The most loved entry in the series by fans, sadly not by me. Reason? My first playthrough was on hard mode.
I completely forgot this is a 2001 game, when games had this fetish for making hard difficulties unfair for the sake of taking a screenshot and bragging that you beat it. It's cool for when it's your favorite game that you already beat, but for the love of god don't start your first playthrough on hard, it really made my experience hella worse.

Aside from this, Silent Hill 2 it's a very solid experience full of surprises and an incredible level design.