Silent Still 2 Review (PC)

Silent Still II capitalizes on the art of hallucinatory stimulation in an effort to keep you awake even when you cradle the thought of dreaming. It finds you there, somewhere between the land of nod and behind the soulless eyes of a static silhouette who cannot move, cannot breathe, and cannot react to the supernatural horrors that shroud the darkest quarters of the room. It puts you in a chokehold, and it forces you to witness a perplexing series of events that offer little to no real comfort or benefit to your wellbeing. The only thing that it doesn’t do, really, is pinch you to wake you up and bring you back to reality.

With sleep paralysis being at the heart of Silent Still’s rough fifty-minute journey, you—a restless civilian who struggles to differentiate between dream and reality—must endure a short but tantalizing voyage through the lens of paranoia, where every whisper, every creak, and every shadow serves only to rock your perspective and force you to question fact from fiction. Alone, and without the warmth of a familiar face or a comforting home, you must embrace the sleep paralysis demons that stalk your nightmares. It isn’t always apparent, but believe me when I say, there is always something watching. And the worst part is, the demons in question are usually a lot closer than you think.

At no point during the few chapters in Silent Still did I ever expect to slip into a gameplay-heavy experience. And to some extent, I wasn’t that far from the truth. In fact, the bulk of the journey involved either waiting for something “spooky” to happen, or channeling the frequencies of the atmosphere and hoping that the mood wouldn’t suddenly shift in tempo and force me to participate in a daring chase sequence. Either way, there was never a lot I could do with the tools I had; I was locked in a static state, defenseless, hopeless, and unable to respond until the episode passed and I was able to proceed to the next chapter. And honestly, that mannequin-like feeling stuck around from the moment I witnessed my first dream to the second I arose from the bedsheet to endure a bitter climax.

There’s a lot that you can do with a subject like sleep paralysis. Heck, with a wealth of silhouettes, demons and hallucinations to work with, you could create a textbook horror with wall-to-wall jump scares and be done with it. But, Silent Still doesn’t opt for the cheap shortcut; instead, it prioritizes the art of suspense, bridge-building techniques, and the subtle shifts in the wind that force you to peek over your shoulder every four seconds like clockwork. Don’t get me wrong, it still features its fair share of eye-rolling peek-a-boo moments, but not enough to make the entire experience feel predictable and borderline ridiculous. No, because if Silent Still is anything at all, it’s a reflection of your standard sleep paralysis experience, and not a shameless attempt to fantasize it with all of the unnecessary frills of a cliche-addled thriller. Well, sort of.

As I mentioned earlier, there isn’t a lot of gameplay to sink your teeth into here, nor is there a beefy story mode with a hundred twists or turns for you to tackle. Aside from the odd head swivel or bit of textbook legwork, you mostly have a classic first-person horror game that emphasizes the psychological aspect over nonsensical jump scares and slop. As such, it doesn’t often require you to manually explore locations or complete any irregular puzzles as a traditional survival horror normally would. Instead, it tasks you with inspecting your surroundings, be it from the foot of your pillow or beneath the suds of a bath, panning the camera back and forth, and listening for any unusual activity that may or may not be taking place during your episode. To that end, it’s a pretty easy game to jump into, as it doesn’t require all that much effort to navigate or even beat. The question is, does its lack of interactivity make it worth playing?

Although there’s still a rather short game here that doesn’t go much further than a psychological creep fest that boasts a few peek-a-boo moments and well-orchestrated bouts of skin-shuddering thrills, I will say that Silent Still has a knack for weaving suspense into its chapters. With a solid audiovisual palette and just enough trickery to keep you second guessing your whereabouts, it certainly makes for an intense affair with a lot of tender sequences. It isn’t great, and it still doesn’t hold its own against a bigger, bolder, and more financially stable psychological horror. That said, for a small indie that has just a fraction of screen time to showcase its world, it does make a pretty strong impression. That’s a huge plus in my books.

Suffice it to say that, with enough eeriness and deadly premonitions to make your skin shudder and your thumbs twitch, Silent Still II makes for an ideal place to plant your feet and launch a quick stream. Again, I wouldn’t expect a beefy campaign with a lot of content if I were you. But, for a quick romp through the world of sleep paralysis, I couldn’t think of a better place to drop your pillow than in Silent Still’s ominous universe.

Verdict

Silent Still II hones in on the atmospheric horrors of sleep paralysis in an attempt to conjure a short but immensely unsettling experience that can put the hairs on your chest and a frog in your throat. It might not linger in a dream-like state for all that long, but it does make a lasting impression in its enclosed world, with thanks to its tender scares and unnerving effects that hold a narrowing presence throughout its short fifty-minute journey. It could be longer, and it could certainly do with a few extra gameplay elements to help broaden its appeal. Still, it gets the job done and gives you more than enough to fret about — and that alone warrants the price of admission.