What scares you in horror games?
- Thread starter Mrhenners12
- Start date
Recommended Videos
A tense environment. When nothing scary is happening whatsoever. When you're walking through a silent building and you can swear you saw something run into that room over there but you're not sure if you should go check or not. That makes a good horror game. Games like Dead Space have some startling moments, but nothing to make me sleep with the light on like Fatal Frame.
Not knowing what is next. The best part of horror games is that we freak ourselves out, the first playthough is the scariest because we don't know what is about to happen.
The right atmosphere can scare me the most. The biggest one that comes to mind is the original Resident Evil on gamecube (so it had updated graphics and a bigger mansion). The camera angles were perfect and half the time the poor lighting led to not being able to tell what was dead or trying to eat you.
The right atmosphere can scare me the most. The biggest one that comes to mind is the original Resident Evil on gamecube (so it had updated graphics and a bigger mansion). The camera angles were perfect and half the time the poor lighting led to not being able to tell what was dead or trying to eat you.
The silence. When all you can hear is your characters own footsteps, it becomes all the more frightening, because you always expect something to jump out on you.
Or when you see an enemy which then just disappears without attacking you. You just KNOW that if you turn around, he'll be there, staring you right in the face.
Or when you see an enemy which then just disappears without attacking you. You just KNOW that if you turn around, he'll be there, staring you right in the face.
To quote yahtzee "The 2nd one where you don't want to turn around because you know the monster will go haboogle woogle woo"(or something similar)
The feeling of what you believe to be rock solid to be falling apart.
This can be conveyed in both story, level design, and game design. In story it would be that some subtle things start to seem off, and eventually shit hits the proverbial fan as the main character you relied on for advice, etc, turns out to be/have gone completely batshit insane, and you as well.
In level design this could be that a perfectly normal street ends in complete shatters of tarmac slowly drifting through the air as the very laws of physics are broken.
In game design this could be that a certain attack or ability that you have had for a very long time doesn't work, or works differently suddenly, etc.
In other words, give the player an expectation and then cruelly subvert it.
This can be conveyed in both story, level design, and game design. In story it would be that some subtle things start to seem off, and eventually shit hits the proverbial fan as the main character you relied on for advice, etc, turns out to be/have gone completely batshit insane, and you as well.
In level design this could be that a perfectly normal street ends in complete shatters of tarmac slowly drifting through the air as the very laws of physics are broken.
In game design this could be that a certain attack or ability that you have had for a very long time doesn't work, or works differently suddenly, etc.
In other words, give the player an expectation and then cruelly subvert it.
Horror games work when you are left to your own imagination, the phrase less is more is a good one. Like others have said a tense atmosphere where nothing is there is the best one. It could be completly safe or there could be something there, not knowing is what makes it scary.
For me, like a lot of people have put, is atmosphere. A perfect example of this would be Amnesia: The dark decent, I've only played the demo mind. For a long time nothing happens, you hear things but nothing happens, then you go into a cellar and see something walk past, it doesn't attack you and I didn't see it again but fuuuuuuuuck.
Sound is a very important part of horror for me. For example, In X-18 In STALKER: Clear sky, there are large periods where nothing is happening, it's dark and you can hear doors slamming, footsteps etc.
Sound is a very important part of horror for me. For example, In X-18 In STALKER: Clear sky, there are large periods where nothing is happening, it's dark and you can hear doors slamming, footsteps etc.
I know I just mentioned Dead Space as not being very scary, but both of those things happen in Dead Space and they were both pretty scary. Like the scenes when you're out in the vacuum of space and just hear your own breathing and couldn't even hear if an enemy spawned behind you so you had to keep checking your back but didn't want to waste time because you were running out of air... I thought that was pretty well done. And the second thing you said has had me sitting there staring at a door thinking about just not opening it because I saw something run in there...C117 said: