Editorials
How ‘The Evil Within 2’s Open World Builds on the Structure of Early ‘Silent Hill’ Games
Ever since the first Silent Hill game, I’ve always loved opening up an in-game map. There’s something about having it on a separate screen that makes you look at it harder, trying to remember your directions. Was it two lefts, then right or the other way around? Can’t remember, better check again. It gave me a second way to get to know the world. Not only was I navigating the space, but I was ingraining it in my memory by studying the maps over and over.
I was not expecting The Evil Within 2 to have a map. Having only played the beginning few chapters of the first one, I was under the impression that the series was a lot more linear. It was a fine game, but never really sunk its teeth in more or elevated itself from other horror games, especially when compared to director Shinji Mikami’s other famous work, Resident Evil 4.
Within the first few chapters of Evil Within 2 I said to myself, “This is just a modern Silent Hill.” Not necessarily in story or creativity, but in structure. The game takes place in a city set up in a subconscious realm called Union. This acts as an open world area that you traverse through, finding your way into interior sections. These levels of the game never end up being quite as memorable as the ones in Silent Hill, but the open world sections evolve the feeling of exploring the town of Silent Hill into a modern era.
When you hear open world, you often think of the UbiSoft model of having a mini-map that is littered with icons, giving the player an overwhelming number of things to check off their to-do list as they move between objectives. Like Silent Hill, Evil Within 2 smartly doesn’t give you a mini-map, instead forcing you to go to the map screen. Even on this map screen, you aren’t bombarded with symbols. In order to place side quests on your map, you have to get close enough to an objective to be able to “pick up its signal.” These can range from corpses with items to memory echoes that give you story details.
You will definitely need to be exploring the open world, because Evil Within 2 definitely has a “count your bullets” old school survival horror feeling. This forces you to explore as much as possible to find these signals and hunt down all the extra ammo and upgrades you can. Often, the game will have you do some risk-reward analysis as to whether it’s even worth getting past enemies to grab an ammo cache. There were several occasions where I decided to hunt down some shotgun ammo, only to use an equivalent amount of a different ammo type in order to fight my way to the point on the map.
Enemies can soak up a lot of damage, and the game limits how much ammo you can hold, so you have to approach your encounters wisely or avoid them altogether. I found myself opening up that map and carefully planning the route of least resistance to attempt to avoid a firefight that would both waste my ammo and draw more enemies to my location. The maps do not show locations of enemies, so there’s only so much planning you can do. You’ll still have to do a lot of improvisation as you sneak out of the bushes to stealthily take out a monster, only to get surprised by the other creature crawling on the ground right behind it.
My favorite part of the open world sections were the wayside stories and optional content popped up throughout. Triggering certain events can throw off all your carefully planned sneaking, forcing you into a full-on panic.
For example, at one point I was sneaking around, successfully avoiding the monsters patrolling the town, only to trigger a side quest that summoned a giant beast. Having never seen anything like it, I decided to try to run and assess my options.
After ducking into a nearby cafe, I inadvertently triggered ANOTHER side quest. This time I was teleported into an entirely different setting where I had to avoid an unkillable ghost while sneaking through a facility. After completing that section, I was sent right back to that cafe, where I had to worry whether or not that giant creature was still roaming. Stories like this that play out organically can be so much more interesting than strictly scripted content, making the game world feel more alive.
Since horror relies so much more on using pacing to control tension and release, developers often have a tendency to build more of a linear funhouse in order to control the player’s experience more thoroughly. Given how death in horror games comes frequently, players may have to play the same section over and over again, taking away the tension, replacing it with tedium. The more open and you can make your horror, the more unpredictability you can inject into your game, providing the user different experiences each time they play.
In this day and age, the word “troll” is often used to describe various online nuisances. Yet as abundant and irksome as the modern troll can be, they aren’t usually as fearsome as their mythological counterparts. I’m not talking about the small and gentler versions that have become more common to see in media. No, there are much bigger and scarier trolls out there—and André Øvredal’s movie Troll Hunter is one of the best places to find them.
It doesn’t take long for Troll Hunter (or Trolljegeren) to dump the Blair Witch Project-esque setup and aim for something a lot fresher. The trajectory of the story is augmented by Otto Jespersen’s character Hans, the titular Troll Hunter. The second he comes barreling out of the deep, dark woods and shouts “troll” at the camera, this movie takes a turn into what feels like uncharted territory. Not only subject-wise, but also conceptually.
For fantastical and made-up subject matter in cinema, found footage is a fast way to add a guise of believability. After all, what we accept to be the most crucial aspect of documentaries—the truth—rubs off on pseudo-documentaries, despite our understanding of the pretense involved. That is what Øvredal delivered with Troll Hunter: a movie so convincing that some viewers wondered if trolls really do exist. So, had this been straightforwardly made, it likely wouldn’t have been as effective. Conventional narratives would be more inclined to treat something like trolls as flat out unreal, and never try to convince the audience to think otherwise.
Hans petrifies the three-headed Tusseladd troll.
The viewers, like the characters trailing Hans, are quickly thrown into the deeper end of that extraordinary story. They have to process all this new information while staying on the go. So, although there is no significant amount of meandering, narratively or physically, there is still a good amount of atmosphere, not to mention tension building. It’s never anything frightful, but then again, Troll Hunter isn’t your standard offering of horror; it’s more on the low end of the dark fantasy spectrum. We aren’t ever spirited away to a faraway world—we stay in rather familiar surroundings, as well as dip into those less so. The outcome is a movie where you’re constantly more in awe than in terror.
As fantasy fiction might do, Troll Hunter prefers not to deal with incredulity. There is no time to waste on doubt, as interviewer Thomas (Glenn Erland Tosterud), soundperson Johanna (Johanna Mørck), and cameraman Kalle (Tomas Alf Larsen) all follow Hans around, recording whatever this character is willing to reveal about his bizarre job. Of course, the Troll Hunter himself is not an open book; in that respect, the diegetic documentary fails to fully capture and unpack the more interesting of its two subjects. Yes, all those giant, monstrous trolls are indeed incredible, but understandably, your mind wanders to their pursuer. What kind of person signs up for this gig and then chooses to stick with it for so long?
Reviews have called out Troll Hunter for its lack of character development. In regard to Thomas and his fellow documentarians, that criticism is valid, but bear in mind, they aren’t the focus of the story, either. Meanwhile, Hans is a well-crafted character. At least better than first realized. Before he was introduced, Hans had already grown tired of the troll grind. Fed up with that low compensation for his services, resentful of the bureaucracy, and wanting to expose his employer on a large scale, Hans’ discontent is glaring.
Then there are those finer details about the Troll Hunter, such as that indifference to both the natural splendor of his everyday surroundings and the affections of an obviously smitten colleague, that also suggest some level of despondency. So it is fair to say this movie doesn’t feature any sizable growth for its characters; however, the namesake isn’t underwritten. No doubt, putting a real-life character like Otto Jespersen in that role is partly why Hans is so fascinating—maybe even relatable.
Otto Jespersen as Hans the Troll Hunter.
There is always a small risk whenever using the term “mockumentary” to describe a found-footage movie, as the word could imply humor where there is none. In the case of Troll Hunter, the term’s usage is appropriate. Some folks have claimed the English-dubbed version has the more comedic tone, however, the Norwegian cut isn’t exactly humorless. Apart from the trolls’ absurd appearances, this is a movie where the characters nearly choke on the monsters’ farts, and Christians are like walking targets. Hans’ complete apathy towards everything is another cause of laughter. Overall, the comedy is intentionally dry and inconsistent. Unfunny, though? Absolutely not.
In a movie where endemic creatures are maltreated, as well as disavowed from living freely and peacefully, it’s hard not to notice the ecological message buried beneath the story. In addition to that is the unmistakable political satire. There is this whole business about intrusive and unsightly power lines—like trolls, they’re big blemishes on the land—that leads to what is perhaps the movie’s funniest moment. The scene in question is that one where certain electric lines, the ones secretly being used to keep the trolls at bay, go in a loop and don’t actually send power to any residents. Yet the monitors of said lines don’t find this at all weird. So it stands to reason that Øvredal was having a go at those who accept the government’s doings without question.
Looking past the fact that trolls aren’t actually real, this movie is an enlightening source of information. And not just for international audiences; Norwegians, too, get schooled about their homeland’s own mythology. It’s also evident from everything on screen that Øvredal and his crew were enthusiastic about the topic. The creature designs are the most indicative of that zeal; those imaginative yet myth-accurate manifestations are equally amusing and grotesque. One second you’re laughing at their phallic noses, the next you’re white-knuckling during a hairy sequence. Most surprisingly is how well the trolls’ visual effects hold up after fifteen years. It’s not all spotless, but on the whole, they remain impressive.
Vouching for a mockumentary about trolls isn’t easy, but those who do come around and give it a shot will more than likely be grateful for the recommendation. For Troll Hunter is a real find in that vast and varied genre we call “found footage“.
A bridge troll reaches up for food and finds Hans decked out in armor.
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