Silent Hills: Guillermo del Toro Teases What Could Have Been

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Film director Guillermo del Toro discusses Silent Hills and the massive potential the game had prior to its cancellation by the developer and publisher Konami.

During Hideo Kojima’s and Guillermo del Toro’s special addressat this year’s D.I.C.E. Summit in Las Vegas, the discussion’s moderator Geoff Keighley couldn’t resist bringing up the elephant in the room, which was, of course, Silent Hills . Obviously, as evidenced by the near-constant discussion of the now-defunct game nearly two years after its cancellation, many fans of Konami’s classic horror franchise had been excited at the prospect of the two luminaries working together on a reboot entry in the series with. That said, Kojima and del Toro reminiscing about the project was certainly interesting to say the least.

When asked about what the collaboration process for Silent Hills ‘ playable teaser (AKA) was like, del Toro’s face lit up, as he began recounting its inspirations and intentions, and the grandiose plans he and Kojima-san had for the final product. In fact, the filmmaker went on to say that PT wasn’t even close to the Metal Gear Solid creator fully flexing his creative muscles.

Interestingly enough, according to del Toro, by using lower resolutions and frame rates, PT was originally meant to throw people off and make them think that an unknown studio was behind the project, but once fans discovered it was a Kojima Productions joint, anticipation was through the roof. For those interested, fans can find a full quote on these matters from del Toro below, along with the complete video from the D.I.C.E. Summit keynote address.

“When we were looking at P.T. , [Kojima] said ‘we’re going to do this low tech. We’re going to do this so people don’t know it’s us until the ending. It’s going to be kinda a bit crappy…’ P.T. itself was meant to be a decoy. We were thinking people would take 10 days, two weeks to solve it and they solved it in like three days.

“We had great plans. We had great ideas I think that would have done fantastic stuff. It was fantastic, the results were amazing, and that was him not putting his foot full on the pedal.”

Although we’ll never know all of what Silent Hills could have been, there’s no reason to despair, as Kojima and del Toro still want to make a new game together, so a lot of the elements from the creators’ ideas on the last project might work their way into fresh collaborations. Not to mention, with Hideo Kojima inking a contract with Sony to make a PlayStation-exclusive game, the likelihood of the film director and renowned video game maker working together once more is quite high.

While Silent Hills being cancelled with a “scorched earth approach”and the whole debacle between Konami and Kojima were two of the lowest points for the gaming world in 2015, it seems like 2016 is shaping up to be a strong year for the industry, especially with del Toro and Kojima potentially joining forces once more. If what we saw from the two wasn’t even their “foot full on the pedal”, then we’re definitely in for something spectacular in the future.

Silent Hills is no more, but Kojima’s next enterprise is in the works.

Source: The TSG Network – YouTube(via GamesRadar)