How Silent Hill: Townfall’s “Creepy Game Boy” Weaponizes Nostalgia For The Better

. I have a complicated relationship with the 1990s, an era remembered for its hazy pre-HD tech and early signs of broader connectivity without the mentally taxing standard of an always-online world. Lately, I've found the aesthetics of that era calling to me in the books I read, the shows I watch, and even in my social media feeds that regularly spit out "remember when?" reels that dredge up imagery of classrooms and malls that I never actually set foot in yet feel familiar. Instagram seems to think I'm simply nostalgic for this stuff, not understanding that I actually find it very eerie, snapshots of a childhood I can hardly recall for complicated reasons. And yet, I'm mesmerized by it. Most recently, I felt that same pull in Screen Burn's Silent Hill: Townfall. Whereas games like Silent Hill and Silent Hill 2 were set roughly in their respective modern days and are today revered as dreary time capsules, Townfall resurrects similar vibes, in turn revealing which parts stick out most to the team performing that necromancy. In a recent conversation with the studio's co-founder and Townfall's writer, Jon McKellan, he told me how Screen Burn sought to weaponize a particular type of n…