Welcome to the red zone
In spirit, the game feels like an episode of “The Twilight Zone” — an American TV series where ordinary and not-so-ordinary people became part of paranormal events. Cozy American small towns where all kinds of devilry took place often served as the setting.
Silver Pines is exactly like that. By the time the game begins, most residents have been evacuated due to an impending storm. But even without people, this place continues to feel alive, with its welcoming signs over shops and diners. Everything here seems logical and clear — until you stumble upon the world's eerie flip side.
Before the storm starts, private detective Red Walker arrives in town, looking much like James Sunderland, the protagonist of Silent Hill 2. Walker is ready to search every nook and cranny to find missing musician Eddie Velvet. The investigation brings the hero into contact with the remaining residents, who know more about the detective than he does himself. Some support him, others criticize him, and the local malicious cop constantly puts spokes in his wheels.
Another character, strange as it may seem, is the color red. The game uses a red filter to mark locations crucial to the plot and show the protagonist's progressing madness. But more often than not, it is a way to warn of an upcoming boss fight. See red? Arm yourself. It is surprising that almost right after Silent Hill: Townfall, a game came out that also relies so heavily on this color.
Mystery behind closed doors
To find Eddie, you need to step into the detective's shoes and latch onto any lead. Walker collects found newspapers, evidence, and instructions in a handy journal and makes marks on the map. If you photograph a certain location or item, the photo appears on the map. At one point, the hero is asked: “Remember the password I told you 10 hours ago?”. Fortunately, there is no need to recall anything when everything is written down in the journal.
To progress through the story and gather resources, you need to solve puzzles. With doors, everything is straightforward — look for clues. Often opening a lock requires a combination hidden in a note or somewhere in the environment. Need to crawl or jump to the right spot? The protagonist is agile and jumps well. Sometimes you will have to find a weapon or special item to solve a puzzle or break through an obstacle.
Sometimes you have to recall skills from the past, like using a push-button telephone. I remember seeing “55-FAITH” on a billboard. And right then it clicked in my head: “Right! In the past it was popular to combine numbers and letters — that means you need to press the digits positioned over the letters to dial the number.” That is how the puzzle was solved.
Just like in Silent Hill: Townfall, the telephone in Silver Pines is used to save progress. As you can tell, I got a strong impression that these two games share way too many common ideas.
However, towards the end, the number of repetitive puzzles goes beyond the bounds of decency. Wherever you go, there is a door requiring a separate key, a number combination, or something else along those lines. And the phrase “This door opens from the other side” reminds you of Silent Hill yet again. Admittedly, it starts getting on your nerves.
Clunky guns and bizarre enemies
The game has plenty of melee and ranged weapons that will fall into the hands of the most observant players. A blade or a baseball bat does not consume ammo, but you will have to repair them with duct tape. After finding cooler weapons, for example to open passages, the previous ones become useless. What is the point of carrying a knife when a sledgehammer can both bash a monster and break through a fragile wall?
Silver Pines also gives you plenty of shooting — while exploring the town, the hero will be able to find several types of shotguns, pistols, a rifle, and a submachine gun. You will have to slowly load cartridges into them to start shooting — remember that doing this in combat is very inconvenient.
Different weapons require distinct ammo types, which the game dishes out sparingly. Often you pull a gun out of storage not because you want to, but taking available ammunition into account, piling the rest into one big heap. But the ammo supply is enough to appreciate each one properly — even the nail gun, from which you do not expect much in games, will get its moment of glory.
And who will you have to fight? You will have to fend off humanoid blobs that walk slowly and hit predictably, but even such enemies cause enough trouble — the clever bastards stop when you wind up a swing, retreat after falling, and break into a run. They are unpredictable.
The deeper into the woods, the thicker and meaner the blobs get: they can poison, leap long distances, and hurl poisoned flesh. You start hating the fast and resilient dogs, which seem to exist solely to test the player's patience. And towards the end, bloated flying creatures show up — they explode and drive the protagonist mad.
The bosses stand out only for their appearance. Fighting the controls is harder than fighting them — getting nervous, I kept opening the map while trying to dodge.
Diagnosis
Silver Pines is a good game, but a very monotonous one tailored to a specific mood. It greets you with the mysterious atmosphere of a backwater American town in the early nineties. Navigating it is comfortable and pleasant, as is wrecking furniture and gunning down monsters, discovering new passages, and gaining access to locked old ones.
However, you will often have to backtrack to visited locations, constantly search for door keys, or solve repetitive puzzles. At the start and up to the midpoint, you enjoy doing this, so you simply do not notice the time spent in the game. But later you start getting bored of the repetition, since you already handle emerging issues on autopilot. The main downside for me was that after getting one of the endings, there was zero desire left to see the rest.
Nevertheless, I still recommend the game to those who want a measured and cozy horror, as strange as that phrasing might sound.