Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition, the years-long fan project to improve Silent Hill 2’s original PC port, has just released its 10th and final update. As the hour-plus video demonstrates, this update adds features like “enhanced environmental assets, restored flashlight reflections, improved water visuals, true 60 fps FMVs, a ton of general game improvements, and more.”
I played Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition one or two updates ago and it was already a lovely HD version of Silent Hill 2. Many of the changes made by this patch are fairly minor compared to the Enhanced Edition’s headline features, like making the classic survival horror headfuck playable in widescreen on modern hardware with upscaled graphics and better controls.
Still, it’s fascinating to see the little tweaks the team decided to complete before saying goodbye to Silent Hill 2. For instance, if you ever noticed that the sign for the Cafe Texan was sometimes displayed backwards, that’s now been fixed, as have various flickering Z-fighting glitches where textures overlapped at doors and on windows, some incorrect textures, a missing payphone, and bugged-out model seams like one on the cover over the hot dog cart.
As the project completion notes explain, “If any major bugs or issues are found that are directly caused by changes to our project’s code for this final update, we will go back and address them.” But, assuming they don’t need to, this is the final update for Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition. And no, the timing wasn’t planned to beat Bloober’s remake to the punch. “This update (Update#10) was planned by our own volition to be our final update for two years now. After working on the project for nearly seven years, we are satisfied with everything we wanted to develop and ultimately achieved for the game.”
To download Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition, head to the website and follow the instructions in full. You’ll need the PC port installed as well, either the North American or European version.
