Horror Games

Ouch indeed.

I actually had the opposite experience of my recent playthrough as well. Despite having a very similar experience to Cappy first time around.

I was even enjoying it so much I grabbed American Nightmare to play back compat on my One.

I was actually holding back. Alan Wake would have a profile somewhere around the level of games like Cold Fear if it hadn't been featured as a press conference platform exclusive.

The way Alan Wake freezes and goes into slow motion, pans the camera around, taking control away from the player every time it wants to highlight a group enemies spawning, which happens scores of times in a chapter means the Alan Wake can never get into good game Valhalla.

Constantly taking control away from the player (in the middle of combat no less) and messing around with the player's inventory are unforgivable.

Alan Wake is an anagram of Weak Anal. Coincidence? I think not.

Are the controls intentional because they are one of the worst I've played in a long time. I quite like the atmosphere and certainly shitting my pants but I can't get my head around the controls! it spoils it.

I bloody love that game, Mr Tibbits... /shudders. So, so good and the story of a Serial Killer X hunting and killing other serial killers and utilising their modus operandi to kill them was awesome. I've still got boxed copies of Condemned and the sequel Condemned 2:Bloodshot as well, plus my old 360 console (I haven't bought a new Xbox since that console). Sadly I've read that Condemned 2 never got an update for the newer Xbox consoles, which is such a bloody shame as that had some terrifying moments.

I mentioned in the Pigwhip thread the other day that I recently completed Outlast 2. This was very creepy in parts and has quite a disturbing storyline involving some psycho-Christians trying to stop the birth of the anti-christ, lead by Father Knoll who is their deranged pastor, and a group of heretics who broke away from that group and live down in the mines, lead by transgender psycho and sex addict Val, who are trying to help the process of the birth along. Lots of talk and notes of adults killing their own children in the Christian camp to keep the evil away and please god. Plus lots of repressed sexual stuff found in many of the notes, including giant cocks penetrating the Earth.

Alongside the main story, there's a back story played out at intervals involving the main character's past surrounding the guilt he felt about the sexual abuse and murder of his female school friend at a Catholic School. The sections in the school are just damn nerve shredding at times. To the tune of 'If you're happy and you know it clap your hands': "Be careful little eyes what you see, be careful little eyes what you see, there's a father up above and he's looking down in love, be careful little eyes what you see...." 🥺 You've been warned.

It's worth a play if you've got 10-12 hours to spare. The first Outlast plus the Whistleblower dlc were also decent and equally disturbing in different ways too.

Ah yes I remember that bit. Whilst I WAS terrified, I always preferred the weird shit, so a big ol' grizzly didn't have the same impact. A stand out moment though, you're not wrong there.

You have just sold Outlast 2 to me though. I never finished the first but I have the second in my games library so that may be the horror fix I need next. Although I have also started Darkwood which is shitting me up.

That's the worst part

Layers Of Fear is the only game I've ever had to stop playing because it was freaking me out too much. Although to be fair, I haven't really gone looking for horror games (never played Outlast, Condemned, Amnesia/Soma etc) so maybe I'm just a horror wuss.

Haha, that was the same for me. I ended up finishing it off late one night when we'd had more than a few glasses of wine and the wife had went to bed. 

Amnesia was pretty scary for the time, but at this point the idea of discouraging the player from looking at the monsters has become too widely used. I doubt it would be nearly as scary now.

The series is actually on 90% off on the eShop for the next two weeks, so if you have a Switch, you could consider it. Not sure if the quality holds up, but I'm hoping that even the Switch should be able to run a 2011 game without too much trouble.

Btw, Soma is not scary. I think it only has some roaming enemies because people expected a horror game from Frictional, but it wasn't really intended to be horror. That's why they eventually added a safe mode with no enemies.

Ooh good shout, the safe mode was also mentioned on one of the many podcasts I listen to recently (can't remember which one - Nextlander maybe?) - they made it sound like the definitive way to play, that the monsters made it worse rather than better. I've got Soma on the pile of shame, sure I'll get to it at some point.

Alan Wake does scream “two episodes too long Netflix series” to me. Like it’d be marketed like a Midnight Mass or whatever but you’d watch it and it’d be like that Mist adaptation they did a few years ago where nothing happened.

The harsh reviews for Fatal Frame keep rolling in. Apparently it's just a straight port, they didn't even use this opportunity to fix a few things or dazzle us with upgraded visuals.

Horror season 21 has had loads of games but been short on classics, Tormented Souls looks like it will end up being the best of the bunch.