There's a video game series I'm a pretty big fan of called Silent Hill. It takes place in the dark, foggy, abandoned town of Silent Hill, filled with nightmarish monsters representing personal flaws and fears of the main character. In order to get through the game the player has to solve puzzles and traverse maze-like streets and buildings, all while avoiding the hellspawn that dwells in the shadows that make up about eighty percent of the game world (the other twenty percent being blood and rust, it's pretty nuts). Throughout the various incarnations of the games, from the greats like Silent Hill 2 to less well-received titles like Silent Hill: Downpour (and the atrocities that were the Silent Hill films), the general concept remains the same: walk around, find stuff to help you get un-lost, and don't die while doing it.
The thing that really struck me about these games-- especially when I started playing them-- was the setting; a small, empty, stereotypical Americana tourist town. Walking around my old hometown, or even my current place of residence, in the middle of the night can give the streets a feeling of being deserted and haunted. The early 20th century architecture of homes and businesses, with chipped paint and lonely glowing neon signs in dusty windows, puts out a kind of eerie vibe. Dimly lit streets devoid of cars or people makes a person wonder who or what is waiting to strike from the bushes. After walking home through the dark so many times, and after watching so many scary movies and playing so many games in the Silent Hill series, I've had some pretty fun moments of freaking myself out.
The other night, for example! I was hanging out with some friends on the far north end of town, a couple miles away from my apartment. Everyone that had been there either left or was going to bed, so I decided to walk home. Of course it was three in the morning, and of course the path of least resistance would be to walk through the desert by moonlight, so I made my goodbyes and set out into the dark. To break some of the silence in the middle of nowhere I decided to play some music on my phone. The only problem, though, is that I decided on the Silent Hill soundtrack, so every shadow and every noise in the bushes became something jump-worthy.
The moon was covered in hazy clouds. The crunch of dirt beneath my feet and the ambient music from my phone echoed through the trees along the creek I crossed while walking along the dirt road. Streetlights buzzed on the corner of the street as I made my way back into town. Walking along, hearing no noise from the highway, seeing no lights on in any of the houses along the way, I started to spook myself. I knew nothing was "out to get me" or anything, but that paranoid feeling of god knows what watching me still sent chills down my spine. By the time I got home to my dark and quiet apartment I realized I'd forgotten my keys at my friend's place, so I used my "finding keys in ass-backward places" I learned from video games to get my spare to get inside and away from the creepy crawlies that didn't actually exist.
I got a little bit out of video games (even more than just learning to accept "There was a HOLE here. It's gone now." written in blood on a wall). I can find things I need, use some things toward unintended ends, and get un-lost while making my way through the dark. I learned this skill through a lot of different video games, but Silent Hill got me to use these skills in a place like home.
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