10 Video Game Bugs That Became Features

5. The Mist - Silent Hill

Silent Hill 2
Konami

It’s hard to imagine Silent Hill without its iconic fear-inducing fog, and yet it largely eventuated due to issues with the hardware and its processing power.

While this one is more of a feature that blossomed out of hardware limitations than a true glitch, it achieved a whole lot more than solving a technical issue. The fog was largely used in order to take pressure off of the hardware so it would only have to render the area around the player. Though there may have been some intention for the fog to be mechanically and narratively important as its use in the Fog World was inspired by Stephen King’s novella The Mist, it ended up being positively crucial to the game’s cult favourite atmosphere.

The horror of not knowing what lay inside the fog and the constant dread of having to push ahead through it helped establish Silent Hill as a survival horror masterclass.

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Jess has been a journalist and content creator in the games industry for over 15 years and has been WhatCulture's resident Australian import and sorry cop since 2020, upping the quotient of swearing and apologising in WhatCulture Gaming's annual blooper videos considerably. She previously worked at GameSpot for 10 years, most notably hosting GameSpot News in addition to E3 live shows, and PAX panels. She regularly livestreams a variety of games on her 'jessmcdonell' YouTube and Twitch channels and hosts the 'Do It On The Day' podcast. She has won awards for her news and feature work in gaming as well as an accolade for her comedic writing (likely an admin error). She can be found on X at @jessmcdonell and Instagram at @jessicamcdonell sharing her current videogame fixations, industry insights, and videos of her cat, Karma.