10 Video Games That Were WAY Ahead Of Their Time
7. Atmosphere - Silent Hill
When Resident Evil 3: Nemesis and Dino Crisis hit shelves in 1999, it looked like Capcom had cornered the survival horror genre. Instead, gamers fell in love with a brand new title from Konami called Silent Hill.
Because of its B-movie plot, generic protagonist, and minimal monster encounters, many didn't expect much from Silent Hill at first.
But what stopped Team Silent's game from being a Resident Evil clone is the focus on atmosphere. Due to the haunting sound design and Akira Yamaoka's ambient soundtrack, Silent Hill doesn't just scare you - it leaves you unsettled. The fog, which was only inserted to mitigate the hardware's limitations, leaves the player in a constant state of dread and isolation. It also made the gameplay scarier since you can only see enemies when they get too close for comfort.
Unlike other survival horror, our hero is an everyman rather than a badass with combat training, which makes him more relatable and the gameplay more frightening.
Although Silent Hill 2 is regarded to be the franchise's crown jewel of the franchise, it was its predecessor that changed the survival horror genre forever.