A new interview has revealed the original team wanted changes on the Silent Hill 2 remake while the remake team, Bloober Team, wanted to retain the feel of the horror classic.
The new interview (with Famitsu) had many things discussed such as the game’s new camera angle, user interface, and even possible changes from that of the original.
Likely to be the surprise of many longtime fans would be the fact that many members of the original development team aimed to “change drastically” a lot of parts with the remake, but that remake developer Bloober Team were the ones to go against changes due to wanting to stick closer to how the original game.
“As a matter of fact, the Japanese staff, including Masahiro Ito, the designer who worked on the original version, and Akira Yamaoka, the sound designer, said, ‘We want to change this part.’ On the other hand, the Bloober Team had a lot of opinions like ‘No, we don’t want to change this part!’,” producer Motoi Okamoto said.
He added, “While opinions sometimes clashed, in the end, we were able to incorporate the changes into the final version. I am sure that if you watch the trailer, you will see that we have kept the good qualities of the original version while making it more modern.”
When asked more about how classic games get remade for modern audiences, Okamoto said the original creators typically don’t want to make the same thing,
“Game creators don’t want to re-create what they have created,” Okamoto said. “They don’t want people to enjoy the same thing over and over again. That is why there were so many things we wanted to change in the remake.
“But in the end, thanks to the input of the Bloober Team, who are big fans of the original, we ended up with a game that highly respects the original. If we had formed a development team entirely in Japan, it might have been a completely different remake.”
One example of something the Japanese side of things wanted to have different was the age of protagonist James. Okamoto wanted to have him appear older compared to the original game because players who enjoyed Silent Hill 2 back in the day have aged as well.
This can be clearly seen in his appearance when the remake was first announced, but now James is closer to his original age, which Okamoto admits he has begun to feel is the better choice.
The developers also seem to be taking fan feedback to heart as well. When the combat trailer was released earlier this year, fans complained about what seemed to be a higher emphasis on action. So they’ve made adjustments to the monster’s movements to make things more “suitable”.
While they have made changes from past decisions to closer reflect the original, there has been online discussion from fans about the character designs, particularly of Maria and Angela having some differences viewed to lose meaning from the original Silent Hill 2.
In the past, Bloober Team’s Chief Marketing Officer has stated the team was going to make changes to parts of the game that needed “modernizing”. So what changes the team themselves wished to make versus that from the Japanese side of development is unknown.
The Silent Hill 2 remake is set to launch for Windows PC (via Steam) and PlayStation 5 on October 8th.
