This review is brought to you by someone who's experience with the original, was getting to grab the flashlight and then getting so scared that I ejected the disc and never played it again. Yeah, I wasn't great with horror at the time. Point is, this review is coming from someone who didn't get to fully experience the original so I can't say how faithful things are or make any comparisons.

Holy crap, this game was such an amazing experience!

Positives:

+ Has one of the best stories I've ever witnessed from a game. Usually on second playthroughs I find myself skipping, but not with SH2. I just wanted to experience the story each time that I played, and I had to witness every ending, even if there wasn't an achievement tied to it. Even after finishing each play through, it stayed on my mind and I kept looking up little things online to learn more about the lore.
+ The atmosphere in this game is truly perfect for a psychological horror game. It's eerie, it's unsettling and creepy. The environments were just so well done and added to the uneasy experience. I don't want to risk spoilers by talking about areas too much, so leaving this there.
+ Grade A sound design. The story and the environment were amazing, and only made even more immersive and eerie by the music and sound effects. Just walking around and hearing those distant sounds added life to the game and that radio static bringing a small sense of dread on what was lurking nearby. Then there was the music. That score switched perfectly between unnerving and melancholic whenever the tempo of the game changed, and on the latter part, I could feel my chest getting heavy with sadness, which shows how effective that music is at setting the tone and helping instill the right emotions for the moment.
+ Great voice acting overall but James's voice actor especially stood out. His voice acting was really outstanding and added so much believability to James as a character and his emotions.
+ Graphics were great and character facial expressions were so well done
+ I'll be honest, beyond a couple of moments that made me jump, I didn't find this 'scary' but it's still one of the best and most effective horrors to me. It didn't scare me but it made me uneasy, uncomfortable and unsettled. I felt on on edge and slightly disturbed at times. All of those emotions are what makes a psychological horror game so effective (imo anyway)
+ A game where the map is actually clear and useful!

- Cons

- Combat was kind of lacklustre for me, but the rest of the game made that no huge deal at all. I enjoyed it thoroughly regardless of what kind of combat I'd like.
- Performance was an issue. It was stuttering and dropping frames like crazy, but once I found the dx11 fix, it played pretty smoothly.
- Now I'm really sad because I don't know when or even if I'll find a game with a story that can impact me as much as this again

I sell cocaine and cocaine accessories 10/10