Konami expands its horror franchise beyond traditional American bounds with Silent Hill: Townfall, a first-person thriller set in a 1996 Scottish village. Developed by Glasgow-based Screen Burn Interactive, the title introduces a pocket television tool and a narrative built across three distinct character perspectives.
Following the series’ journey through 1960s Japan in previous releases, Konami is pushing its iconic horror property into fresh geographical territory. The publisher has enlisted external studios to reimagine the franchise with annual release ambitions spanning remasters, remakes, and entirely new entries. Konami has been very vocal regarding its most popular IP, Silent Hill, and its new offering, Silent Hill: Townfall, is set to release on September 24. This news comes with statements made by the game’s producer, Motoi Okamoto, in an interview with Video Games Chronicle that the company is planning to drop new games in the Silent Hill franchise annually. Okamoto has also expressed his desire to release a Silent Hill game every year. The series’ lead producer at Konami Motoi Okamoto told me the team were looking at various areas to potentially set the next games, from other parts of Europe
to “Latin America”.
Silent Hill Townfall
St. Amelia and the Scottish Coastal Setting of 1996
Silent Hill: Townfall drops players into the fictional coastal village of St. Amelia in 1996 Scotland. Following Silent Hill f’s journey through 1960s Japan, Townfall takes the series to the isolated shores of 90s Scotland, bringing a fresh ensemble of characters, nightmarish terrors, and a tragic tale that’s as addictive as it is enthralling. Townfall is set in 1996 and takes place in St Amelia, a Scottish coastal village. It doesn’t exist in real life, but as someone who spent much of my childhood visiting Scottish fishing villages, it’s stunningly authentic anyway (especially to St Monans, the Fife hamlet it’s based on). The environment draws heavy inspiration from real locations, specifically incorporating authentic period details like local post office posters, vintage computer disk boxes, and family photographs sourced from the development team’s personal archives. The Post Office (or its trademark-shimmying equivalent, at least) has exactly the kind of charmingly crap promotional posters on the wall that you would expect to have seen there at the time. Residents with computers keep their floppy disks in those little boxes with the clear lid (and some of these are locked, leading to puzzles where you have to find the key).
Players step into the shoes of an amnesiac man named Simon Ordell, who has found himself in the foggy coastal town of St. Amelia. He doesn’t know how he’s washed up on the harbor’s shores, nor does he remember why he has an IV drip hanging from his arm. All Simon knows is he has to ‘put things right’ in a place where things have tragically gone wrong. It’s only when he looks deeper into the heart of St. Amelia that he uncovers the mysteries hidden beneath the fog, and the role he played in the abandoned town.
Silent Hill Townfall review
Screen Burn Interactive Shifts to First-Person Horror and the CRTV
Shifting away from the franchise’s traditional third-person perspective, Screen Burn Interactive has ditched its predecessors’ signature over-the-shoulder perspective, putting you firmly in the quaking boots of its unlucky protagonist. This time, it’s the Glasgow-based Screen Burn who are taking charge, and that means finding themes that evoke ‘Silent Hill,’ despite the move away from its home territory. At Gamescom, we asked Writer and Creative Director Jon McKellan of Screen Burn and Konami Producer Motoi Okamoto about Townfall’s use of analog horror, and where its journey will lead. Okamoto reveals (via translator) that the partnership with Screen Burn came as the result of conversations between himself, Konami US, and publisher Annapurna Interactive. After we were introduced to their name, we of course made sure to play their previous games, Stories Untold and Observation, and that really clicked with us. We were really impressed with those games, so we decided to follow through.
Screen Burn’s history with narrative-driven thrillers runs all the way through Silent Hill: Townfall, which adopts a first-person perspective to put you right in the thick of what protagonist Simon Ordell sees and hears. It’s a new format for Silent Hill, and McKellan says this was the pitch right from the start: We felt that was going to be the best fit for a game where you want the player to really connect to the environment around you.
Jon McKellan, Writer and Creative Director at Screen Burn
Silent Hill f Shows Why Reinventing a Horror Game
The handheld CRTV serves as a multifaceted tool for survival. The first-person view is also the ideal way to integrate Townfall’s most prominent tool, a pocket television called the CRTV that can tune into signals as you explore.
Multiple Endings Tied to Player Choices
Games journalist and self-proclaimed “Silent Hillian” Vikki Blake told me the latest game exceeded her expectations, though she’s still not convinced these newer games truly fit under the Silent Hill name. After my playthrough, I can see why Konami are pushing ahead with the idea to let other studios breathe new life into the franchise and take it to different destinations. Townfall is a brutal, grim journey – uneven in parts, but clever – and full of immense tension and inventive game design, the kind that is needed to push a nearly 30-year-old franchise forward.