I need some real horror gaming...

[Maverickly]

... and I'm lost as to where this can be found. It took stereo headphones for Dead Space to get spooky, and the last game that shocked me mildly was way back when with Thief 2 on the PC (it was the atmosphere, mostly). I would thoroughly enjoy any recommendations and anecdotes to help my next purchase.

As a side note, I must commend the Escapist for being one of the most polite web forums I have visited.

 

[Nouw]

Aliens Vs Predator 2. The old one. The Marine campaign is freaky. Try it.

 

[Brotherofwill]

It would help if you could list what consoles/ platforms you have. Only PC?

Sadly, I haven't been really scared by a video game since Doom 3 just when it came out, so I doubt the athmosphere holds up favourably by today's standards. Actually Portal scared me a bit, but I do tend to get paranoid when an omni-present, dictatorial voice guides me.

 

[PixieFace]

Wait for Amnesia: The Dark Descent to be released. The only thing you can do in this game, as far as I understand, is run and hide. That's fucking terrifying.


Check out the Condemned titles, too. The first FEAR is good for some spooky moments. Silent Hill 2 is always a great standby if you don't want to sleep at night, either.

 

[SnootyEnglishman]

Condemned 1 and 2, Resident Evil's 1 2 and 3, Silent Hill 2 and the most forgotten about sometimes Nightmare Creatures.

 

[tycho0042]

I could see condemned as cheap thrills scary. The two games that ever made me come close to true fear was in silent hill 2 and clock tower. Clock tower was the only point-and-click style game that made people WATCHING me play panic. Literally I had a friend who was laying on the couch and then bam! Scissorman jumps out and he kicks his legs in the air yelling for me to run. Different place I was running from the aforementioned villain and they decided to have a cutscene with him closing down on me and the elevator closes JUST in time. The whole time my friend and I were in a complete panic.
silent hill 2 was the only game that made me(however briefly) NOT want to further the plot. In the apartment complex there was a point where Pyramid head was on the other side of these steel bars. I knew how to get there but I DEFINITELY knew that I didn't want any part of him.

 

[RaNDM G]

Are you looking for cheap scares or actually real horror?

If you've never played a Resident Evil game before 4, I would suggest you start with those. They just rereleased Zero and REmake for the Wii and you can find 2, 3 and Code Veronica for the GameCube if you do some digging online.

Silent Hill's 2 and 3 were the most tension-inducing games I've ever played. Talk to pretty much anyone else who played them and they will say the same thing. If you can't find them in stores, they're also pretty easy to get online.

You could also try some Half-Life 2 mods. The guys who run this site were just talking about how great Dear Esther and Korsakovia were. I've never played them myself but they might be worth a look.

 

[Logic 0]

Silent hill 2, because of pyramid head that dude will give you nightmares or RE4 because when one of the bad guys gets a cheap shot it's pretty unnerveing.

 

[Bofus Teefus]

If you don't mind going to a "previous-gen" console, Fatal Frame 1, 2, and 3 are three of the best-done horror games I've played. Finding them can be diffucult, though, to say the least.

 

[Amnestic]

Condemned 1

Yes.

Now turn off the lights, get a big fuckoff TV and surround sound and prepare to have nightmares.

It's possibly the only game I had to step away from for a while because of how nervous it made me >_>

 

[CyanLink]

Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem

It's on the cube.

 

[BrokenIcon]

If you can find them, the Echo Night series was creepy as hell. Echo Night was on the PS1, and the sequel, Echo Night: Beyond, was on the PS2. I highly suggest them.

 

[Bonkekook]

Look through here.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.184184-Games-that-truly-frightened-you

There's a ton of games listed that may interest you.

 

[Shock and Awe]

Silent Hill is pretty damn scary, I also hear Fatal Frame 2 is something else.

 

[Maverickly]

My father played Silent Hill 2, maybe I can get it off of him. I went through RE4 and it didn't really scare me. I didn't play FEAR 1 but I went through FEAR 2 with no real scares besides the beginning when Alma jumps from the little music player in the helicopter. I'll try the first one out.

 

[He_Is_Legend]

There is a game for the Xbox, or the Ps2, I don't remember. It's a pretty scary game according to my friend-. Basically you walk around in an old haunted house, and you take photographs of ghosts. You can only see ghosts through your camera, and when you take their picture, you trap them in the film. Is pretty scary. Don't remember the name.

EDIT h yeah, the original Quake is actually pretty scary. Turn of all music in-game and turn up the sound fx. Play on a harder difficulty.

 

[Iwata]

If you can find them, the Echo Night series was creepy as hell. Echo Night was on the PS1, and the sequel, Echo Night: Beyond, was on the PS2. I highly suggest them.

This. Echo Night: Beyond is a spectacular game.

 

[Liberaliter]

Condemned 1 and 2, this gen is woefully lacking when it comes to horror games.

 

[Eekaida]

Project Zero games are pretty scary, in a suspence kind of way