Silent Hill 2 Spoiler Warning (sex with dogs)
Silent Hill 2 is a much more subtle game, everything is much more subdued, you don't have all kinds of sirens and stuff announcing every time you cross over into the
otherworld (hell hill
).. instead it just sort of happens, often without you even noticing it's happened. I like this actually, it makes it seem as if the two worlds are much closer together than we thought in the first game, and they shift back and forth very easily.
There are 5 endings in Silent Hill 2. Unlike the first game, there is no "good" or "bad" endings; it's up to the player to decide which ending they think is the best, or the truest ending. Those endings are...
Leave - the most common ending. James defeats the Mary boss, makes peace with himself over what he did, and leaves town with Laura to start a new life raising her, just as Mary's letter to Laura said she wished they could do (raise Laura together).
Maria - James defeats the Mary boss, makes peace with himself and leaves town with Maria. It is believed Maria is a creation of the town, modeled after Mary. The fact that James decides to spend his life with his dead wife's fun-loving duplicate seems wrong.. (can't quite think of the words I want to say here). At the end, when they're walking away together, Maria coughs, just as Mary did. Does Maria have the same disease? Will she too end up on her death bed just as Mary did prior? Will James' nightmare repeat itself? Has he truly made peace with himself as I said above? If he's turning to an almost exact duplicate of his dead wife to spend the rest of his life with, then maybe he hasn't.
In Water - James doesn't forgive himself for what he had done to his wife and is so grief-stricken he literally drives his car into the lake and kills himself. Mind you, we don't see any of this, we only hear the sounds of James getting into his car, starting the engine, driving through some form of barrier and a big splash, all while looking at a murky underwater scene.
Rebirth - IIRC, you had to have beaten the game at least once to be able to get this ending. Through out the game, on your second play through, you'll find 3 objects that weren't there the first time through. Let's see if can remember what they're called: the White Chrism, the Book of Crimson Ceremony, and some other bottle of something. Yeah! Anyway, if you've collected these three items, at the end of the game James rows out to a small island in the middle of the lake, where there presumably is an altar on it or something. We never see him do anything, but on the way over as I recall he's thinking to himself something about starting over, something about a rebirth, a second chance.. the widely accepted theory is that he's going to perform some ceremony to bring Mary back from the dead, so he can have a second chance with her. Mind you, to do this he's invoking a pretty hefty religious ceremony used by the cult, and who knows what new can of worms this will open up for him. The rebirth ceremony is talked about when you read the Book of Crimson Ceremony, when you pick it up.
Dog - The joke ending. To get this ending you have to have either A. completed all three of the normal endings (Leave, Maria and In Water) OR the Rebirth ending. Across from Rosewater Park you'll find a small doghouse in a lot with a bone-shaped key in it. James will keep this with him until almost the end of the game, in the hotel. On the 3rd floor is a locked door which on the map is called the Observation Room or something. Use the bone-key on it and find out the
true powers behind Silent Hill!
Dog Spoiler: There is a control room, with a dog sitting on a stool moving some levers. James goes in, says "So it was you!" (or something similar) in Japanese, and bows to the dog (who then licks his face). Credits roll with some of the funniest music you'll ever hear in a video game, with hilarious images of the characters playing behind the credits.
Getting the endings is a little different than in Silent Hill, in which you had to perform a certain action at a certain point in the game to unlock the endings, such as killing or not killing certain people, etc. Silent Hill 2 is totally different:
Think of a big balancing scale, with three tray things (I'm not up on proper scale terminology), each perfectly balanced. Each of these three tray things represents a different ending, Leave, Maria and In Water. Certain actions you take and behaviors you show during the game will add weights to the scales. For instance, going for long periods of time without healing will add weight to the In Water ending, constantly looking at the picture of Mary in your inventory or reading her letter will add to the Leave ending, defending Maria as she follows you and not running too far away will add to the Maria ending, while running far away from her and not waiting for her to catch up (or allowing her to take damage) will take away from it.. checking back on her frequently while in the hospital (when she lays down for a rest) will also add to the Maria ending, and so on.
It's a really cool way to do it, and I like it because you never totally know which ending you're going to get. There are many more factors btw, I just listed a few off the top of my head.
The reason why you and most people got the Leave ending their first time through, is because you more than likely constantly made sure you were healed, looked at Mary's picture and letter a few times, and distanced yourself from Maria (by running ahead of her on the streets and not checking back on her in the hospital room). This is because most people on their first play just want to get out of there quickly and solve the mystery.
C
