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Silent Hill 3 is the third installment in the survival horror series. The game was released in Europe on May 23, 2003, in Japan on July 3, 2003 and in North America on August 6, 2003. It was released for the Sony PlayStation 2 and PC.

The game is staged seventeen years after the first Silent Hill game, and is centered on a teenage girl named Heather who is drawn into Silent Hill's bizarre reality and must enter the town itself to resolve the situation. She ultimately discovers she is a part of the plans of the town's cult and becomes caught in a conflict within the cult itself.

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Summary of Silent Hill 3

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Years pass, and Heather is now a young girl of seventeen. One day, while running an errand for her father at the local mall, she falls asleep inside a burger joint known as Happy Burger, and dreams about Silent Hill. She finds herself wandering through the nightmare version of Lakeside Amusement Park, armed with a switchblade, a length of steel pipe, a pistol, and a submachine gun. After fighting her way past several demonic-looking monsters, Heather makes her way up the stairs where the 'Monster Coaster' is located, and is mowed down on the tracks by a roller coaster.

After the coaster incident in her dream, Heather wakes up from the nightmare. Shaking it off as a bad dream, she exits the burger joint and calls her father and lets him know that she is on her way home. She encounters a detective named Douglas Cartland, who was hired by a cult known as The Order to find Heather. Heather thinks that he is a stalker and ducks into the ladies' restroom. She jumps out the window, but her way out is blocked on both ends, forcing her to find another way through the mall. Inside the employee's area there are strange monsters lurking around. Inside a clothing store, Heather finds a handgun to defend herself with.

As Heather wanders through the mall, she encounters a woman dressed in all black who identifies herself as Claudia Wolf, and hired Douglas to find Heather. Claudia tells her, "Remember me, and your true self as well," and that she will lead them to Paradise "with blood stained hands." Heather then comes down with a serious migraine, as if she was trying to remember something from long ago as Claudia departs. It is later told that Claudia is the daughter of Leonard Wolf, another leader of the Order.

When Heather enters an elevator, its descent causes a radio to drop from the ceiling, which emits static whenever monsters are nearby. The elevator doors open up revealing a second, more sinister-looking elevator that indicates a crossover into another reality. After riding the second elevator down, Heather then finds herself inside a nightmare version of the mall. Even though she is frightened, she manages to make it back to the real world after a battle with an enormous worm in the mall's depths.

Once everything is back to normal, Heather heads for the subway. However, Douglas stops her. Heather assumes that the private investigator is in league with Claudia and leaves the bewildered man alone. As with the mall, the subway is deserted, with the exception of the odd monster. Heather even has a close call when she narrowly avoids being run over by a subway car. Heather takes the aforementioned subway to the sewers and shoots her way through and after electrocuting a monster (that lives in the water) with a hair dryer, she finds an exit and reaches two buildings that are being renovated.

It is inside the second building that while inspecting a bathtub, Heather enters the nightmare world once again. She also runs into a man named Vincent, who is also a member of the same cult as Claudia, but share different views on where the cult should go. Heather's exit from the building is blocked by a large monster, and can only be done away with after she recants a spell from a childhood fairytale. After getting rid of the monster, Heather is brought back to the normal world and escapes the construction site.

Upon arriving at her apartment, she discovers the body of her father,Harry Mason, having been brutally murdered while in his living room. After temporarily grieving over her father's death, Heather follows the blood trail to the apartment's rooftop, where Claudia awaits. Her explanation for Harry's murder is for his interference 17 years ago in Silent Hill, and that killing Harry would fill Heather's heart full of hatred. Claudia merely tells her that she wasn't the one that killed him, only that she gave the order to her companion, a monster known as the 'Missionary' (or Scraper). Claudia tells Heather that she will be waiting for her in Silent Hill.

Once the Missionary is taken care of, Heather finds Douglas inside the apartment. After their following verbal altercation, Heather pays her final respects to her father. Douglas offers to drive her to Silent Hill, which she agrees to, wanting to avenge her father's death. Douglas also gives her a map of Silent Hill - a gift from Vincent - and tells her that Vincent says to look for a man named Leonard Wolf, Claudia's father. Douglas also gives Heather a book addressed to her from her late father, one that recounts Harry's search for his daughter Cheryl Mason and the events that lead up to the birth of the God and Heather's own origin.

Return to Silent Hill

Heather and Douglas arrive in Silent Hill the following day. The town itself still is deserted and covered by the ever-present fog. After stopping in a local hotel, they decide to split up and search the town. Heather then heads for Brookhaven Hospital, while Douglas goes over to search the former cult leader's home.

Heather searches the hospital for clues to Claudia's whereabouts. During her time there, she discovers a hospital patient named Stanley Coleman has an unhealthy obsession with her, and that Leonard is imprisoned within the hospital.

As with the mall and construction site, Heather enters the nightmare realm once again. It is here that she encounters Leonard. Unfortunately, Leonard has degenerated into a monster and attacks Heather. After battling Leonard, Heather acquires the Seal of Metatron, and she returns to the inn, where Vincent has awaited her return.

Vincent relays a message allegedly from Douglas, telling her the Church is her next stop. In order to get there, Heather must go through Lakeside Amusement Park. Heather doubts the message is really from Douglas, yet decides to head on once again, only to find that when she arrives at the park, she enters the nightmare world once again. As in her dream, Heather follows the path to the roller coaster, only this time around, she manages to jump off the tracks before she is ran over.

Following several close calls inside a haunted house, she comes across a wounded Douglas, telling him to stay there and wait for her as she carries on. Heather eventually finds herself in the same area of the amusement park Harry was over seventeen years ago. On the carousel, Heather encounters her "dark side" otherwise named the Memory of Alessa, seemingly covered in blood or burns. Once Heather defeats her dark half, she finds the intentions of Alessa for herself and continues on, reaching the church. She encounters Claudia inside the chapel and manipulates her into believing Alessa has returned, telling Claudia that she likes the world just the way it is. Claudia explains that there is too much suffering in the world and the God of her cult will change all that. Heather explains that suffering is a fact of life and that reality must be confronted. However, Heather once again feels a severe stomach pain coming on, unable to stop Claudia once again.

Further into the church, she encounters Vincent inside the library, who tells her the seal of metatron is the key to defeating Claudia. However, upon the final confrontation, the item is useless against Claudia, who then kills him for his treachery. Heather once again begins to feel the effects of carrying the God inside her, but is able to reject the birth, much to Claudia's dismay

Using the pendant Harry gave as a gift to her, she finds it contains a small amount of Aglaophotis, the red liquid that was found when Harry made his way through Silent Hill years earlier. Heather swallows it and she becomes violently ill, vomiting the bloody fetus of the God onto the floor. After taunting Claudia that "God didn't make it," Heather is about to squash it under her heel when Claudia shoves her to the side and picks up the fetus and ingests it, disgusting Heather.

Claudia falls through a hole, and Heather follows her. Inside the hidden chamber, Claudia is nowhere to be seen. Heather then discovers the monstrosity that is in the room with her; a repulsive skeletal body, a reptilian female face and some sort of metal helmet provided by Valtiel. Due to Claudia, God has been reborn. Heather defeats the God, just as her father had before her, stomping its head in with her boot and finally finishing her vengeance.

Endings

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• Normal ("Good"): In this ending, Heather returns to the amusement park after beating the game. While there she acts very strangely as she approaches Douglas. She wields a knife and seems unresponsive. She acts as if she is about to kill Douglas but then suddenly stops and tells him she is just kidding and playing a joke. Douglas makes a comment on how she has a twisted sense of humour. She then insists that Douglas call her Cheryl, which is the name her father, Harry, originally gave her. Douglas then asks if she is also considering going back to her original black hair colour, to which she replies that blonds have more fun. The game closes with the credits rolling over a picture of Heather visiting Harry's grave as the song Hometown plays, sung by Joe Romersa. In the Book of Lost Memories, an official story guide from the creators of Silent Hill, this is the only ending analyzed and can be interpreted as the true ending. However, the guide also takes into account the Phantom and Possessed endings as conclusions that can be drawn about the game from each individual, much like those found in Silent Hill 2.
• Possessed ("Bad"): Heather appears to come out of a daze. She sees Douglas lying before her, stabbed to death. She realizes that she is holding her knife in her hand, and that it is soaked with blood. Some feel this alludes to the prophecy, which contains the sentence "leading believers to paradise with blood stained hands," and that this relates to Heather somehow. To get the "Possessed" ending, the player must have already finished the game at least once, with Heather accumulating a certain number of "points" throughout the second attempt. Points are accumulated through killing creatures (10 points each), taking damage (1 point with each attack), or forgiving the confessor (1,000 points). The player must accumulate 4,000 points to receive this ending.

• Revenge: Just as in Silent Hill and Silent Hill 2, Silent Hill 3 has a UFO ending. After doing what is necessary to attain this ending, a story-board\comic-like ending commences. Heather returns home to find that her father and protagonist of the first game, Harry Mason, is not dead, and is in fact sitting at a table drinking tea with an alien. James Sunderland, the protagonist from Silent Hill 2, can be seen in the background, hiding behind a curtain. Heather, who seems unfazed by the fact that an alien is present, informs her father of all the horrors and events that she has experienced in Silent Hill. Harry, clearly upset, vows revenge on the town for wronging his daughter. He jump-kicks a wooden board, held by James, clean in two pieces in a fit of rage, as Heather and the alien look on and cheer. The next scene portrays the town being obliterated in a UFO attack similar to a 1950s science fiction B-horror movie. The credit sequence then begins, with an unseen Japanese man coaxing an unseen chorus of what sounds to be Japanese men impersonating children into singing an odd song, entitled Silent Hill no Uta ("Silent Hill's Song") about the Silent Hill 3 characters, featuring silly jabs at each of the characters. They then appear to be gunned down by anonymous machine gun fire. This ending cannot be acquired on the first playthrough, and requires that the player kill at least 30 monsters with the "Sexy Beam" before entering Harry's apartment. According to the creator, whether jokingly or not, the UFO endings are the true endings to Silent Hill as they link all of the games together.

• Phantom:

Most tend to regard only the three primary endings, Normal, Possessed and Revenge. However, if the player should attack Claudia in the Final Stage, the God will be born and the game over screen will appear. This is also considered a possible conclusion to the game.

Reception

Silent Hill 3 has received positive reviews since its inception, garnering an 84% at Game Rankings for the PS2 version and a 70% for the PC version

Music

The original soundtrack for Silent Hill 3, composed by Akira Yamaoka, was released in Japan on July 16, 2003 and its cataloged number is KOLA-038.

Influences and trivia

See Silent Hill influences and trivia

Sequels

As of 2006, one sequel title exists. A second is planned for an as yet unspecified next generation console.

• Silent Hill 4: The Room (2004)
• Silent Hill 5 (TBA)

Additionally, a prequel is planned for release on the PlayStation Portable.

• Silent Hill: Origins (2007)

External links

• Official Silent Hill 3 site (Konami Europe)
• Silent Hill series (Konami Japan)
• Gamespot
• Silent Hill 3 ⚠ "mbid" is missing! at MusicBrainz
• Silent Hill 3 ⚠ "mbid" is missing! at MusicBrainz
• Silent Hill 3 at MobyGames
• Translated Memories

1. http://www.translatedmemories.com/bookpgs/Pg08-09AlessasHistory.jpg
2. http://www.translatedmemories.com/bookpgs/Pg70-71SH3Ending.jpg
3. http://www.translatedmemories.com/bookpgs/Pg108-109.jpg
4. http://www.translatedmemories.com/bookpgs/Pg110-111.jpg
5. http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/561292.asp?q=Silent%20Hill%203
6. http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/914765.asp?q=Silent%20Hill%203

• 2003 video games
• Horror video games
• Survival horror games
• Windows games
• PlayStation 2 games
• Silent Hill