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Best Horror games you've ever played

Destroid

Arcane
Joined
May 9, 2007
Messages
16,628
Location
Australia
AvP 1 was pretty damn scary as marine.

I couldn't play the system shock games either because they were too scary :(



On the other hand... I did love to scare the shit out of people 1v1 as alien in AvP1 :D
 

DarkSign

Erudite
Joined
Jul 24, 2004
Messages
3,910
Location
Shepardizing caselaw with the F5 button.
coaster said:
-changing genres - I found Sanitarium to be very sinister in parts (eg. the bit where all the adults had vanished & the kids became deformed). I'd actually like some suggestions for other horror type adventure games - has anyone played Scratches?

Glad you loved Sanitarium (yeah the level with "Mother" and the defrmed kids was quite good...but the twisted circus level was creepy too)

If you havent played Phantasmagoria...do so. Scratches is pretty good but Barrow Hill is even better.
 

MountainWest

Scholar
Joined
May 29, 2006
Messages
630
Location
Over there
Resident Evil 1 for being the first in the survival horror genre (or so I think). It wasn't dumbed down; you had limited ammo and saves, and the saves you made were reflected in your over-all score at the end. Thus it encouraged cautious game-play, making the threats as "real" as they can become in a video game. It also made me scream like a shocked girl the first time a "dead" zombie bit my foot. Gotta give credit for that.

Silent Hill 2 for the story and atmosphere. The controls weren't very responsive but that only added to the feeling of not being a hero. You were a regular Joe put in a nightmare, not a demon eating killing machine given a smorgasboard.

Silent hill 1 for being the first Silent Hill game. Again, the atmosphere and the fact that you're not a killing machine makes it a winner. I played this one after SH2.

Dreamscape, Gabriel Knight and 11th hour all needs to be mentioned. They're lodged in my memory more as pleasant feelings than as games, however.

I've finished both Phantasmagoria and Gabriel Knight 2. I enjoyed both, but then again, I am (was? Who knows... there won't be any more) a sucker for those kind of games so I won't claim them good in a general sense.

I remember playing a game called Blood. It was a horror FPS and a quite good one at that, if my memory serves me right. However, I don't remember finishing it. Or if it was scary. And I don't recall it being mentioned by anyone. Mayhap it actually sucked and my horror love got the better of me.

Never got hold of Project Zero. When the opportunity arises, I'll give it a try.
 

coaster

Liturgist
Joined
Oct 5, 2007
Messages
222
If you havent played Phantasmagoria...do so. Scratches is pretty good but Barrow Hill is even better.

Thanks, I'll look up Phantasmagoria. I tried Barrow Hill, but found the voice acting to be so poor as to break the whole atmosphere (that guy in the garage...oh dear :cry: ) Maybe it's because I'm a Brit that I picked up on it a bit more.
 

dunduks

Liturgist
Joined
Jan 28, 2003
Messages
389
Project Zero/Fatal Frame
Aliens vs Predator 1 as a marine.
System Shock 2
Silent Hill

MountainWest said:
Never got hold of Project Zero. When the opportunity arises, I'll give it a try.
Project Zero/ Fatal Frame
Blood was a quite good fps, but as far as I remeber, it was not that scary.
 

Section8

Cipher
Joined
Oct 23, 2002
Messages
4,321
Location
Wardenclyffe
Resident Evil 1 for being the first in the survival horror genre (or so I think).

I'm pretty sure that honour belongs to Alone in the Dark, which was fucking incredible at the time, despite what are now very primitive graphics (flat shaded very low poly models, against some fairly sexy 2D backdrops, albeit at 320x240 resolution.) Lots of Lovecraft influences, and set in a crazy old Lousiana mansion, it has a lot going for it if you can stomach the graphics and interface that is a little difficult at times.

It wasn't dumbed down; you had limited ammo and saves, and the saves you made were reflected in your over-all score at the end. Thus it encouraged cautious game-play, making the threats as "real" as they can become in a video game. It also made me scream like a shocked girl the first time a "dead" zombie bit my foot. Gotta give credit for that.

My biggest gripe with Resident Evil was that it didn't just encourage cautious gameplay, it encouraged cautious metagaming.
 

Schauman

Scholar
Joined
Oct 27, 2007
Messages
157
Location
Finland
Haunted House for Atari 2600
Croissant bats, swarming spiders and phasing ghosts. All this while chasing items to open rooms for progression and praying for the ghost to ignore you.
If I recall right, you had to use matches for light to see anything at all and the wind would randomly kill the flame, leaving you in the dark with the nasties.
 

Virtz

Educated
Joined
Aug 16, 2007
Messages
89
Not really for the scare factor, but I really liked Ecstatica. Most of all for the fact that, rather than throw a bunch of generic monsters at you, nearly all monsters there were unique. I can only recall about 2 "clones" appearing, otherwise you dealt with one of everything and they all acted in quite unique ways (especially the werewolf). At the beginning you were really vulnerable, too, and had to run away from most threats and hide somewhere. The biggest issues were the exploitable combat system and inventory system (or practical lack of one - you could only carry things in your two hands), which was quite annoying for certain tasks that required multiple items.
Quite a shame its sequel didn't follow any of the pros and just turned into a hack n' slash adventure with both cons of the previous game.

Another horror game I really liked, this one more for the scare factor, was the first Silent Hill. The unique thing about it was that it didn't really try to scare you with constant "boo!" moments, instead it warned you of various threats using radio static and made the awareness of approaching danger scare you (the main character being an average joe helped here, as well). It also made you well aware of the dangers that awaited in the "darker" version of the world and this often made me almost too terrified to move on when the world changed.
 

Starwars

Arcane
Joined
Jan 31, 2007
Messages
2,829
Location
Sweden
Btw, has anyone tried the game called Haunting Ground?
I've always found that setup kinda interesting (I think the Clock Tower games are similar in this way as well), the fact that you have to run and hide instead of being able to kill everything in your path. Then again, I suppose it could be extremely frustrating as well.
 

Fat Dragon

Arbiter
Joined
May 24, 2007
Messages
3,499
Location
local brothel
I haven't played very many horror games. The only ones I've played that I found to be scary were System Shock 2, and Condemned: Criminal Origins.
 

Norfleet

Moderator
Joined
Jun 3, 2005
Messages
12,250
I don't comprehend horror. I think my horror-sense is broken. To me, all horror is another form of comedy. Where other people react with shock and startlement, I react with snickering and laughter. All those games and movies people cite as horror always make me laugh.
 

RK47

collides like two planets pulled by gravity
Patron
Joined
Feb 23, 2006
Messages
28,396
Location
Not Here
Dead State Divinity: Original Sin
i think it might be growing up effect.
you think it's real when you're younger...well in my case anyway. I was really afraid of Chuckie the movie. I used to hide on those 'thrilling' parts of a horror TV show where the lone dude is about to get owned. I used to shout 'RUN HE'S COMING' at the TV set to warn the guy.

But as I grew up I realize 'it's all fake, there's no harm to it. The only shock horror I felt is when I see a lot of gibs n blood that kinda disgusts me.
 
Unwanted

Zinc

Unwanted
Joined
Feb 4, 2006
Messages
2,160
Norfleet said:
I don't comprehend horror. I think my horror-sense is broken. To me, all horror is another form of comedy. Where other people react with shock and startlement, I react with snickering and laughter. All those games and movies people cite as horror always make me laugh.

I'm exactly the same. When I went to see Wolf Creek with a few friends, a girl we was with was on the verge of leaving the cinema during one of the torture scenes, and I was just sitting there laughing. I think the last time I was scared of a movie was when I was about 13.
 

Jasede

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jan 4, 2005
Messages
24,793
Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Codex Year of the Donut I'm very into cock and ball torture
The dungeons were the best part of Daggerfall. And I liked Krondor's graphics, beats the shit out of Jeff Vogel's games' looks.
 

denizsi

Arcane
Joined
Nov 24, 2005
Messages
9,927
Location
bosphorus
Silent Hill (I haven't played the sequels so far, though I have the 2nd game waiting in some dark corner)
Blair Witch Project Volume I - Rustin Parr (had some terrifying moments)
Haunting Ground (so that's a yes, Starwars), though I didn't finish it.
Thief (as mentioned by others)
Alien Trilogy (still the best Alien FPS in my opinion)
AvP 1 - marine campaign, though I really hated the way aliens "crunched" when you killed them. They were like just huge sized cockroaches.

Some of the old text adventures, like The Lurking Horror, were also quite horrifying.

Resident Evil 1 had its moments, but it as Section8 mentioned, it forced me to pay attention to metagaming rather than terrify me.

First play through Phantasmagoria can be a terrifying experience for some indeed, it was for me, but it loses the magic once you finish it.

Blood is rather a hilarious (or humorous) take on violence than horror, and quite a successful on in my opinion. One of the best FPSs as well. Variation in 2D animation of creatures was incredible.

Daggerfall achieved most of its scariness with its sound effects for me.
 

Longshanks

Augur
Joined
Jul 28, 2004
Messages
897
Location
Australia.
In no particular order, Thief, Undying, System Shock.

Will also add Realms of the Haunting, much like Undying with puzzles and a better, longer story.

Someone was asking about a good horror adventure game, ala Sanitarium? Well, this is it, if you don't mind dated graphics and FPS elements in your adventure game. It still has more puzzles and is longer than most (after playing Culpa Innata in recent days, I'd say all adventure games should have an FPS component, or at least something to do other than sit through a whole lot of long, dull non-interactive dialogue), complete with "stuck fast, won't budge" dialogue ad nauseum (was this in Sanitarium, or am I mis-remembering?).
 

Baphomet

Scholar
Joined
Feb 9, 2006
Messages
354
Location
Americans do not need geography
The first Silent Hill didn't scare me much. The monsters were mostly lame ... oh no, a grey midget is going to stab me in the knees! That game only scared me during those moments where creepy stuff was going on but the monsters had not showed up yet, which is a shame, because Team Silent obviously wasn't going for Gothic Horror. Don't get me wrong, I still give the game huge props - I was very disappointed this past Halloween when I decided to play through again but realized the game was lost in a recent move.

Resident Evil 4 was briefly scary during the part where you play as the girl you're rescuing. Then again the perceived helplessness of a protagonist is known to make things scarier.
 

Zakat

Novice
Joined
Nov 20, 2007
Messages
7
System Shock 2 Cargo bay - all is quiet & all you can hear is the mutant muttering (we are,we are,we are) and as you turn you see the bastard swinging an iron pipe at you screaming "JOIN USS", oh, & those self destruct service droids, brrrr gave me the creeps just remembering...think ill go play it again.

Clock Tower - being chased bye a crazy kid with giant scissors & no weapons to fend him off is scary, gave me an adrenalin rush evry time i heard his theme music.
I also foud it quite scary that the game had no music (exept when scissor man apears), you can just hear your footsteps.
 

Jack_Deth

Augur
Patron
Joined
Dec 13, 2002
Messages
266
Insert Title Here
Undying is probably my favorite horror based game. The first half is really good.

Resident Evil remake for Gamecube was pretty scary - I had played it of course on PS but never beat it.

System Shock 2 with its tendency to have jamming weapons added an unknown element to when you were fighting zombies - was pretty scary.
 

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