I'm like 99% sure they swapped the final monsters. The Oogly Boogler's appearance has absolutely nothing to do with Rachel killing all those factory workers for profit, but it would be a decent monster to represent a strangling, overbearing mother figure. John Cena's appearance has absolutely nothing to do with Astrid's mommy issues, but would be a decent monster to represent, you know, locking a whole shitload of people in a room with a fire.
The fact that both of them have trauma relating to fire really feels like they had to design things to fit wherever. The vag face might have worked if they, yknow played into the sexual aspect of the cult more but even then rachel wasnt involved in that part of it
I think oogly booglers were supposed to represent the cult and trauma dogs represented the johansens but really I think it all represents why your monster making team and story team shouldn't be different studios
*”Entangle’ means to “involve (someone) in difficulties or complicated circumstances from which it is difficult to escape”. Entangler holds a bunch of people in place and doesn’t let them leave, which leads to their demise (the workers from the mill, Joy from the cult). *”Immolate” means to “kill or offer as a sacrifice, especially by burning”. The Immolator is a self-harming, rampaging beast that shoots gouts of flame at people, and is also on fire (Eva shot and killed people, and she died by being poisoned and set on fire). It’s really not difficult to guess why the monsters are the way that they are.
@@whichcache2517 Yeah nah, any explanation for why the Entangler allegedly makes sense for the cult storyline is going to have to address the fact that it's pregnant and has a vulva for a face.
@@InfiniteAnvil Rachel is a strangling, overbearing mother figure. She keeps telling Faith what to do, and Eric sticks around because he’s passive. Rachel is the cause of The Withering (being the person who killed Joy and was responsible for the mill workers not being able to escape), and as such, The Entangler represents her and how she affects the people around her.
The sad thing about this game is that a story about someone dealing with the trauma of being in an abusive family and the aftermath of having one of your family members becoming a spree shooter is a really good idea for a psychological horror game. It's basically the plot of We Need to Talk About Kevin. But my god did this game fuck that whole premise up.
I totally agree honestly think the structure of the Norwegian family could be the good basis of an actual game where Astrid would be the main character. The twist being you think the secret is they killed their abusive mother and that is why they are in silent Hill but the truth being they killed their own sibling at the behest of their parent. The public story being they ran away after the shooting and ended their life at home but the main character getting really defensive whenever asked about what happened when they got home. Like starting off with "Don't you think that's a super invasive question" to answers that don't add up and finally being revealed in the climax.
@@winstonsmith3703in a better silent hill the plot with the steel mill would’ve been actually good, but they start adding pieces and connecting plots out of thin air.
@@Jt1Torso1Winabego I'll be honest I don't think the mill idea would ever be as easy to get to work well as the basis for the Norwegian plotline. The Norwegian setup with some revisions has the potential to be great while the American cult one could at most be good in my opinion.
@@Jt1Torso1Winabego Eeeh, It sorta works, but it just feels a lot more generic than the Norwegian stuff. Feels like the sorta plot they would've made for a Silent Hill game if they continued making new games after Downpour. Maybe I just think that cause it's got the really bad Foundation stuff all over it, or because they only really start dropping shit about it *at the end of the show.* But I just think the Norway stuff has a way higher celling.
@@winstonsmith3703 Yeah, the Split of Plotlines really dragged the Show down. Had it only been the Norwegian Plotline it would have been way better. It also wouldn't have the Silly "In Order to stop the Withering, we have to do the (insert Name here) Ritual, that will totally fix stuff!" followed by said Ritual doing fuck all. Which happens like 6 diffrent times.
Real cool how Rachel, factory owner who literally locked her workers inside the factor to try to keep them working forever, gets a happy ending while Nora, did literally nothing wrong, gets oogley-boogled. Good stuff.
This whole game's sense of morality is completely wild. The fact that Astrid and Brit, both of whom were abused children forced into awful situations by their parents, are portrayed as needing "redemption" on the same level as Rachel doing a Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, is so bizarre
I genuinely love that Karl was such a void of nothing that everyone just agreed in the voting to remove him from the story entirely, and it never mattered at all
Why the fuck is Rachel allowed a good ending?! Astrid was presumably a teenager, being forced into doing awful things by her abusive mother. I can sympathize with that. Rachel on the other hand was an accountant desperate to appease shareholders by literally barricading workers inside the Mill, forcing them to work to boost numbers then leaving them all to burn when an accident inevitably occured. Except Eric and Toby I guess, somehow. What a bastard.
That was the most stupidest thing i ever had the displeasure to watch in my entire life. Her husband, WHO BY ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES WAS TRYING TO HELP OTHERS AS BEST AS HE COULD, DIED IN THE MOST DEPRESSING WAY POSSIBLE WHILE ACTUALLY FEELING GUILTY FOR WHAT HE DID, while his bitch of a wife got to live scott free and probably fuck up her daughter in the process, after being directly responsible, and COMPLETELY UNREPENTANT, for killing a bunch of people both barely indirectly (the people stuck inside the steel mill) and directly (killing the other woman after the ritual fails to "cleanse" her of her impurity, though it seems mildly ambiguous if she did end up killing her or not, compared to the steel mill victims). What a fun game.
Every "fate" decision throughout the "game" contributed to their final outcome. Which means they earned their endings primarily based on vibes. There couldn't have been more than 2 decisions between finding out what Rachel did, and the end of the show. Even if everyone had thrown their whole weight behind Damning her as soon as they learned the truth, it wouldn't have been enough to give her what she deserved.
Especially funny when you realize that Nora also completely gets fucked over and right after confronting Rachel about it too. At least with Eric and Toby it was honest mistakes and they actually paid for it. Meanwhile Rachel basically fucks over everyone repeatedly, including her own daughter!, and gets away with it. I'm almost surprised that Astrid or Brit didn't get screwed over too despite them both being *way* more sympathetic than Rachel ever was even before the 11th hour reveal. What the fuck.
I'm actually super relieved that the ending seemingly doesn't tie directly or indirectly into anything else 'Silent Hill'. This way Ascension can be safely scrubbed from existence and never be spoken of again, without any disruption to the greater SH narrative and/or lore.
Same. Like it's still a shame that there's a potentially good story or two (or three, give poor Nora) here that is utterly squandered, but this thing is literally only _Silent Hill_ in name only thankfully. (Not that I trust PachinKonami to keep it that way.)
I genuinely dont understand Astrid's traumatic backstory. So Eva did the shooting and was apparently not stopped or arrested or anything, and instead just... came back home? To have tea? But her mother knew about what she did so she made Astrid poison her with wolfsbane? And then they burned her body and buried her in their backyard, somehow without the police finding out about it ever, despite the fact THAT THE WHOLE TOWN KNOWS ABOUT WHAT EVA DID? The more I think about it the more my head spins holy shit help
So after watching this one live on stream, I was... feeling similar to everyone else about the ending, shall we say. Confused! "What were they thinking?!" Etc. I still do not know what they were thinking, but I have an explanation as to why the game ended this way. As I understand it, when playing the game every character had two mechanics that kept track of what ending the character was barrelling towards. The first is straightforward, the sorts of choices the audience made - every character by the end had made redemptive choices, so they got a redemption version of their ending. The second mechanic however was apparently a hope mechanic of sorts - my suspicion is that Eric in his ending had low hope, so he was redeemed but unable to survive. Meanwhile the other characters had high hope, so they lived. So, knowing that Eric could have survived, and assuming that Toby could have survived too (he just died way earlier), this *somewhat* explains the ending. The evil king ghost monster has claimed two keys from the dead characters, but while this was enough to make...the guy... very upset, it wasn't enough to unlock the door. "But Loz!" I hear you cry, "doesn't it make zero sense to have this sort of tiered ending in a game that can only be played once? And isn't this ending specifically really lacking as either a happy ending or a tragic one?" WHY YES. I agree. I guess this is what the "what if?" streams are for but this mess is what we're stuck with. WE'VE IMPACTED THE CANON OF SILENT HILL and we got the super mediocre ending that in any other game would signal to try again.
This might have worked if it was a complete project like Heavy Rain. Like if Heavy Rain had broadcasted a Twitch Plays mode as its premiere. Like a theatrical release before the home release you can buy and play on your own. But this doesn't even feel like a narrative game that could be played. Just disjointed cutscenes.
Good write-up. Thanks to some light reading on the Silent Hill Fandom Wiki, here's a quote about alternate endings, from a Resetera thread back in May 2023, after the first trailer dropped: "The goal is to make some of the outcomes available in the non-canonical run. That said by my current calculation there are 36(!) right now between live/dead states and redemption/suffering/damnation, and that's not counting some of the smaller branches, so most will still be unseen." /Azabu. CEO at Genvid [Yes, mr. Genvid CEO Jacob Navok actually jumped into the thread to clarify a few things for the... sceptic... forumites.]
This feels like the product of time and budget mismanagement, and the game's weird format probably also didn't help. If only they had just made an actual, normal choice based game.
@@siegwardinspirit Not gonna lie, if they just produced a stand-alone version of this as an actual single-player game, I'd... I'd probably watch someone else play it, fuck that.
I said it on a previous video, but man, there really could've been a compelling and unique Silent Hill video game made from the ideas the Norwegian story tries to go for. The idea of the whole family all dealing with trauma stemming from how their mother treated them (Karl living in denial of what his children went through, Astrid trying and failing to not to repeat the cycle with Orson, Brit's alcoholism) and the pain of what happened with Eva and how that make the entire town turn on them. All of that sounds like a good potential silent hill set-up. And there's little nuggets of stuff that *feels* like it's actually somewhat working, like Astrid's relationship with the cop lady (Who also feels like she *could've* worked if they were written better.) and Brit actually having a bit of a dynamic with Nils that turns them into a bit more of an actual character beyond *has a podcast.* Karl... Karl had a nice voice actor, and had most of the stuff with Eva, so that's nice too. Try and pair that with some Scandinavian inspired horror stuff (Focus on the desolate snowy forests and bogs, make some enemies partially inspired by viking myth shit, idk). Take out most of the padding, and come up with some better lore than the generic Foundation stuff, and you could've had a really neat little Silent Hill game in that alternative universe. ... But then we would've lost most of the funny stuff over in America, so you know, better outcome really.
My thoughts exactly. As fun of a hate-watch this was there’s genuinely so much potential in the Norwegian plot line. The idea of the Silent Hill ‘sin’ being a passive father snapping and killing his abusive wife after she drove one of her kids to murder is so fucked-up but also deeply complex. Everyone can agree the sin is wrong, yet everyone can also agree the father’s motivation is immensely sympathetic. The father’s sin and subsequent strained relationship with his daughters could’ve been the game all by itself: just imagine knowing (or suspecting) your father murdered your mother in a mad bid to protect you from further abuse. From a writing perspective there are so many interesting ideas and emotions to explore. (Sensitively, of course. I’m nowhere near talented enough to write it and neither are these hacks) Yet that’s just the tip of the iceberg for the theoretically interesting family dynamics. Because, on top of that, you have a mother trying to protect their son from deeply painful inter-generational trauma in a bid to make a fresh start. Unfortunately, she’s in Silent Hill - where everybody’s traumas/sins are made manifest. It could’ve been brilliant. …But they found a way to fuck it up anyways.
Absolutely agree it'd need some restructuring but the basis for the Norwegian plotline is so fucking good and has so much potential. Would make a great silent Hill game where you think the secret the main character has is they killed their mother but instead it's that they killed their own sibling at their abusive mothers behest after the sibling committed a mass shooting.
After finishing SIlent Hill Ascension, i'm convinced that the monsters the both sides have to deal at the end are flipped by mistake. The only other explanation is complete misuse and incompetency. There are certain reveals that make Fire Monster of the Norwegian side fit thematically better with the Rachel and Eric on the foundation side. While Tentacle monster from the first episode of the Foundation side fits better with Astrid and Brit. On the Foundation side, it's revealed how Rachel and Eric are responsible for the Steel Mill accident. Even tho how is actually pretty stupid if you think about it, especially for Eric and what he gets as the good ending. It revealed to be a giant fire there a bunch of people died trapped with no ability to get out. The Immolator aka fire monster with a giant perpetually on fire cage on his head that he can't escape from and is also spewing fire on others, feel to me like a pretty obvious if not blunt thematic connection. On the Norwegian side. Even tho it was already hammered home that it's about generational sin passed down from mother to her offspring. It's also about how atmosphere in the house was oppressive and Ingrid was abusive. So The Entangler aka pregnant looking female monster that smothers everyone with her tentacles would fit thematically perfect. Tentacles which also easily symbolize overbearing protective grasp of a mother gone to far. But instead Fire monster is on the Norwegian side, cause they have forest and it looks cool on fire. Plus, the shooting tangentially . It's also revealed that Astrid and her mother poisoned and burned Eva's body, then buried in their backyard. So i guess that is justification for fire monster even tho the actual death was caused by CHOKING on poisonous herbs. The whole thing of them also getting away with her murder is stupid if you think about it for a second. While Pregnant tentacle monster is on the Foundation side, cause that one time it was a throwaway mention that Rachel didn't want to get pregnant. Plus, if you stretch hard enough it's about people inhaling smoke in the fire aka tentacle down the throat. Even tho the description of the Mill event is always horrible fiery death and not choking on smoke.
Man you're 100% right. Holy shit... How does this game have so much obvious glaring potential in it, while simultaneously being absolutely buttfuck awful in every way, shape or form?
@@JoseRS1186 On the Astrid side there also were glimpses of a monster that had a constricting looking ballerina type shoes\wraps on. You know the subtle family\sisters had to tiptoe around the mother to not get abuse. But i'm pretty sure it was never fully utilized and dropped offscreen or just plain forgotten. I think it's The Stinger on the wiki. But might be some monster that didn't even got the wiki entry.
I'm constantly blown away how little shits Rachel gives about her child. She just shuffles her little antichrist around various locations, doesn't talk or bond with that child or anything despite the fact she was KIDNAPPED BY AN EVIL CULT, MISSING FOR WEEKS, and whenever Fath speaks up she's like "not now, mommy is busy, go play somewhere else. Out of my sight". And whenever Faith lashes out and says she prefers her dad, Rachel is just confused how could this be. Truly one of mothers of all time, give her all the awards, 11/10
“Two mothers reliving the horrible sins they committed to protect their livelihoods/honor are brought back to reality by their children” has alot of potential in a horror narrative, maybe even a Silent Hill game, if this game wasn’t such a half-assed AI monstrosity
I really liked the idea of a character who killed their sister after they committed mass shooting at the direction of their parent. That is fucked up and totally something that could be hinted at in many ways that are not obvious.
@@ne0nmancerI think this already is the A.I.-related thing, which means that PachinKonami will probably use A.I. in other things both _Silent Hill_ and not if this project used A.I. for its awful script. I normally roll my eyes at the claims of A.I. as being responsible for apparently all the recent bad scriprts over the past year or so when actual humans have readily proven themselves to indeed be *that* bad time and time again, as with Zach Synder, but the script for this "game" is so consistently disjointed even with the forced multiple choice that I can actually believe that claim for once. Either way, things look even worse for _Silent Hill F_ and the _Silent Hill 2_ remake than I already expecting them to likely be given current Konami. Such a shame.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! It all boils down to 'people did horrible murderous things and then just forgot about doing them' AGAIN?! Can Silent Hill ever not be about goddamn amnesiacs?
Everyone gets amnesia about everything! The worst of it is the reveal that Rachel was writing the letters to Nora and all the other victims' families. That's the stupidest part. She some how knew the mill workers well enough to write like them and then forgot she did it... out of guilt?
@@chrisdaughen5257 Didn't one of the letters say Rachel and Eric's house was where Nora's brother's murderer lived? Isn't that the only reason Nora was so confident one of them must've been involved with to begin with (even though she said it was obviously an impersonator trying to trick her)? So did Rachel write that one too??? Wtf
They came up with a few cultish phrases for this one, and even the ones that weren’t stupid to begin with end up sounding so after the awful mutant children say them enough times.
I feel like the visual metaphor of killing the representation of your past trauma works in most scenarios. The character being directly related to a mass shooter doing it via gun? Maybe uh, maybe they should have revised that part.
All the massive reveals that happen in this finale are said in the same word salad inconsistent tone that everything else has been said in so far and it gives it the opposite of gravitas.
16:50 Rachel relationship to the mill was discussed in the previous episodes, albeit somewhat vaguely. However, every time Rachel was on screen with either Krista or Eric, John was preoccupied pleading for the show to "TELL HER ABOUT THE ORGY!" so those discussions may as well have never happened.
Man, they even got the wrong monsters for each character's finale. John Cena, the burning industrial monster with a caged head should have been with the woman who trapped people in a steel mill. The Oogly Boogler isn't a perfect match, but it's a very obvious fear-of-women monster what with its yonic face and gooch tentacles, so it should have been with the woman who's mother was evil. Tragically, there's the skeleton of a good Silent Hill game here with the Norwegian family. The monster designs were great, but didn't fit the themes. I guess there's also the basis for a funny-bad Until-Dawn-like with the cult storyline.
You know, if the incident at the mill was going to be THIS important, arguably more important than the cult, I really think Toby should have lived longer. For that matter, given the storyline was all about the family confronting their sins, it's just genuinely weird to have Karl leave on a rowboat instead of confronting how he SH2-ed his wife (or just having him die if you didn't want him to do that). I'm honestly just disappointed. It wasn't even a funny bad ending or over the top. Just lacking.
By the looks of it, going by the weird straw doll scene at the end there, I‘m pretty sure Toby COULD have survived the whole ordeal, depending on the players‘ choices. Which would mean that Eric would have survived his redemption as well
@@petruciosxd1374 well, that’s just my theory. Eric did get redeemed in the end, despite the fact that he, you know, died. And since the only reason he died is because he‘s the cause of Toby‘s death, I believe that if the players managed to save Toby, Eric‘s redemption would’ve seen him survive as well
We're all in Silent Hill, and this show is our oogly boogler. The audience who actually voted on this really failed us all by not killing every character so Ghost King could open that door at the end.
I don't know if this is ever pointed out, but does anyone else think it's weird that Astrid looks nothing like her sisters or mother? Beyond the blonde hair, their faces have almost zero family resemblance. I mean, Eva looks like a younger Brit, and both sisters look like younger versions of their mother and aunt. But Astrid looks straight up adopted.
To be fair that isn't THAT uncommon. You sometimes see a family that's all brunettes and one kid is a redhead. Totally possible Astrid just happened to get the recessive blonde gene and her looks from her father's side.
@@mario98730 Yeah, that's why I said "beyond the blonde hair"; I'm aware it's pretty normal regardless of parentage, so it's not an important factor in this comparison.
So let me get this straight, in this game, every episode ends with three choices for the audience. These were Damnation (bad), Suffering (neutral), and Redemption (good). Everyone wanted the good ending, so they kept voting redemption. So at the end of the game, every major character gets "redeemed". From when we've seen, redemption has entailed everything from overcoming a trauma from your past, to dying horribly to a monster and the ghost of your dead ex-friend. With all this in mind, what does it actually mean to be redeemed in Silent Hill Ascension? It doesn't sound like it means much if it could be anything from "absolve yourself from past wrong doings and live happily ever after" to "die horribly to a supernatural horror". I'm sure all my questions will be answered in the upcoming season 2, right? The season 2 that's definitely happening because it was so popular because this project was so well thought out and executed? I'm sure all the money they made from those microtransactions will mean this next season is bigger and better!
Eric dying actually had nothing to do with the whole redemption/suffering/damnation system, it was because he had low hope, which is a different stat that I don't really know whether any direct choices impact it or not. The only thing I've seen people say about hope is that you can raise it by doing puzzles on the app or doing well in QTEs or something. So it's actually something much dumber than redemption being an inconsistent concept in this (which it still is, Rachel's arc is such a mess).
So my take is that ghost king and the great empath represents the viewers watching and "deciding" the outcome, ghost king being the trauma monster for the viewer's "sin" of playing with these characters stories, like a doll house and probably why ghost king has all the fingers and hands. Idk what was up with Rachel and Toby's trauma monster tho, they burn a mill full of workers and their monster is a vagina face with umbilical cord? It almost seems reversed, like oogly boogler should have been Astrid's monster, and John Cena should have been Rachel and Toby's monster right? Right? I shouldn't be thinking this hard about this
Wait, so Eva committed a terrible crime that hurt a lot of people very publicly, and then had time to go home and have death tea prepared for her without getting caught, and then after she disappeared everyone in town was like "yeah this is probably fine"????? Edit: BRIT ISN'T DEAD?! HOW!?
I love how all the endings were "redeemed" but for some reason only Eric died. Like, yes he directly killed the most people in the Steel Mill fire but like, compared to Rachel he was in way less denial about his guilt.
So everyone gets redeemed, but only Eric dies? No Krista ending? Not even a vague explanation of who that random dude at the end was? Just when you think it can't get worse, Silent Hill Ascension delivers. What a journey. I would be curious to check out the choices picked, and see what it means for the characters to not be redeemed, but no way in hell am I making an account for this shit.
The random dude appeared before both of them on the previous episode. He said he had great power and could do a bunch of shit...but well, he didn't DO much beyond that, besides disappear into the fog and telling them something about some stuff I can't be bothered to remember RN.
No Nora ending or redemption either despite her easily being the most sympathetic person by far on the American side while somehow the worst persons on the American side after Xavier, Rachel and presumably Barbara, get off scot free. Gods, the only thing "funnier" is that the 11th hour steel mill reveal with Rachel retroactively makes *all* of Krista's hatred of her and trying to steal Eric away from her actually justified. Way to go "writers".
@@KuroeNezumi He also appeared once for a brief moment, I'm talking like one second, a few episodes prior to that. It was just him playing with those straw dolls and that's it. What a weird experience.
You know that one Hellraiser movie that was originally just an unrelated horror film but they made it a Hellraiser movie and barely patched in Pinhead because the IP would get more attention? Yeah.
I like the bit at the end where Krista sees Rachel leaving with faith and says "So you're leaving Silent Hill?" "Yes" "We had some great orgys here" "Yes we did" And then we see the dog looking at some buttons "withering" "fog" "cut away" and "end".
huh?????? HUH??????????????????? what????????????????????? they made a game that you can only play once, with a story that is only fulfilling and only makes sense if you get several different endings???????????? WHY????????? WHY KONAMI?????????????????? WHO THOUGHT THIS WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA
Who say YOU could play this one? Voting on major plot turns was determined by vote, and the ones who put the most money in were the ones who were pushing down on the scale. In this game, the controller belongs only to the whales...
"If you're sufferin from some kinda trauma, buddy, just grab a fuckin 12-gauge and BLAM!!" -The Final Gamer I think this quote is enhanced greatly when divorced from context, let's keep it that way.
So many of the ideas here could have been something. Two mothers from opposite sides of the world meeting under supernatural circumstances, trying to figure out how they're connected and how to save their children, it's such a cool concept of something deeply human uniting two strangers against the unknown horror. The finale should have been Rachel and Astrid finding answers together, not getting sectioned off for their weird redemptions (though despite everything I kind of dig Astrid's backstory)
Well, at least we got to see the [John is not R E D E E M E D] ending, in which he never got to see any of the characters say "Silent Hill". Hopefully on the new game+, we'll get to see it.
I'm glad Konami is making the silent hill experience transcend the media of gaming by letting us experience what our own personal hell is like by making new silent hill content
It seems that with SH: Forte (taking place in Japan) the franchise is expanding into more generally the spirit world while SH itself is just one place where the barrier is thin. So not every story connects directly to the town, but anything in the franchise can affect the town in future installments. Plus the Great Empath seems like the god of the Cult. Or at least whatever spirit they keep trying to force into the role.
One thing I have to say is that I don't mind the idea that Silent Hill doesn't have to *literally* take place in the titular town in Maine. I'm looking forward to Silent Hill F, still, and I don't mind the concept that it's taking place in Japan.
I don’t understand why Eric was redeemed and still died but Rachel survived when they were arguably equally terrible (Rachel might be worse even) Extremely boring outcome that everyone was redeemed
My hypothesis is that the only change would be if they got the big green REDEEMED or whatever would show up otherwise. Otherwise everything would play out the same.
The thing that bothers me is that the whole redemption thing was never elaborated on at all. I wasn’t aware that the purpose of this supposedly choice-based game was redemption for any of the characters. This being a Silent Hill game, I figured coming to terms with trauma was the point, or at least some explanation for what Ascension or the Great Empath was. That seemed to be what it was building up to. It hardly satisfies the trauma aspect, and never answered anything on the cult’s end. It’s just a convoluted mess. The good thing about this ending is that no one ever mentioned Silent Hill, so it’s much easier for me to pretend this game isn’t part of the series. That and it makes the other American Silent Hill games look good by comparison.
It felt like a petty choice by the folks in charge for constantly getting their Erik/Krista plotline denied. They had to have Rachel and Krista team up because they had the "Ascension" already animated.
Rachel is definitely worse than Eric. It's not even close since when Eric made things worse, outside of lying about it being solely Toby's fault, it was genuinely an accident. Rachel intentionally locked people inside with the implication that even the fire didn't make the automatically unlock the doors until it was way too late to matter.
The trauma for every single character of note is that they either killed someone or led someone to their death. Some other side things, but that's the main trauma for everyone that they have to own up to. In Silent Hill 2, James/Angela/Eddie are all responsible for another being's death, but the only focus on that note is on James and for good reason. It's like the writers for Ascension thought that killing someone was the most traumatic and dark thing possible so they just gave it to everyone to make THEIR Silent Hill the darkest one!
i think the guy at the end was radcliffe maybe? and also was supposed to be like. you know the curator from dark pictures anthology? i think he was supposed to be like that. except somehow he ended up as an off-brand curator despite being FROM A REAL ACTUAL SILENT HILL GAME. but ! hey! the lesbians were okay! and i think they even got to be happy together! which is WAY more than i was expecting from this 'game'!
He's Zayne (Zayne Davies apparently), Orson's imaginary friend who I guess is just this actual guy who seemingly also played Silent Hill Ascension (no wonder he's so messed up about everything)
So... did Krista die? If so then literally every innocent person in this game died other than Lejo and Nils lol. And sure some of them died because of The Withering so maybe it was the Collector's doing (trying to stop Ghost King?) but Karl killing his wife had NOTHING to do with The Withering even though they teased it the entire first half! He denied that the wife was abusive until right before he left so did he just decide to kill her? He just gets off COMPLETELY scot free for straight up murder. Heck most of the main cast kill SEVERAL people/ leads to them dying brutally and they just laugh it off. Welp. It's like they say. You can't spell Silent Hill Ascension without AI
This has been one of the most entertaining "let's plays" I have ever seen and I'm shockingly sad it has ended. This was a great journey and I have FAITH it will get a sequel as horrible as this one.
i would even accept.. after the end, in a new house, trying to start over "hu, i really like this new house.. so peaceful.. such a silent................ hill" :))))))))))
The way some of the Redeemed scenes play out make me think that there was actually going to be no difference in how the scenes played out regardless of what outcome they got. But more importantly, I am stupified. I was expecting a hacky ending on the level of what the game has had so far. I was not expecting it to simply drop everything with no real attempt at an explanation or resolution. Whatever. Whats really important here is this: THE FINAL GAMER HAS ASCENDED
John loves this because its just the kind of storytelling in wrestling, 10+ weeks of promise with no forward momentum in plot only for every single resolution to happen in like 1 hour.
06:57 I'm bit surprised Foxcade didn't edit "Joy is Redeemed" here even before that ending after all of John's obviously misplaced yet constant hopes. The only other thing that surprises me is that the script managed to make Rachel *even more* unlikeable before the end...while also just letting her get away it with completely like it technically did Barbara and Aurora's useless asses. What. Gods, I'm *so* glad that the words "Silent Hill" never pop up "in-game" so I can just completely ignore this supposedly being part of the same series. There was potential for two or three actually decent stories here, but the script managed to utterly squander all of them even before going out of its way to fuck over Nora despite her being the most sympathetic American character by far even with how superfluous she largely is. Sigh. I can't say I'm surprised by that either given what current Konami has become and has been for the past decade or so. Things *really* aren't looking good for _Silent Hill F_ and the _Silent Hill 2_ remake at this point.
I don't think it can be overstated how psychotic it is that the game shows Astrid confronting and overcoming the guilt she feels in connection with her sister's mass shooting by grabbing a gun and shooting it
I'm like 99% sure they swapped the final monsters. The Oogly Boogler's appearance has absolutely nothing to do with Rachel killing all those factory workers for profit, but it would be a decent monster to represent a strangling, overbearing mother figure. John Cena's appearance has absolutely nothing to do with Astrid's mommy issues, but would be a decent monster to represent, you know, locking a whole shitload of people in a room with a fire.
The fact that both of them have trauma relating to fire really feels like they had to design things to fit wherever. The vag face might have worked if they, yknow played into the sexual aspect of the cult more but even then rachel wasnt involved in that part of it
I think oogly booglers were supposed to represent the cult and trauma dogs represented the johansens but really I think it all represents why your monster making team and story team shouldn't be different studios
*”Entangle’ means to “involve (someone) in difficulties or complicated circumstances from which it is difficult to escape”. Entangler holds a bunch of people in place and doesn’t let them leave, which leads to their demise (the workers from the mill, Joy from the cult).
*”Immolate” means to “kill or offer as a sacrifice, especially by burning”. The Immolator is a self-harming, rampaging beast that shoots gouts of flame at people, and is also on fire (Eva shot and killed people, and she died by being poisoned and set on fire).
It’s really not difficult to guess why the monsters are the way that they are.
@@whichcache2517 Yeah nah, any explanation for why the Entangler allegedly makes sense for the cult storyline is going to have to address the fact that it's pregnant and has a vulva for a face.
@@InfiniteAnvil Rachel is a strangling, overbearing mother figure. She keeps telling Faith what to do, and Eric sticks around because he’s passive. Rachel is the cause of The Withering (being the person who killed Joy and was responsible for the mill workers not being able to escape), and as such, The Entangler represents her and how she affects the people around her.
The sad thing about this game is that a story about someone dealing with the trauma of being in an abusive family and the aftermath of having one of your family members becoming a spree shooter is a really good idea for a psychological horror game. It's basically the plot of We Need to Talk About Kevin. But my god did this game fuck that whole premise up.
I totally agree honestly think the structure of the Norwegian family could be the good basis of an actual game where Astrid would be the main character. The twist being you think the secret is they killed their abusive mother and that is why they are in silent Hill but the truth being they killed their own sibling at the behest of their parent. The public story being they ran away after the shooting and ended their life at home but the main character getting really defensive whenever asked about what happened when they got home. Like starting off with "Don't you think that's a super invasive question" to answers that don't add up and finally being revealed in the climax.
@@winstonsmith3703in a better silent hill the plot with the steel mill would’ve been actually good, but they start adding pieces and connecting plots out of thin air.
@@Jt1Torso1Winabego I'll be honest I don't think the mill idea would ever be as easy to get to work well as the basis for the Norwegian plotline.
The Norwegian setup with some revisions has the potential to be great while the American cult one could at most be good in my opinion.
@@Jt1Torso1Winabego Eeeh, It sorta works, but it just feels a lot more generic than the Norwegian stuff. Feels like the sorta plot they would've made for a Silent Hill game if they continued making new games after Downpour.
Maybe I just think that cause it's got the really bad Foundation stuff all over it, or because they only really start dropping shit about it *at the end of the show.* But I just think the Norway stuff has a way higher celling.
@@winstonsmith3703 Yeah, the Split of Plotlines really dragged the Show down. Had it only been the Norwegian Plotline it would have been way better. It also wouldn't have the Silly "In Order to stop the Withering, we have to do the (insert Name here) Ritual, that will totally fix stuff!" followed by said Ritual doing fuck all. Which happens like 6 diffrent times.
the withering was a gas leak that we mistook for silent hill fog all along...
Real cool how Rachel, factory owner who literally locked her workers inside the factor to try to keep them working forever, gets a happy ending while Nora, did literally nothing wrong, gets oogley-boogled. Good stuff.
This whole game's sense of morality is completely wild. The fact that Astrid and Brit, both of whom were abused children forced into awful situations by their parents, are portrayed as needing "redemption" on the same level as Rachel doing a Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, is so bizarre
I finally understand hate watching
I genuinely love that Karl was such a void of nothing that everyone just agreed in the voting to remove him from the story entirely, and it never mattered at all
He probably got the best ending of all by yeeting himself from the story before it got worse than it was.
i agree hermano
Why the fuck is Rachel allowed a good ending?! Astrid was presumably a teenager, being forced into doing awful things by her abusive mother. I can sympathize with that. Rachel on the other hand was an accountant desperate to appease shareholders by literally barricading workers inside the Mill, forcing them to work to boost numbers then leaving them all to burn when an accident inevitably occured. Except Eric and Toby I guess, somehow. What a bastard.
Ah, the beauty of player choice!
That was the most stupidest thing i ever had the displeasure to watch in my entire life. Her husband, WHO BY ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES WAS TRYING TO HELP OTHERS AS BEST AS HE COULD, DIED IN THE MOST DEPRESSING WAY POSSIBLE WHILE ACTUALLY FEELING GUILTY FOR WHAT HE DID, while his bitch of a wife got to live scott free and probably fuck up her daughter in the process, after being directly responsible, and COMPLETELY UNREPENTANT, for killing a bunch of people both barely indirectly (the people stuck inside the steel mill) and directly (killing the other woman after the ritual fails to "cleanse" her of her impurity, though it seems mildly ambiguous if she did end up killing her or not, compared to the steel mill victims).
What a fun game.
Every "fate" decision throughout the "game" contributed to their final outcome. Which means they earned their endings primarily based on vibes. There couldn't have been more than 2 decisions between finding out what Rachel did, and the end of the show. Even if everyone had thrown their whole weight behind Damning her as soon as they learned the truth, it wouldn't have been enough to give her what she deserved.
Especially funny when you realize that Nora also completely gets fucked over and right after confronting Rachel about it too. At least with Eric and Toby it was honest mistakes and they actually paid for it. Meanwhile Rachel basically fucks over everyone repeatedly, including her own daughter!, and gets away with it.
I'm almost surprised that Astrid or Brit didn't get screwed over too despite them both being *way* more sympathetic than Rachel ever was even before the 11th hour reveal. What the fuck.
Do you think the people responsible for this procedurally generated crap might have a callous attitude towards working people?
I think characters are being "redeemed" the same way you "redeem" coupons
I'm actually super relieved that the ending seemingly doesn't tie directly or indirectly into anything else 'Silent Hill'. This way Ascension can be safely scrubbed from existence and never be spoken of again, without any disruption to the greater SH narrative and/or lore.
I agree. It’s so different from the Silent Hill series that it’s easy for me to pretend that it isn’t related to the franchise.
Same. Like it's still a shame that there's a potentially good story or two (or three, give poor Nora) here that is utterly squandered, but this thing is literally only _Silent Hill_ in name only thankfully. (Not that I trust PachinKonami to keep it that way.)
I ain't scrubbing shit. This is going to leave a sun stain on the brand that is Silent Hill™
A Good ending? Here?! Impossible
John's face once the credit roll is so worth it watching this entire series.
"How Silent Hill Ascension broke me"
I genuinely dont understand Astrid's traumatic backstory. So Eva did the shooting and was apparently not stopped or arrested or anything, and instead just... came back home? To have tea? But her mother knew about what she did so she made Astrid poison her with wolfsbane? And then they burned her body and buried her in their backyard, somehow without the police finding out about it ever, despite the fact THAT THE WHOLE TOWN KNOWS ABOUT WHAT EVA DID? The more I think about it the more my head spins holy shit help
So after watching this one live on stream, I was... feeling similar to everyone else about the ending, shall we say. Confused! "What were they thinking?!" Etc.
I still do not know what they were thinking, but I have an explanation as to why the game ended this way.
As I understand it, when playing the game every character had two mechanics that kept track of what ending the character was barrelling towards. The first is straightforward, the sorts of choices the audience made - every character by the end had made redemptive choices, so they got a redemption version of their ending.
The second mechanic however was apparently a hope mechanic of sorts - my suspicion is that Eric in his ending had low hope, so he was redeemed but unable to survive. Meanwhile the other characters had high hope, so they lived.
So, knowing that Eric could have survived, and assuming that Toby could have survived too (he just died way earlier), this *somewhat* explains the ending. The evil king ghost monster has claimed two keys from the dead characters, but while this was enough to make...the guy... very upset, it wasn't enough to unlock the door.
"But Loz!" I hear you cry, "doesn't it make zero sense to have this sort of tiered ending in a game that can only be played once? And isn't this ending specifically really lacking as either a happy ending or a tragic one?" WHY YES. I agree.
I guess this is what the "what if?" streams are for but this mess is what we're stuck with. WE'VE IMPACTED THE CANON OF SILENT HILL and we got the super mediocre ending that in any other game would signal to try again.
The perfect end to a perfect game
This might have worked if it was a complete project like Heavy Rain. Like if Heavy Rain had broadcasted a Twitch Plays mode as its premiere. Like a theatrical release before the home release you can buy and play on your own. But this doesn't even feel like a narrative game that could be played. Just disjointed cutscenes.
Good write-up.
Thanks to some light reading on the Silent Hill Fandom Wiki, here's a quote about alternate endings, from a Resetera thread back in May 2023, after the first trailer dropped:
"The goal is to make some of the outcomes available in the non-canonical run. That said by my current calculation there are 36(!) right now between live/dead states and redemption/suffering/damnation, and that's not counting some of the smaller branches, so most will still be unseen."
/Azabu. CEO at Genvid
[Yes, mr. Genvid CEO Jacob Navok actually jumped into the thread to clarify a few things for the... sceptic... forumites.]
This feels like the product of time and budget mismanagement, and the game's weird format probably also didn't help. If only they had just made an actual, normal choice based game.
@@siegwardinspirit Not gonna lie, if they just produced a stand-alone version of this as an actual single-player game, I'd... I'd probably watch someone else play it, fuck that.
I said it on a previous video, but man, there really could've been a compelling and unique Silent Hill video game made from the ideas the Norwegian story tries to go for.
The idea of the whole family all dealing with trauma stemming from how their mother treated them (Karl living in denial of what his children went through, Astrid trying and failing to not to repeat the cycle with Orson, Brit's alcoholism) and the pain of what happened with Eva and how that make the entire town turn on them. All of that sounds like a good potential silent hill set-up.
And there's little nuggets of stuff that *feels* like it's actually somewhat working, like Astrid's relationship with the cop lady (Who also feels like she *could've* worked if they were written better.) and Brit actually having a bit of a dynamic with Nils that turns them into a bit more of an actual character beyond *has a podcast.* Karl... Karl had a nice voice actor, and had most of the stuff with Eva, so that's nice too.
Try and pair that with some Scandinavian inspired horror stuff (Focus on the desolate snowy forests and bogs, make some enemies partially inspired by viking myth shit, idk). Take out most of the padding, and come up with some better lore than the generic Foundation stuff, and you could've had a really neat little Silent Hill game in that alternative universe.
... But then we would've lost most of the funny stuff over in America, so you know, better outcome really.
My thoughts exactly. As fun of a hate-watch this was there’s genuinely so much potential in the Norwegian plot line.
The idea of the Silent Hill ‘sin’ being a passive father snapping and killing his abusive wife after she drove one of her kids to murder is so fucked-up but also deeply complex. Everyone can agree the sin is wrong, yet everyone can also agree the father’s motivation is immensely sympathetic.
The father’s sin and subsequent strained relationship with his daughters could’ve been the game all by itself: just imagine knowing (or suspecting) your father murdered your mother in a mad bid to protect you from further abuse. From a writing perspective there are so many interesting ideas and emotions to explore. (Sensitively, of course. I’m nowhere near talented enough to write it and neither are these hacks)
Yet that’s just the tip of the iceberg for the theoretically interesting family dynamics. Because, on top of that, you have a mother trying to protect their son from deeply painful inter-generational trauma in a bid to make a fresh start. Unfortunately, she’s in Silent Hill - where everybody’s traumas/sins are made manifest.
It could’ve been brilliant.
…But they found a way to fuck it up anyways.
Absolutely agree it'd need some restructuring but the basis for the Norwegian plotline is so fucking good and has so much potential. Would make a great silent Hill game where you think the secret the main character has is they killed their mother but instead it's that they killed their own sibling at their abusive mothers behest after the sibling committed a mass shooting.
After finishing SIlent Hill Ascension, i'm convinced that the monsters the both sides have to deal at the end are flipped by mistake. The only other explanation is complete misuse and incompetency. There are certain reveals that make Fire Monster of the Norwegian side fit thematically better with the Rachel and Eric on the foundation side. While Tentacle monster from the first episode of the Foundation side fits better with Astrid and Brit.
On the Foundation side, it's revealed how Rachel and Eric are responsible for the Steel Mill accident. Even tho how is actually pretty stupid if you think about it, especially for Eric and what he gets as the good ending. It revealed to be a giant fire there a bunch of people died trapped with no ability to get out. The Immolator aka fire monster with a giant perpetually on fire cage on his head that he can't escape from and is also spewing fire on others, feel to me like a pretty obvious if not blunt thematic connection.
On the Norwegian side. Even tho it was already hammered home that it's about generational sin passed down from mother to her offspring. It's also about how atmosphere in the house was oppressive and Ingrid was abusive. So The Entangler aka pregnant looking female monster that smothers everyone with her tentacles would fit thematically perfect. Tentacles which also easily symbolize overbearing protective grasp of a mother gone to far.
But instead Fire monster is on the Norwegian side, cause they have forest and it looks cool on fire. Plus, the shooting tangentially . It's also revealed that Astrid and her mother poisoned and burned Eva's body, then buried in their backyard. So i guess that is justification for fire monster even tho the actual death was caused by CHOKING on poisonous herbs. The whole thing of them also getting away with her murder is stupid if you think about it for a second.
While Pregnant tentacle monster is on the Foundation side, cause that one time it was a throwaway mention that Rachel didn't want to get pregnant. Plus, if you stretch hard enough it's about people inhaling smoke in the fire aka tentacle down the throat. Even tho the description of the Mill event is always horrible fiery death and not choking on smoke.
Man you're 100% right. Holy shit...
How does this game have so much obvious glaring potential in it, while simultaneously being absolutely buttfuck awful in every way, shape or form?
Also the Oogly Boogly was in a hall littered with bottles. The Johanneson mother did look like a drinker... and the dad.
@@JoseRS1186 On the Astrid side there also were glimpses of a monster that had a constricting looking ballerina type shoes\wraps on. You know the subtle family\sisters had to tiptoe around the mother to not get abuse. But i'm pretty sure it was never fully utilized and dropped offscreen or just plain forgotten. I think it's The Stinger on the wiki. But might be some monster that didn't even got the wiki entry.
Omg you're so right. Oogly Boogler makes so little sense for the American side and I spent the whole time scratching my head about it
John's commitment to call this a game until the end really makes me worry about his sanity
I'm constantly blown away how little shits Rachel gives about her child. She just shuffles her little antichrist around various locations, doesn't talk or bond with that child or anything despite the fact she was KIDNAPPED BY AN EVIL CULT, MISSING FOR WEEKS, and whenever Fath speaks up she's like "not now, mommy is busy, go play somewhere else. Out of my sight". And whenever Faith lashes out and says she prefers her dad, Rachel is just confused how could this be. Truly one of mothers of all time, give her all the awards, 11/10
what even WAS the ascension? They started it, then she stabbed an enemy once and the story ended
WHAT EVEN WAS ASCENSION????
The ascension was the enemies we've made along the way.
The Ascension was this entire experience.
The origy we had along the way
I can't use my bullets, they're a consumable. I'm saving them for the final boss.
“Two mothers reliving the horrible sins they committed to protect their livelihoods/honor are brought back to reality by their children” has alot of potential in a horror narrative, maybe even a Silent Hill game, if this game wasn’t such a half-assed AI monstrosity
I really liked the idea of a character who killed their sister after they committed mass shooting at the direction of their parent. That is fucked up and totally something that could be hinted at in many ways that are not obvious.
Is there really anything AI related in the production pipeline for this? It just looks like a standard low budget, low effort animation.
@@ne0nmancerI think this already is the A.I.-related thing, which means that PachinKonami will probably use A.I. in other things both _Silent Hill_ and not if this project used A.I. for its awful script. I normally roll my eyes at the claims of A.I. as being responsible for apparently all the recent bad scriprts over the past year or so when actual humans have readily proven themselves to indeed be *that* bad time and time again, as with Zach Synder, but the script for this "game" is so consistently disjointed even with the forced multiple choice that I can actually believe that claim for once.
Either way, things look even worse for _Silent Hill F_ and the _Silent Hill 2_ remake than I already expecting them to likely be given current Konami. Such a shame.
i appreciate that i only got that was what they are going for from this comment
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! It all boils down to 'people did horrible murderous things and then just forgot about doing them' AGAIN?!
Can Silent Hill ever not be about goddamn amnesiacs?
Everyone gets amnesia about everything! The worst of it is the reveal that Rachel was writing the letters to Nora and all the other victims' families. That's the stupidest part. She some how knew the mill workers well enough to write like them and then forgot she did it... out of guilt?
@@chrisdaughen5257 Didn't one of the letters say Rachel and Eric's house was where Nora's brother's murderer lived? Isn't that the only reason Nora was so confident one of them must've been involved with to begin with (even though she said it was obviously an impersonator trying to trick her)? So did Rachel write that one too??? Wtf
they forgor :(
the only silent ascension here was my blood pressure going through the roof
Why the fuck do children just walk like tiny adults?
Silent Hill: Uncanny Valley
N word querilous mouthsound.
I’m quite convinced the devs have never seen a child and relied on second hand descriptions of what a child is
Faith and Orston are the modern child version of all those pictures of medieval cats.
Because hiring and mo-capping children is expensive. Heck, I'd be surprised if there are more than two actors doing the mo-cap: one man, one woman.
@@MarieAntoon i think the number is closer to zero for this game.
I'm so glad the people being held hostage to finish this doomed project can now move on and be happy.
"Mods, have him killed" = send a hit man
"Chat, have him killed" = John incites a mob
The writers think the foundation's mantra is way cooler than it actually is.
They came up with a few cultish phrases for this one, and even the ones that weren’t stupid to begin with end up sounding so after the awful mutant children say them enough times.
I wonder if the workers being locked in a steel mill has any grounding in what the dev team making this had to go through while making this
I feel like the visual metaphor of killing the representation of your past trauma works in most scenarios. The character being directly related to a mass shooter doing it via gun? Maybe uh, maybe they should have revised that part.
All the massive reveals that happen in this finale are said in the same word salad inconsistent tone that everything else has been said in so far and it gives it the opposite of gravitas.
Disappointment? Here? Impossible.
Can't wait for the developer inside stories to start coming out.
Foxcade is earning next week’s firing with that ending. Holy shitttttt.
16:50 Rachel relationship to the mill was discussed in the previous episodes, albeit somewhat vaguely. However, every time Rachel was on screen with either Krista or Eric, John was preoccupied pleading for the show to "TELL HER ABOUT THE ORGY!" so those discussions may as well have never happened.
To be fair, that orgy revelation was a wasted unfired Chekov's gun.
@@Owesomasaurus Unlike Eric's "gun," which was firing ALL night, pew pew!
You knew it was going to be dog shit, you expected it the whole time, and somehow you still got less than what you expected.
What a beautiful story.
Man, they even got the wrong monsters for each character's finale. John Cena, the burning industrial monster with a caged head should have been with the woman who trapped people in a steel mill. The Oogly Boogler isn't a perfect match, but it's a very obvious fear-of-women monster what with its yonic face and gooch tentacles, so it should have been with the woman who's mother was evil.
Tragically, there's the skeleton of a good Silent Hill game here with the Norwegian family. The monster designs were great, but didn't fit the themes. I guess there's also the basis for a funny-bad Until-Dawn-like with the cult storyline.
WE ALL GETTING BOOGLED TODAY!!!
You know, if the incident at the mill was going to be THIS important, arguably more important than the cult, I really think Toby should have lived longer. For that matter, given the storyline was all about the family confronting their sins, it's just genuinely weird to have Karl leave on a rowboat instead of confronting how he SH2-ed his wife (or just having him die if you didn't want him to do that).
I'm honestly just disappointed. It wasn't even a funny bad ending or over the top. Just lacking.
By the looks of it, going by the weird straw doll scene at the end there, I‘m pretty sure Toby COULD have survived the whole ordeal, depending on the players‘ choices. Which would mean that Eric would have survived his redemption as well
@@KeDe1606 if eric only dies because toby dies then that sounds super jank
@@petruciosxd1374 well, that’s just my theory. Eric did get redeemed in the end, despite the fact that he, you know, died. And since the only reason he died is because he‘s the cause of Toby‘s death, I believe that if the players managed to save Toby, Eric‘s redemption would’ve seen him survive as well
John: Can you imagine if some last-minute twist pulls It off and saves this whole thing?
Me: *reads title of video*
We're all in Silent Hill, and this show is our oogly boogler.
The audience who actually voted on this really failed us all by not killing every character so Ghost King could open that door at the end.
I don't know if this is ever pointed out, but does anyone else think it's weird that Astrid looks nothing like her sisters or mother? Beyond the blonde hair, their faces have almost zero family resemblance. I mean, Eva looks like a younger Brit, and both sisters look like younger versions of their mother and aunt. But Astrid looks straight up adopted.
To be fair that isn't THAT uncommon. You sometimes see a family that's all brunettes and one kid is a redhead. Totally possible Astrid just happened to get the recessive blonde gene and her looks from her father's side.
@@mario98730 Yeah, that's why I said "beyond the blonde hair"; I'm aware it's pretty normal regardless of parentage, so it's not an important factor in this comparison.
in a just world the CEO of Konami would get boogled
So let me get this straight, in this game, every episode ends with three choices for the audience. These were Damnation (bad), Suffering (neutral), and Redemption (good). Everyone wanted the good ending, so they kept voting redemption. So at the end of the game, every major character gets "redeemed". From when we've seen, redemption has entailed everything from overcoming a trauma from your past, to dying horribly to a monster and the ghost of your dead ex-friend. With all this in mind, what does it actually mean to be redeemed in Silent Hill Ascension? It doesn't sound like it means much if it could be anything from "absolve yourself from past wrong doings and live happily ever after" to "die horribly to a supernatural horror". I'm sure all my questions will be answered in the upcoming season 2, right? The season 2 that's definitely happening because it was so popular because this project was so well thought out and executed? I'm sure all the money they made from those microtransactions will mean this next season is bigger and better!
Eric dying actually had nothing to do with the whole redemption/suffering/damnation system, it was because he had low hope, which is a different stat that I don't really know whether any direct choices impact it or not. The only thing I've seen people say about hope is that you can raise it by doing puzzles on the app or doing well in QTEs or something. So it's actually something much dumber than redemption being an inconsistent concept in this (which it still is, Rachel's arc is such a mess).
Most of the twists feel like they have no buildup or foreshadowing so it just feels like the writers are going by the seat of their pants.
So my take is that ghost king and the great empath represents the viewers watching and "deciding" the outcome, ghost king being the trauma monster for the viewer's "sin" of playing with these characters stories, like a doll house and probably why ghost king has all the fingers and hands.
Idk what was up with Rachel and Toby's trauma monster tho, they burn a mill full of workers and their monster is a vagina face with umbilical cord? It almost seems reversed, like oogly boogler should have been Astrid's monster, and John Cena should have been Rachel and Toby's monster right? Right?
I shouldn't be thinking this hard about this
What a weird silent hill to die on.
IMPORTANT: Every Oogly Boogler sighting
6:02
17:35
31:14
31:20
31:44
32:30
Wait, so Eva committed a terrible crime that hurt a lot of people very publicly, and then had time to go home and have death tea prepared for her without getting caught, and then after she disappeared everyone in town was like "yeah this is probably fine"?????
Edit: BRIT ISN'T DEAD?! HOW!?
THE EVENT OF THE MILLENIUM!!!
WHO LIVES?! WHO DIES?! AND WILL ANY OF IT MAKE A LICK OF SENSE?!?!?!?!?
To answer the third question: no and why start now?
I love how all the endings were "redeemed" but for some reason only Eric died. Like, yes he directly killed the most people in the Steel Mill fire but like, compared to Rachel he was in way less denial about his guilt.
WE ASCENDING WITH THIS ONE!!! 🎉🎉🔥🔥🔥🔥
Seeing John go through shock, horror, confusion, and disgust is the true ascension of silent hill
Is that little girl ever in real clothes and not her pajamas?
Shush, pajamas are real clothes to go out in the street with /s
Will Rachel ever change out of her bloodstained, cut up shirt?
She's even in it in the family photo I'm crying.
You think they’d have had the time and budget to make another model of her? Lol
@@dingus_maximus I guess they had to spend those workhours on cosmetics for the audience NPCs. What a terrible waste
So everyone gets redeemed, but only Eric dies? No Krista ending? Not even a vague explanation of who that random dude at the end was?
Just when you think it can't get worse, Silent Hill Ascension delivers.
What a journey. I would be curious to check out the choices picked, and see what it means for the characters to not be redeemed, but no way in hell am I making an account for this shit.
The random dude appeared before both of them on the previous episode. He said he had great power and could do a bunch of shit...but well, he didn't DO much beyond that, besides disappear into the fog and telling them something about some stuff I can't be bothered to remember RN.
No Nora ending or redemption either despite her easily being the most sympathetic person by far on the American side while somehow the worst persons on the American side after Xavier, Rachel and presumably Barbara, get off scot free.
Gods, the only thing "funnier" is that the 11th hour steel mill reveal with Rachel retroactively makes *all* of Krista's hatred of her and trying to steal Eric away from her actually justified. Way to go "writers".
There's a gamefaqs thread that describes them all!
@@KuroeNezumi He also appeared once for a brief moment, I'm talking like one second, a few episodes prior to that. It was just him playing with those straw dolls and that's it. What a weird experience.
35:31 Orsen just running around doing shooting noises just seems wrong.
You know that one Hellraiser movie that was originally just an unrelated horror film but they made it a Hellraiser movie and barely patched in Pinhead because the IP would get more attention? Yeah.
I like the bit at the end where Krista sees Rachel leaving with faith and says "So you're leaving Silent Hill?"
"Yes"
"We had some great orgys here"
"Yes we did"
And then we see the dog looking at some buttons "withering" "fog" "cut away" and "end".
huh?????? HUH??????????????????? what????????????????????? they made a game that you can only play once, with a story that is only fulfilling and only makes sense if you get several different endings???????????? WHY????????? WHY KONAMI?????????????????? WHO THOUGHT THIS WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA
Who say YOU could play this one? Voting on major plot turns was determined by vote, and the ones who put the most money in were the ones who were pushing down on the scale.
In this game, the controller belongs only to the whales...
"If you're sufferin from some kinda trauma, buddy, just grab a fuckin 12-gauge and BLAM!!"
-The Final Gamer
I think this quote is enhanced greatly when divorced from context, let's keep it that way.
"Dealing with your trauma ain't no big deal. Just grab the 12-gauge... BLAM!"
So many of the ideas here could have been something. Two mothers from opposite sides of the world meeting under supernatural circumstances, trying to figure out how they're connected and how to save their children, it's such a cool concept of something deeply human uniting two strangers against the unknown horror. The finale should have been Rachel and Astrid finding answers together, not getting sectioned off for their weird redemptions (though despite everything I kind of dig Astrid's backstory)
Well, at least we got to see the [John is not R E D E E M E D] ending, in which he never got to see any of the characters say "Silent Hill".
Hopefully on the new game+, we'll get to see it.
It's not over...now you gotta watch those O T H E R S C E N E S...
I have never clicked on a video so fast LET'S GO
Edit: Damn I can see this one hurt you, play something you enjoy next buddy, you've earned it.
21:40 I have to emphasize that yes, this is indeed live. This wasn’t cut off, he just did that in the stream.
It was so sudden a transition I burst into laughter
I'm glad Konami is making the silent hill experience transcend the media of gaming by letting us experience what our own personal hell is like by making new silent hill content
It seems that with SH: Forte (taking place in Japan) the franchise is expanding into more generally the spirit world while SH itself is just one place where the barrier is thin. So not every story connects directly to the town, but anything in the franchise can affect the town in future installments.
Plus the Great Empath seems like the god of the Cult. Or at least whatever spirit they keep trying to force into the role.
I once begged the heavens to bring back the Silent Hill franchise... I'm sorry, this is all my fault.
You Pet Semantaried Silent Hill!
@@JoseRS1186 Sometimes boogled is better.
The finger of the Monkeys Paw curls in on itself.
Pretty sure your call was rerouted to Lucifer, which is understandable - he didn't change his number since before he was tossed down there.
One thing I have to say is that I don't mind the idea that Silent Hill doesn't have to *literally* take place in the titular town in Maine. I'm looking forward to Silent Hill F, still, and I don't mind the concept that it's taking place in Japan.
I don’t understand why Eric was redeemed and still died but Rachel survived when they were arguably equally terrible (Rachel might be worse even) Extremely boring outcome that everyone was redeemed
My hypothesis is that the only change would be if they got the big green REDEEMED or whatever would show up otherwise. Otherwise everything would play out the same.
Because voting
The thing that bothers me is that the whole redemption thing was never elaborated on at all. I wasn’t aware that the purpose of this supposedly choice-based game was redemption for any of the characters. This being a Silent Hill game, I figured coming to terms with trauma was the point, or at least some explanation for what Ascension or the Great Empath was. That seemed to be what it was building up to. It hardly satisfies the trauma aspect, and never answered anything on the cult’s end. It’s just a convoluted mess. The good thing about this ending is that no one ever mentioned Silent Hill, so it’s much easier for me to pretend this game isn’t part of the series. That and it makes the other American Silent Hill games look good by comparison.
It felt like a petty choice by the folks in charge for constantly getting their Erik/Krista plotline denied. They had to have Rachel and Krista team up because they had the "Ascension" already animated.
Rachel is definitely worse than Eric. It's not even close since when Eric made things worse, outside of lying about it being solely Toby's fault, it was genuinely an accident. Rachel intentionally locked people inside with the implication that even the fire didn't make the automatically unlock the doors until it was way too late to matter.
The trauma for every single character of note is that they either killed someone or led someone to their death. Some other side things, but that's the main trauma for everyone that they have to own up to. In Silent Hill 2, James/Angela/Eddie are all responsible for another being's death, but the only focus on that note is on James and for good reason. It's like the writers for Ascension thought that killing someone was the most traumatic and dark thing possible so they just gave it to everyone to make THEIR Silent Hill the darkest one!
There wasnt even an ascension in this, let alone a silent hill
i think the guy at the end was radcliffe maybe? and also was supposed to be like. you know the curator from dark pictures anthology? i think he was supposed to be like that. except somehow he ended up as an off-brand curator despite being FROM A REAL ACTUAL SILENT HILL GAME.
but ! hey! the lesbians were okay! and i think they even got to be happy together! which is WAY more than i was expecting from this 'game'!
Happy Pride, I guess 🤷🏿♀️?
He's Zayne (Zayne Davies apparently), Orson's imaginary friend who I guess is just this actual guy who seemingly also played Silent Hill Ascension (no wonder he's so messed up about everything)
@@petruciosxd1374 what I love about silent hill ascension is how clear and communicative the story is /j
I guess you could say every hill has its silent
Nora didn't deserve this, she was the only sympathetic character
So... did Krista die? If so then literally every innocent person in this game died other than Lejo and Nils lol. And sure some of them died because of The Withering so maybe it was the Collector's doing (trying to stop Ghost King?) but Karl killing his wife had NOTHING to do with The Withering even though they teased it the entire first half! He denied that the wife was abusive until right before he left so did he just decide to kill her? He just gets off COMPLETELY scot free for straight up murder. Heck most of the main cast kill SEVERAL people/ leads to them dying brutally and they just laugh it off.
Welp. It's like they say. You can't spell Silent Hill Ascension without AI
a third or so of ascension was orson reenacting that youtube video where the mom asks what the kid has and he says A KNIFE.
Silent Hill Ascension: Endut! Hoch Hech!
Eyepatch Wolf: What the hell was that!
Name dropping all those characters' families is so fucking dumb it's almost incredible.
We need the video on this. I need an explanation. This was ... We knew it was bad but fucking what
Man, I keep hearing ‚the GREY Empath’ - and that would have made the lead-up to his reveal so much more intriguing.
JOHN IS REDEEMED
I can't watch it without thinking this is my hell
Eyepatch Wolf is a saint to go through this
The Silent Hill was inside us all along
This has been one of the most entertaining "let's plays" I have ever seen and I'm shockingly sad it has ended. This was a great journey and I have FAITH it will get a sequel as horrible as this one.
Imagine if none of the other Silent Hill projects were anounced and this was the only thing released for the series after all this years
Ah, finally, some real cinema
Gettin Boogled for John Eyepatch
i would even accept.. after the end, in a new house, trying to start over "hu, i really like this new house.. so peaceful.. such a silent................ hill" :))))))))))
Well.
That certainly was.
The way some of the Redeemed scenes play out make me think that there was actually going to be no difference in how the scenes played out regardless of what outcome they got. But more importantly, I am stupified. I was expecting a hacky ending on the level of what the game has had so far. I was not expecting it to simply drop everything with no real attempt at an explanation or resolution.
Whatever. Whats really important here is this: THE FINAL GAMER HAS ASCENDED
A Sponsor! Here?! Impossibe!
Holy shit! There's *SO* many dead bodies in that backyard!
This game gets exactly 1 point for not killing the lesbian couple
You had to kill them all to have the Silent Hill ending.
So is the moral of the game that violence solves trauma?
The resilience of this man ...to being able to follow up this """game""" ... truly admirable. Respect.
Silent Hill Ascension has stuffed enough Revelations into the last 3 episodes to make at least 2 Resident Evil games
John loves this because its just the kind of storytelling in wrestling, 10+ weeks of promise with no forward momentum in plot only for every single resolution to happen in like 1 hour.
they all walk like middle aged men getting out of the pool
A fascinating watch, beginning to end. I hope (sincerely) that you will make a two hour breakdown video. We all need it. You as well...
06:57 I'm bit surprised Foxcade didn't edit "Joy is Redeemed" here even before that ending after all of John's obviously misplaced yet constant hopes. The only other thing that surprises me is that the script managed to make Rachel *even more* unlikeable before the end...while also just letting her get away it with completely like it technically did Barbara and Aurora's useless asses. What.
Gods, I'm *so* glad that the words "Silent Hill" never pop up "in-game" so I can just completely ignore this supposedly being part of the same series. There was potential for two or three actually decent stories here, but the script managed to utterly squander all of them even before going out of its way to fuck over Nora despite her being the most sympathetic American character by far even with how superfluous she largely is.
Sigh. I can't say I'm surprised by that either given what current Konami has become and has been for the past decade or so. Things *really* aren't looking good for _Silent Hill F_ and the _Silent Hill 2_ remake at this point.
I don't think it can be overstated how psychotic it is that the game shows Astrid confronting and overcoming the guilt she feels in connection with her sister's mass shooting by grabbing a gun and shooting it