History YMMV / SilentHill1

** Part of the reason for this too is the rather unintuitive nature of the health gauge, which shows Harry's portrait and a colored moving line effect behind it. Granted, while you can USUALLY tell if you're in danger of dying as it goes from a slow-moving green (healthy) to a fast-moving deep red (near death), it's not a particularly good indication otherwise of just how damaged Harry is, which can sometimes lead to either wasting supplies when Harry isn't as injured as the player thinks, or he may be even more damaged than the player thinks and dies to another hit simply cause the player couldn't easily gauge his health. Thankfully later games are a bit more intuitive with their health indicators.

** Is Dahlia really an [[AbusiveParents abusive mother]] towards Alessa or does she just have a warped view of love towards her?

* SoBadItWasBetter: The graphics of ''Silent Hill'' have been called by some to have not aged well in the slightest compared to the much-improved visuals of [[VideoGame/SilentHill2 the]] later [[VideoGame/SilentHill3 entries]]; while cutting-edge at the time, it's regarded by these people as very dated and clunky-looking. However, many also say it's precisely ''for this reason'' that the first game is such a CultClassic; the 64-bit, polygonal graphics give a lot of ambiguity to the appearances of monsters, and the distorted-blurry visuals and downright nightmarish tone had some people considering it ''[[FirstInstallmentWins the scariest]]'' entry in the series, as it perfectly fit the surreal vibes of the game and made everything seem like a bad dream. In that, the game's weak graphics have become a hallmark of a lot of "[=PSX=]" {{Retraux}} indie horror titles, all of which are very effective at scaring the player ''because'' it's so polygonal.

* NintendoHard: Compared to later games in the series, most parts of the Otherworld are extremely hazardous, with the volume of enemies pumped up to ridiculous levels. This is particularly true of the city streets, where darting from building to building is your only viable way to stay uneaten. Decidedly not the case with puzzles, as aside from one tricky [[SongsInTheKeyOfLock music-based riddle]], most are fairly straightforward and simple compared to the hair-pullers later games would feature.
** Part of the reason for this too is the rather unintuitive nature of the health gauge, which shows Harry's portrait and a colored moving line effect behind it. Granted, while you can USUALLY tell if you're in danger of dying as it goes from a slow-moving green (healthy) to a fast-moving deep red (near death), it's not a particularly good indication otherwise of just how damaged Harry is, which can sometimes lead to either wasting supplies when Harry isn't as injured as the player thinks, or he may be even more damaged than the player thinks and dies to another hit simply cause the player couldn't easily gauge his health. Thankfully later games are a bit more intuitive with their health indicators.
* ThatOneLevel:
** The Resort Area is likely the hardest area in the game. The whole area is completely infested with Groaners, Air Screamers, and Rompers who will absolutely not stop chasing you, making actually taking your time to explore a risky prospect unless you want to use up a ton of bullets and health drinks. The first area's not so bad exploration-wise, consisting mainly of wide streets and just a few buildings, but it's dense with packs of monsters and small enough that running from one will drive you into several more. Furthermore, it's home to an important sidequest that's fairly easy to miss while you're running for your life ''and'' essential to getting the Good ending of the game. Furthermore, there's a PointOfNoReturn on the bridge where it transitions into the Otherworld, making it impossible to go back and get anything you missed. It's pretty likely on your first run through the game that you'll end up running across the bridge in a blind panic and completely miss everything in the first area. The second half is a series of narrow docks that are infested with Wormheads and Night Flutters. The docks are so thin that you barely have space to maneuver around enemies, and the tank controls mean you'll likely end up running into invisible walls and left vulnerable to attack. Making it worse, it's very easy to miss the map at the beginning of the level, leaving you to run blind through one of the most labyrinthine parts of the game.
** As expected of your typical DownTheDrain level, the sewers of Silent Hill are overall very unfun to traverse through, no thanks to its confusing layout, low visibility, cramped walkways and the radio interference that deprives you of knowing where your enemies are.

** One that is usually overlooked but may be ''even worse'' than the music puzzle is the revolving turnstiles leading to the Otherworld school's boss. The pair of valve wheels on either side determine which direction the gates turn and the degree of rotation, but it's very hard to visually determine and then mentally keep track of which valve directions affect which rotational patterns. This is the kind of puzzle you either solve in 30 seconds through dumb luck or --more likely-- you waste 30 minutes screwing around with before you finally, randomly spin them into the correct place with no idea how you* NintendoHard: Compared to later games in the series, most parts of the Otherworld are extremely hazardous, with the volume of enemies pumped up to ridiculous levels. This is particularly true of the city streets, where darting from building to building is your only viable way to stay uneaten. Decidedly not the case with puzzles, as aside from one tricky [[SongsInTheKeyOfLock music-based riddle]], most are fairly straightforward and simple compared to the hair-pullers later games would feature.
** Part of the reason for this too is the rather unintuitive nature of the health gauge, which shows Harry's portrait and a colored moving line effect behind it. Granted, while you can USUALLY tell if you're in danger of dying as it goes from a slow-moving green (healthy) to a fast-moving deep red (near death), it's not a particularly good indication otherwise of just how damaged Harry is, which can sometimes lead to either wasting supplies when Harry isn't as injured as the player thinks, or he may be even more damaged than the player thinks and dies to another hit simply cause the player couldn't easily gauge his health. Thankfully later games are a bit more intuitive with their health indicators. actually did it. Oh, and the puzzle also remembers your moves, so don't think you can just leave the room and reset it. [[note]]It's very much a GuideDangIt, but "two rights on the right, one left on the left" will solve it right away. If you've already started messing with the valves, you can just keep alternating those two steps and you'll eventually open the turnstiles.[[/note]]