Exploring the Dark Recesses of the Teenage Experience in Silent Hill: The Short Message

Wandering the horrors in the halls of our own mind

Horror stories have a long history of paralleling raw, painful human experiences, and Silent Hill: The Short Message, the latest release in a franchise known for exploring the dark depths of the human soul, leans heavily into such subject matter. Co-developed by Konami Digital Entertainment and HexaDrive and released for free on the PS5 at the end of January, The Short Message explores potentially triggering subjects, such as suicide, depression, bullying, and child abuse and neglect. In fact, the game is well aware of the effect this could have on its players, and so warns them multiple times in between story beats by providing information on how to reach out for help, if needed, and phone numbers for support hotlines.

Upon the starting the game, Anita wakes up in an abandoned building in Kettenstadt, Germany. She immediately receives a text from her friend Maya, an internet-famous graffiti artist, who asks Anita to come and find her somewhere in the building. As the player explores the building through Anita’s first-person perspective, it is revealed through various ephemeral — old records, newspaper clippings, letters, and books — that this building has a dual reputation.