History YMMV / SilentHillOrigins

** As was pointed out by [[WebVideo/ZeroPunctuation Yahtzee]], making your visits to the Otherworld voluntary robs a lot of series' oppressive atmosphere from the game, by putting the player in control of something that until then had been seemingly at the whims of the titular EldritchLocation itself.

* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic: Richard Grady. What he went through with his wife wouldn't be wished on anyone, but succumbing to despair and committing suicide in the face of such tragedy comes off as a rather selfish choice for a father to make, with his final written message pretty much dismissing the fact that it would leave his young son both orphaned and ''heavily'' traumatized.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: By today's standards, the game looks like any other PSP game on the market, some dynamic shadows aside. For its time, ''Origins'' looked nearly as good as its console predecessors, to the point that despite the Playstation 2 version being a PolishedPort, it arguably looks ''worse'' at a higher resolution by being PSP graphics with better textures on top.

* ScrappyMechanic: The 3D-only movement (no TankControls) is fine and dandy whenever the camera is freely following you around, but it becomes a ''huge'' liability and pain in the ass whenever you're in an area full of dynamic camera angles because Travis has a bad tendency to switch his orientation on a dime with the sudden perspective shift and start running in a direction you didn't want him to, which is usually smack into a pissed-off enemy.

* ContestedPrequel: Being the first Silent Hill game developed by a western studio after ''Team Silent'' disbanded, opinions tend to vary. Some fans see it as a solid horror game on its own and a worthy entry to the series that sticks true to the formula, whereas others disliked it for sticking ''too'' much to the formula and didn’t develop its own identity, and felt some of the gameplay mechanics (such as breakable weapons) were not needed and made the game less fun to play. It being a prequel to the [[VideoGame/SilentHill1 first game]] hasn’t helped either, with some loving the expansion on the original story, while others feel it was unnecessary and didn’t need to be explained (the fact that ''Origins''[='s=] story also includes a couple of somewhat controversial {{retcon}}s and {{Continuity Snarl}}s probably doesn't help matters). That said, it at least seems to be the ''least'' negatively received of the three western-developed ''Silent Hill'' games, with ''Homecoming'' and ''Downpour'' having received a significantly more negative reception.

* ContestedPrequel: Being the first Silent Hill game developed by a western studio after ''Team Silent'' disbanded, opinions tend to vary. Some fans see it as a solid horror game on its own and a worthy entry to the series that sticks true to the formula, whereas others disliked it for sticking ''too'' much to the formula and didn’t develop its own identity, and felt some of the gameplay mechanics (such as breakable weapons) were not needed and made the game less fun to play. It being a prequel to the [[VideoGame/SilentHill1 first game]] hasn’t helped either, with some loving the expansion on the original story, while others feel it was unnecessary and didn’t need to be explained. That said, it at least seems to be the ''least'' negatively received of the three western-developed ''Silent Hill'' games, with ''Homecoming'' and ''Downpour'' having received a significantly more negative reception.

* BaseBreakingCharacter: Lisa in this game. A lot of fans did not like the portrayal of Lisa here, who was less kind than her portrayal in ''VideoGame/SilentHill1'', and was a significant MoodSwinger. [[spoiler:Given that the Lisa in the original Silent Hill was a re-creation of the original from the memories of Alessa, it makes a certain amount of sense that ''that'' Lisa was practically angelic. This game also seems to ''show'' the effects of the drugs she took that Dr. Kaufmann supplied for her; this was alluded to in the original game but never actually seen.]]

* ScrappyMechanic: The 3D-only movement (no TankControls) is fine and dandy whenever the camera is freely following you around, but they become a ''huge'' liability and pain in the ass whenever you're in an area full of dynamic camera angles because Travis has a bad tendency to switch his orientation on a dime with the sudden perspective shift and start running in a direction you didn't want him to, which is usually smack into a pissed-off enemy.

* ScrappyMechanic: The 3D-only movement controls are fine and dandy whenever the camera is freely following you around, but they become a ''huge'' liability and pain in the ass whenever you're in an area full of dynamic camera angles because Travis has a bad tendency to switch his orientation on a dime with the sudden perspective shift and start running in a direction you didn't want him to, which is usually smack into a pissed-off enemy.