it ends up being: Sakuko has a clinical record of "shows characteristics of mild autism", which the doctor describes as not worthy of attention, but explains why she has trouble thinking ahead. She tends to seek attention by being passive-aggressive, and gets confused why people don't understand her, to the point of her feeling there's no point in explaining herself. As a kid, she got locked up in the school's pet den, causing her extreme PTSD when she's in dark closed places, something her mother never figured out. Sakuko also started to hear the voice of Inari, causing her extreme stress due to two gods asking her to pick a side. She was a bit physically weak and wasn't assertive, which manifests in her being killed off because Hinako views her as slow and unimpressive. She and Hinako once made a promise that they will find their husbands together, resulting in her becoming petty to Hinako leaving with Kotoyuki despite Hinako explaining that she didn't have much choice in the matter. In one of the diaries she admits that the promise was silly in the first place and she should have spoken up earlier. Her fate is unknown, but a school riddle placing a heart attack next to her makes me worried.
Rinko Nishida is not who she appears to be
How it's presented: Rinko has a tendency to hyperfixate on some interest until she gets tired of it. Hinako notes that she admires Rinko being hard-working, though is annoyed when she doesn't listen to her. Like many girls in the town, she subscribes to the traditional gender values and wants to present herself as attractive and thoughtful. She was the class president during the time at Ebisugaoka Middle School and used to spread gossip to secure her position. She has an extreme crush on Shu, to the point of trying to leave Hinako for the monsters despite herself being completely useless as an escort.
How it ends up being: Rinko shows characteristics of being bipolar with some degree of psychopathy. Her journal contains messages of her delusions about Shu, followed by apologies to Hinako for being a bad friend, followed by passionate death threats to her, sometimes in the same entry and very erratic handwriting. The school records show that she likes using condescending compassion and helping others so they would treat her as superior. Still, as it turns out Rinko did not push Hinako down the stairs despite having such thought, Hinako genially tripped. Rinko is self-aware that she's difficult to deal with and made up with Hinako several times in the past, and tried to comfort heart-broken Shu regarding Hinako leaving, thinking Hinako would be better marrying Shu instead of her. Considering the phrasing in Rinko's diary, she appears to be an adult now, full of regrets.
Shu Iwai is not who he appears to be
How it's presented: Shu is Hinako's friend who doesn't care that she's a girl and calls her "partner" out of respect for her wishes. Shu comes from an old lineage of village physicians and has some interest in herbology and gardening, with his grandmother being the current head of the clinic. As kids, he and Hinako used to play as an army who would defend the town from made-up aliens. Shu is very popular with the girls due to his secure future and his skills in prescribing painkillers. As Hinako's grew older, she became aware that her hormones are acting up and got afraid she wouldn't view him platonically.
How it ends up being: Rinko notes that after Hinako has left, Shu started to play Space Wars again, alone, showing that he's unable to cope with reality. Due to Hinako's regular headaches, Shu has prescribed her Kakura-makakura pills made from Hakkokusou flower. This flower has records of being used as hallucinogenic agent for occult practices, but one may think Shu has overestimated the effects due to lacking in medical experience. However, he confesses that he indeed was suppressing his sexual feelings due to not wanting to ruin the bond he has with Hinako, and instead he grew so jealous of Kotoyuki. It's unclear if Shu knows that the clinic has some criminal ties, but it's very likely. He gave Hinako an increased dosage with the expectation that she'll ruin the wedding somehow, but didn't expect her to gulp several of them at once. In the fox ending he strikes a deal with Kotoyuki that he can visit so they can treat Hinako together, which is presented as two men taking turns with their toy. Shu is curiously absent from the true ending, and him being hanged in the Dark Shrine and apologizing for not trusting his partner makes me concerned.
Junko Kinuta is not who she appears to be
How it's presented: Junko is Hinako's elder sister, who got married some time ago. Junko always shielded Hinako from parental abuse, so she kind of feels betrayed by her leaving. In the Dark Shrine, a version of her with an owl mask (possibly representing the Kinuta family) appears to criticize Hinako for being idealistic, up to aligning herself with the Fox Mask and Shiromuku to get her killed for not respecting her social role. Junko appears to be happy with her marriage for all it's worth, but when Hinako met her in the hospital during her pregnancy, she got a traumatizing impression.
How it ends up being: Similar to Hinako, Junko's marriage was arranged to cover the family debt. Her father got approached by a matchmaker, and Junko agreed to a marriage with a man she can trust the most even if she doesn't know him, and it appears her judgment was correct. Junko shows a surprising amount of distaste for general roles and tells Hinako that she was born a couple of decades too early, and the reason she's compliant because not marrying in their situation would result in her living alone in poverty.
Kimie Shimizu is not who she appears to be
How it's presented: Hinako views her mother as pathetic and pitiful. Kimie used to defend Hinako when she was young, but not so much anymore. She keeps cheerfully telling her daughter that her father is just slightly drunk and that Hinako should be less stubborn, which is extremely ignorant and condescending. In the Dark Shrine she and her husband appear as a boss, but Kimie's health isn't much larger than regular enemies. She also tells that she only helped Hinako to keep her value as a bride.
How it ends up being: Kimie confesses that marriage isn't a one-sided relationship and she shows backbone to her husband when needed, just not when Hinako could see it. She tells that her own mother similarly was married against her will, but over time could resolve the differences with her husband. When Kotoyuki approached them, she thought that the marriage would be for the best for Hinako since they already knew each other.
Kanta Shimizu is not who he appears to be
How it's presented: Hinako's father is a drunkard who acts nice in pubic, but controls his family with an iron fist. Instead of admitting to making poor decisions, he thinks that Hinako's disrespect is her growing up wrong. At one point during a party he threw a knife in front of Hinako, which was so traumatizing it keeps showing up in various ways. He has a dream of opening a fish restaurant, but is nowhere close to it. When the Tsuneki family has approached them with a large sum of money in exchange for Hinako, he quickly agreed, making Hinako feel she's a commodity.
How it ends up being: Kanta acts this way, both in public and in private, because that's what he thinks the society expects of him. But he's quite a coward and he easily folds when his wife stats pressing on him. Some time ago, he had a friend that he viewed as a brother, who has run away after stealing almost the entire budget. Kimie also appears to be diagnosed with cancer, suggesting that the debt came from the savings for the operation instead of being being put into a pipe dream business. When confronted, he grovels and apologizes that his attempts of being a strict parent has caused Hinako to fear men, and begs her give Kotoyuki a chance.
The Fox Mask is not who he appears to be
How it's presented: Fox Mask appears as an onmyoji priest of the Dark Shrine who helps Hinako access deeper areas. Hinako acts quite familiar with him despite not remembering who he is. The notes at the Dark Shrine tell that the fox family has a tradition of taking in young girls and sacrificing them to the gods after playing with them. Fox Mask talks sweetly and shows concern for Hinako, but she likes her much more after she goes through a brainwashing ceremony.
How it ends up being: Tsuneki Kotoyuki is a bastard child of Tsuneki patriarch Hidetoshi and a maid Fujitori Sachie. He was one of the Ebisugaoka classmates and got friendly with Hinako. When he was bit by a fox, Hinako and the villagers chased it away, which has awakened some kind of epiphany in him. He with his mother got expelled from the family, causing him to be moved away and write letters to Hinako about their situation. His mother was extremely overbearing and installed the idea into him that one's happiness comes at the expense of others and he can only have nice things when he's rich and powerful. When Kotoyuki's father died, he was asked to return to the family as the heir, who additionally installed into him ideas that the family is protecting the town from the Water Dragon. He quickly picked Hinako as his bride, and from what he's heard of her life, he thought he's doing her a favor. But it also appears that Hidetoshi wife's Suzutani Mayumi and Kotoyuki's grandfather have played a bigger role in this. When Hinako spells out that she doesn't want to be subservient, Kotoyuki is shocked since that's not how he knows women should be, but quickly accepts her point. At the end of the game, he leaves the town to experience small things his family wasn't allowing him.
The Fog Monster is not who it appears to be
How it's presented: Two times Hinako is chased by a barely visible figure in the fog, who appears to be responsible for everything. At the end she appears a giant woman in a Shiromuku dress with no face.
How it ends up being: Near the end of the game it turns out that the monster is Hinako's split personality who tries to get rid of her rebellious self. Meaning, the fog is Hinako's wish that some incident would stop the marriage and is an antagonistic force towards herself to ensure the marriage would go on. This contradiction causes her a complete mental breakdown in the endings where the compromise isn't reached. In the true ending, the two admit that things aren't black and white and reconcile.
The Doll is not who it appears to be
How it's presented: The Doll is a toy that Hinako used to play with as a child, but at one point abandoned due to it being too girly. The Doll keeps showing up next to the messages that tell Hinako about sources of danger. In the endings it spirits Junko away for interfering.
How it ends up being: The Doll's true identity is the Tsukumogami god, who has been trying to take Hinako away from the Tsuneki family to weaken the Inari faith, which comes of as just being petty. It's also the actual summoner of all the monsters, and has done so as Hinako either dying or running away would achieve the same result. In one of the endings, it possesses Shu, as both symbolize tools that were thrown away when they've served their purpose. Its boss form incorporates elements of various lore pieces about the town. It also being the boss in the true ending shows that destroying the rival matters to it more than anything.
Of course, since it's all in Hinako's head we can't really be certain any of that is still accurate as the ending is very brief and avoids clarifying anything.
On religion
Ebisugaoka is noted to be very old and is isolated from the world by the landscape, so over its history it has accumulated many traditions unique to it.
- The first is the Water Dragon faith, with a myth that the mountains are sealing off the toxic corpse of Yamato-no-Orochi after it was beheaded by Susanoo-no-Mikoto. Which clearly refers to the underground gases and is why digging wells is forbidden.
- After that the location was used as a base by medieval soldiers, as the toxic gases provide natural defenses. And then the fog itself became worshiped.
- Next is the Divine Tree faith, which in late 12th century worshiped the thousand-year cedar because some giant monk said that it keeps the Water Dragon at bay.
- The tree got burned by a lightning in the 17th century, so it got superseded by the tsukumogami faith. It's a classic Japanese culture of taking care of old tools and items instead of recycling them in case they one day become sentient. The previous faiths resurfaced because anything old is considered worthy of respect.
- The town's fog made it a great hunting ground for foxes. So the foxes were credited as a samaritan family who took over the Divine Tree's job, and a statue of O-Inari was built closer to the residential areas.
Of course, each part of this is treated with complete seriousness by the residents. In 1880 there was a serial killer who claimed that the foxes are usurpers. Then there are fairly recent cases where people who disrespect the Inari statue suddenly fall to terrible diseases, which I note were deliberately disregarded by the police.
As the historian notes, traditions change over time and obscure their original purpose. During the game, the Tsuneki family are represented by multi-tailed fox demons who feast on maidens with special blood, while all previous religions have merged into a demonic entity who tries to outgambit its rival. Let's just say it's not pretty no matter who you side with. This just shows the dangers of letting organized movements to twists cautionary folktales into political tools.
Of course, this is a story written by Ryukishi07, so the supernatural elements actually being real is always on the table, as there's some evidence for either interpretation.
Ties to Silent Hill, Maine
There are several parallels between Ebisugaoka's religions and the satanic Order in Silent Hill 1.
- The Red Capsules are made from the Kakura-makakura drug, which is made from Hakkokusou flowers. They are initially misidentified as headache medicine, but the notes say there were used in mysticism practices to communicate with the gods. It's mentioned to be imported by a western missionary centuries ago. This is practically identical to White Claudia and PTV pills, which the cult used for their own rituals, and the drawings of the two flowers look similar.
- The holy water called Agura no Hotei-sama is red and can purge the corruption from the Scared Sword, and may just be filled with some purifying mold. Very interestingly, the Order has Aglaophotis, which is a red holy water they keep as a demon repellent in case their plan backfires.
- Hinako is mentioned to have a rare blood type that allow her to form connection with the gods and be used for sacrifices, which is one of the reasons the Tsuneki family insisted on having her. And not to mention that the fog town is really her doing. Alessa Gillespie is a psychic girl that was abused by the Order for her special ability to wrap reality in the town in order to have her give birth to their goddess. The two also have a similar hair design.
- The game takes place less than 20 years before Silent Hill Origins.
Despite this, I still don't think the game is a prequel. 1. There being similarities is not a connection, at least the game doesn't make them, and nothing in Silent Hill 1 mentions Japan. 2. The director wanted to make a Japanese Silent Hill because the first game had eastern influences that were lost to time. 3. Hakkokusou and White Claudia are similar, but in practice they operate quite differently. So I'm more comfortable with calling it a reinterpretation of the first game's plot points if they took place in a different culture.
What does f stand for in the title?
The game doesn't tell, so nobody knows.
Final thoughts
Silent Hill f feels like a proper revival of the franchise after years of directionless mediocrity. It reuses the religious horror plot of Silent Hill 1 and psychological horror plot of Silent Hill 2 and mixes them to tell a multilayered narrative that someone like Ryukishi07 specializes in. Every aspect of the game is highly interpretive with some renaming open questions, letting itself be re-analyzed in multiple ways. The story present some ethical problems about gender roles, only to reveal that there's no correct answer and it's not the main theme, the only thing that matters is making calculated choices instead of letting others make them for you. The combat though feels quite repetitive and is too action-heavy for this type of game. As the game is fairly recent and the first ending is full of red-herrings, I expect the game getting popular only a couple of years later after the essayists eat it up enough.
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