Games that don't get enough credit for atmosphere

[Alhazred]

Painkiller is surprisingly atmospheric for an arcadey run-n-gun shooter.

The Asylum and Orphanage levels in particular are genuinely spine-chilling, despite the fact you're a demon-slaying badass with an arsenal that could level a small country.

 

[Pink Gregory]

LA Noire for me; I know that a lot of people HATED the flaws that it did have, but that game hooked the living fuck outta me.

I once stopped and did nothing because 'smoke smoke smoke that cigarette' was playing on the car radio.

That being said it was kind of a first for me, not having read much pulp detective fiction.

 

[Legion]

Halo: ODST.

No, seriously, hear me out on this one.

The halo series has been pretty good at big, epic set-pieces with orchestral music blaring off at you whenever something explodes in big, bright colours while your god-warrior flips tanks with one hand and doesn't afraid of anything.

In ODST, however, everything is dark, it's raining, your a pitiful little human and the city your in is filled to the brim with shit that wants to kill you. The big Orchestral set pieces aren't there anymore, instead replaced with near-total silence save the sirens of abandoned police cars.

And it's... pretty damn intense. I was so used to Halo 3 that when I first started up ODST, I was thrown by how completely alone and small I felt in this new world, going around cautiously and sneaking past fights instead of doing the usual 'Run in, throw grenades, everything dies' tactic of Halo 3. Granted the missions where you controlled other squad-members went back to the usual Halo feel, but the middle bits where you controlled the voiceless-protagonist guy were pretty damn awesome in the atmosphere component.

Halo Reach was also alright in the atmosphere department, with the whole 'everything is fucked, let's enjoy the ride' approach. It did the big epic set-pieces of Halo 3 but bigger, but there was just something about it that didn't let the atmosphere sink in with me.

When I first started the game I'd have completely agreed with you. What broke the atmosphere for me was realising that as an ODST I was just as physically tough as a Spartan, and could move just as fast, and actually faster while holding a turret.

The game gave you 'stamina' instead of shields but it worked in exactly the same way. Stamina goes down from damage, wait for a bit and it regenerates. You could still run up to a Brute and melee them to death as they don't hit you back, but do a roaring animation each time you do it.

The setting, music, sounds, graphics etc. were very atmospheric, I agree. I just wish they'd made the game-play reflect it as well.

 

[Karoshi]

Gothic, especially the first one. It felt like a real prison camp, with some fantasy sprinkled on top of it. I loved it.

Also, I dont think many people know how much atmosphere World of Warcraft has. Seriously.

 

[Dark Prophet]

Borderlands both the 1st and the 2nd one 1st one has some points over the 2nd one mostly music which in 2nd one is a bit all over the place and too wub wub and the world feels more complete in the 1st one I guess. 2nd one is far prettier and they have found a right balance between the shell shaded cartoony look and the more realistic look. Also I have to mention it, I have a siren who is supposedly this godess like badass but some of her lines are as she was trying to act more badass than she actually is and then sometimes when she laughs it ends with this hilarious snorting sound and I'm like yeah you are a badass yes you are.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. SoC and CS, CoP not so much it was more combat driven. I know S.T.A.L.K.E.R. has been praised over its atmosphere but it has been greatly over shadowed by the suppsed fuck loads of bugs, which the first two games surely have (CoP has in all my six or seven playthroughs crashed only something like five times), but they ara not as numerous as people have stated.

 

[Calibanbutcher]

Silent Hill: Origins.
Played it in the dark, with headphones on my PSP.
I did not care that the story doesn't really give a reason for the trucker to be there, I truly enjoyed the atmosphere.

 

[Rooster893]

Oddworld. You really feel like you're helpless in a very dark, unforgiving environment. The feeling you get in your chest when you are literally flirting with death in many different, dangerous forms is epic. And the brooding, haunting soundtrack just amplifies that feeling.

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So chilling...

 

[A.A.K]

Rage. I thought Rage was absolutely brilliant when it came to atmosphere. For half the game I was on edge. I got startled like once, and died twice during the whole experience, but I remained on edge of the entire experience. That's good atmosphere.

 

[James Joseph Emerald]

Jet Set Radio Future!
I always wanted to live in a world like that.

Also, I think the atmosphere and world-building of Final Fantasy X is often disregarded.

But you can forget about all of that, because The Dig is the MOST ATMOSPHERIC GAME OF ALL TIME:

I really hope there are other people here who've played that game. Nobody ever seems to know it.

 

[kacj321]

Dead Island
Fallout 3
Oblivion
Boarderlands 1/2

 

[Orange12345]

Halo ODST was pretty good, just wandering through the city had a great lonely feeling

EDIT I also started playing Thief recently and that has some amazing atmosphere that bypasses the dated graphics entirely

 

[Jaeke]

This game is Soooooo forgotten:

... Oh man.

That just shot me in the head with a .50 calibur bullet of nostalgia.

 

[OpticalJunction]

civilization 5 has a great atmosphere. I especially like the music

 

[Gatx]

I love the atmosphere of the Sims games. It really gives you this peaceful yet upbeat feeling that really goes with the fact that the game is supposed to be real life without all the baggage of reality.

Steambot Chronicles is a game that few remember period but it also had great atmosphere. Everything kind of had this kind of sort of washed out sepia look that gave you the feeling that it was a period piece despite having giant car robots.

 

[Bostur]

WoW always had great atmosphere, but very few people seesm to notice it. Which as I think about it is probably one of the defining aspects of atmosphere. It must not be noticeable.

Crusader Kings 2 is really good at setting the mood. The loading screens, the music, the style of the UI and even the tool tips of the character traits help with that. Many strategy games do have good atmosphere, I think out of necessity. When the world is represented mainly by symbols, text and numbers there needs to be something to help the player's imagination along.

Also I agree that most of the Civ games and the first 2 X-Com games had amazing atmosphere.