The Best and the Worst Horror-Themed Video Games of All Time

Horror games are such a thrill to play, because they make us put our money where our mouth is for all the times we scream at people doing stupid things in horror movies. I like to think of it this way:

Me watching horror movies: NO DON’T GO IN THE BASEMENT YOU IDIOT YOU DESERVE TO DIE.

Also me playing horror games: I wonder if there’s anything cool in the basement?

So yeah. Having said that, there are some truly awesome horror games that have been released throughout history, that have terrified us out of our wits. And then there are the horror games that are so bad, the real horror is that you spent money on them. And so we’re presenting a list of those games, if the article title didn’t give it away.

The Best

​CLOCK TOWER​

Clock Tower was released in 1995 for the SNES as a point-and-click survival horror game, and man was it impressive. You would think that a point-and-click game would’ve been incredibly clunky on a console controller before thumbsticks were even invented, but somehow it just worked.

Human Entertainment did a great job of setting the pacing with a creepy atmosphere, numerous jumpscare moments and random events, and eight endings depending on the player’s actions.

​Resident Evil 4

Considered the holy grail of the Resident Evil franchise, RE4 was originally released on GameCube in 2005, but has since been ported to like, literally every single console and handheld device ever made.

RE4 was able to use a new over-the-shoulder camera effect for a more action-oriented game, while maintaining the creepiness and atmosphere of the first three titles, before the franchise spiralled into a cliche Hollywood action-fest.

​amnesia: The Dark Descent

Indie developers Frictional Games released Amnesia: The Dark Descent in 2010, and featured significantly polished weaponless survival horror gameplay over their previous survival horror franchise Penumbra.

What made Amnesia: The Dark Descent so incredible was 1) Mind-blowing graphics that could really test your hardware’s limits, 2) An intriguing story that kept you hooked into the gameplay, and 3) Legitimate “holy sh** oh god oh god what the f*** is that?!?!” moments, as you had absolutely no weapons and had to hide from monsters.

​Microgaming Halloween Slot

The Halloween film franchise has been terrifying us since the first film’s release in 1978. It’s had its share of bad sequels and questionable reboots, but Halloween is certainly cemented as one of the “big three” horror franchises, which include Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street.

Halloween fans can enjoy a spooky Halloween-themed online slot game at this casino online.

​Silent Hill 2

Silent Hill 2 is not just known as one of the great horror games of all time, but also as one of the best games of all time. Rather than relying on cheap jumpscares, of which there are practically none, SH2 focused on incredible art direction, an amazing atmospheric soundtrack, and a deeply layered story that delves into all sorts of nuanced psychological themes.

One of the incredible things about SH2 was that it offered six different endings, but you didn’t achieve the endings by making conscious decisions throughout gameplay. The game actually had a system that would silently “judge” even your most miniscule actions, such as how near or far you stayed to a character under your protection.

Yes, a game that dealt with plenty of psychological issues psychoanalyzed your actions to give you the game ending it deemed you deserved. That alone was so groundbreaking and mind-boggling even today.

Honorable mentions: Condemned, F.E.A.R, Outlast, Fatal Frame II, Dead Space

THE WORST

Resident Evil 6​

Where even to begin with how absolutely terrible RE6 was? We could start with the logo, which appeared so similarly to a giraffe performing a certain act that even Capcom was forced to respond.

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You can’t unsee it. You know what we’re talking about.

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We could talk about the absurd amount of quick-time events that made the player feel like they were watching a movie rather than playing a survival-horror game. We could talk about the fact that Resident Evil 6 barely even qualified as a survival-horror game, and Capcom admitted they only added zombies because fans expected it as part of the franchise.

We could also point out how Capcom was basically trying to capitalize on action-shooter gameplay and create something more akin to Call of Duty with a Resident Evil logo to boost sales, which ended up backfiring as they only sold 5 million copies and were forced to admit how disappointing it was. Yeah, we could talk about all of those things, but it’s better to just say “worst Resident Evil game ever”.

Ju-On: The Grudge

Take the ghosts from Japanese horror franchise Ju-On, add none of the characters from the films, give it bad Wiimote flashlight controls, call it a “haunted house simulator”, blend this all up into a milkshake, and what do you get? A pretty disgusting milkshake that only the most desperate would drink.

Ju-On: The Grudge was universally panned by critics, holding a 39/100 Metascore from critics, and an only slightly higher 5/10 stars from user reviews, with some user reviews basically saying “It’s the only horror game for Wii, so might as well give it a higher score”. 

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​Friday the 13th

Nintendo made their reputation by strictly controlling the quality assurance of games on their console after the video game industry crash of the 80s, and yet, somehow this underwear skidmark of a video game made it onto their roster. Was somebody asleep at the levers?

Yeah, it was bad. And don’t give me any of that “It was the 8-bit era!” garbage either, because there were far better horror games on the NES. What exactly made Friday the 13th so bad?

Outrageous difficulty notwithstanding, it was basically a walking simulator, as you traversed from one end of Crystal Lake Camp to the other, collecting stuff, then rushing to mini-fights with Jason before he killed children. Also, that ridiculous neon purple jumpsuit they gave him.