Konami already announced in 2022 that multiple Silent Hill projects are in development at various third-party studios. Two of these received the spotlight during the State of Play presentation today by Sony, with both Silent Hill: The Short Message and Silent Hill 2 dropping new trailers.
Silent Hill: The Short Message is a standalone experience made for newcomers to the series, and it is available now on the PlayStation Store for PlayStation 5 as a completely free horror experience.
Played in the first-person perspective, players take the role of a woman named Anita, who enters an "otherworldly" space following messages from a friend. The only clue to get out is a message saying "can"t leave til you find it", with her mobile phone also being a major gameplay factor.
Per Konami, the project had started off as an experiment as the studio tried out new ventures in the horror formula, while also giving new team memers valuable experience with building atmospheric games.
Here"s how Konami described the inspiration for the Silent Hill: The Short Message:
"We wanted to make a new, modern Silent Hill. As part of that we explored how we could incorporate contemporary problems. We ended up looking at how modern youth communicate online and through phones, and the role that could play in a psychological horror story. For instance, a frightening thing about social media is how even insignificant individual comments can, en masse, build and build until they become this overwhelming wave of hate crashing down on you.
Next up, Konami also gave a new look at the Silent Hill 2 remake. Being developed by Bloober Team, the latest trailer focuses more on the combat elements, catch it above. Unfortunately, a release date is still not attached to the project, with only a "in development for PlayStation 5" tagline appearing in the trailer.