The excellent Silent Hill 2 remake hasn’t even been out for long, but it already has a bunch of stellar mods.
If you think the remake looks too similar to the original classic, then this is where you might find the extra spice that’ll make it original enough for you.
Silent Hill 2 First Person Mode mod
The main evolution seen in the horror genre during Silent Hill‘s dormancy was the shift to first-person perspective introduced in Amnesia: The Dark Descent and later seen in the doomed P.T.
The remake opts for a more modern approach in third person, but JessicaNatalia at NexusMods quickly found a way to remove the character that always stood between the danger and the player.
With First Person Mode, you really do feel like you’re visiting the town yourself, and I don’t need to explain just how scary that will turn out to be.
Silent Hill 2 PS2 Demake
Maybe your gripe is with the remake’s too-modern looks. If you’re not into insanely amazing graphics, you can instead try to experience the entire thing as a PS2 game or just play a few chapters in lo-fi for a while to make the transition less shocking.
In all seriousness, this mod provides a way to get the game to run on less powerful machines. It’s a cool option for fans of the series who, sadly, don’t have the rig that this monster needs to run smoothly.
Lastly, it’s hilarious that this is called the “PS2” mod. We all know damn well that Silent Hill 3 looked way better than this.
Original James model
A lot of people seemed to forget that this is a remake — not a remaster — and took issue with the redesign of some of the characters. I don’t know if this mod was made for those people, but it’s good to know you can now play the game as the “real” James from the original game’s release.
Playing as “classic” James is an interesting addition, especially when you bear in mind the Remake’s new special ending that I love and absolutely won’t spoil any further.
Better hair
Even though the remake does hair physics amazingly well, the same cannot be said about hair lighting. Regardless of your ray tracing settings, the hair on nu-James’ head will sport a peculiar sheen in all locations. That’s not very realistic and, worst of all, doesn’t really look all that great. The best remake deserves the best hair, so modders quickly came to the rescue and gave James a realistic makeover.
Even better hair
If realism isn’t your jam, then you’ll be glad to know there are also mods to make your James’ hair look just like that of Dante from Devil May Cry. Even better, perhaps, is how there are also mods that make his hair feature a color combo that matches Maria’s hair. Fabulous Hills.
No fog
Whereas the difficulty level of most games comes from their enemies and/or level design, one of the biggest challenges in Silent Hill is not getting too scared to keep on playing. Are you afraid of coming too close to deadly beasts using the fog as a camouflage device? No more!
You can now completely remove the fog, courtesy of FrancisLouis’ “Silent Hill HD Collection” mod, which got that name after the 2012 HD collection that accidentally messed up most of the game’s fog.
Sunny Hills
If even the complete removal of fog isn’t enough for you, then let’s make the game look even more like what James and Mary likely experienced when they first visited the town. How? By adding a sun. Sunny Hills doesn’t always look great — and it surely won’t help you in the many indoor areas — but when it looks great, it looks absolutely stunning.
This, like most of the visual mods on this list, should totally be absorbed and made into an official alternate game mode for NG+.
Ultra Plus Fixes and Visual Improvements
The remake already looks out-of-this-world-good, but that kind of grandeur doesn’t come without a few visual glitches and performance hiccups.
This mod fixes issues with fog noise, stutter, particle trails, and reflections and even improves the game’s performance. Better yet, all donations made to modder SammiLucia will go towards Wildlife Society.
CJ Silent Andreas
I knew this would only be a matter of time, but I didn’t expect CJ to show up before the game had been out for a whole week. I guess it just makes sense that the remake would be blessed by the video game patron saint of “here we go again,” even more so when we’re talking about a crossover between two of the best games in the history of the PS2.
Modder Iven warns that CJ might look a bit weird in some cutscenes because he retains some of James’ attributes, but I’d argue that weirder can only mean better in this context.
Restoring the Silent Hill Ranch to its former “glory”
Some remakes go too far and end up removing jank that had rightfully earned a place in our hearts. Fans will know I’m talking about the controversial “Silent Hill Ranch” sign, which saw its serious font inexplicably replaced by the universally loathed Comic Sans in the 2012 remaster.
The remake, even with all of its immense improvements, has made — in the eyes of some — the mistake of fixing this sign, which caused the game to lose some of its soul. Rest easy, though, as you can now go through the trouble of downloading and installing a mod just so you can once again re-fix something that you’ll only take a brief glimpse at once during your playthrough.
