We love to be afraid. Recently conducted a study to determine why we are so attracted to all kinds of horror films, thrillers and other similar entertainments? It turned out that in case of danger, a whole cocktail of hormones is thrown into the blood, including adrenaline, dopamine, serotonin, endorphin, oxytocin and others. And if you are a little familiar with physiology and biohacking, then you already realized that a little fear in controlled conditions is nice. Therefore, the horror industry - films, books and computer games - has been feeling better in recent years. After all, most of us have never been in really terrible, dangerous conditions, “whoever served in the army doesn’t laugh at the circus,” so it’s a sweet thing to tickle your nerves with some kind of horror, sitting on the couch or in the armchair.



And since man is a creature with a very developed imagination and indefatigable imagination, for fear we do not even need the transcendental special effects that the modern entertainment industry is so rich in. Although it is much more interesting with them. And we decided to find out how the techniques and expressive means of horror games have evolved over the past decades.

3D Monster Maze, 1981

One of the first horror games, just a year younger than our Olympic Bear. This is a first-person walker in which you need to get out of the maze, fleeing from the pursuit of a tyrannosaurus. The game was created for the Sinclair ZX 81 home computer. Don’t judge strictly for the graphics, would you do better with a maximum of 64 Kb of RAM?





Given the most severe technical limitations, the authors of the game had only one way to scare the players, when a tyrannosaurus suddenly jumped around the corner, or the player himself came across it around the corner.

Halloween 1983

Two-dimensional corridor platformer. The game was made on the 1978 film of the same name. You play as a nanny looking after the children in the house into which the psychopath with a knife crawled into. You need to go around the whole house and transfer the children to a safe room. And you have to always be on your guard, because while the heroine runs to the other side of the screen, a maniac can run out towards her at any moment.





Here, in addition to the effect of surprise, they added such a classic horror reception as the light that goes out in the room. More precisely, blinking.

The Evil Dead, 1984

Action with a top view. A classic of horrors, the game in the movie "Evil Dead". In the game, a group of friends comes to rest in a forest house, but the house is a trick. The witch’s spirit turned your four friends into green mutants, and you need to fight off them with weapons that appear and disappear in different rooms.





The story is told to the player using a running line, and from the very beginning the plot is gradually escalated when, along with the narrative, the souls of your friends first appear, then they turn into mutants, and then you have to rush around the house, fighting off the means at hand.

Friday the 13th, 1985

Again, the game on the film of the same name - "Friday, the thirteenth." At the beginning of the game, an introductory textual description of the plot is given and what needs to be done is explained: find and kill Jason before he kills you.



Actually, the soundtrack is responsible primarily for tickling nerves - an inimitable 8-bit reproduction of Bach's tokata in D minor. The surrounding space is furnished rather gloomily, the action itself begins in the church at the cemetery. You run and wet everyone you meet, and some urinate in response to you. Such are the horrors.

Uninvited, 1987

Adventure game with point-and-click mechanics. Everything in it works from the very beginning to create an appropriate atmosphere. The characteristic color scheme, consisting of black, purple, blue and white. The game itself is static, there is practically no animation in it, and it is based on clicking the mouse in different parts of the picture, searching for and applying the right places and objects. The horror Well, if you unsuccessfully click somewhere, you can die from some kind of trap or outburst of evil spirits. And a lot of fiction describes the difficulties and dangers facing you. And in complete silence, she can suddenly scream - now this trick is a classic of scare in the cinema - a speaker in the system unit. What sound card? In the yard of 1987, even the USSR still lives and lives.

Elvira: Mistress of the Dark, 1990

A bizarre hybrid RPG and shooter. Well, as a shooter - here you could kind of fight with knives, just poking the “block” and “attack” buttons with the mouse on time. The graphics are already noticeably better. The authors emphasized the “terrifying” nature of the game with the very name of the company - Horror Games on the gravestone in the headband. Despite the rudimentary animation, the artists were able to create rather eerie images and interiors, competently worked with camera angles, lighting, and camera movement. Although it was not possible to get away from the basis in the form of a text narration, that is, the graphics themselves still worked, rather, like book illustrations.

Alone in the Dark, 1992

Quest. And this game once became a milestone in the igrostroy. Thanks to the development of technology, the authors created the right mood for the player using real three-dimensionality and unusual fixed camera angles with emulation of wide-angle lens distortions. Skillful work with sound, music and closed space, with unexpectedly getting out (as without this) zombies and other reptiles also played an important role in atmospheric conditions.

The 7th Guest, 1993

A year later, the game "The Seventh Guest", also a quest, was released. In addition to three-dimensional animation, video inserts with real actors were very widely used here - there was such a fad in the game-building in the early 1990s, it was not the only such game. Video overlays were superimposed on three-dimensional graphics to create the effect of ghosts, ghostly scenes. Here, the “point and click” mechanics were also used, but the scenes themselves were no longer always static pictures, animated transitions of changing the angle appeared.

Clock Tower, 1995

A two-dimensional point-and-click adventure game with mechanics. The company of girls, by the will of fate, ended up in a secluded estate, and there they began to be squeezed one by one from the light. As tools for psychological impact, they did not use technological capabilities here, but scenario moves, all sorts of surprises, and a general depressing atmosphere in the house. The first ahtung in the game occurs exactly at the 10th minute of the video.

Resident Evil, 1996

Adventure action that marked the beginning of a series of games. The game begins with a cinematic video narration: night, clouds, disturbing soundtrack, some kind of monster, close-up predatory mouth - in short, all the Hollywood cliches. Three of these commandos fall into a strange mansion, and you can play for any of them. In the house immediately begins all the devilry, and you are faced with zombies. To scare the player, closed spaces, unusual fixed camera angles, unexpected appearances of opponents, loud sounds, disturbing music are also used here, that's all.

Silent hill, 1999

Another legend of the world of computer games. The authors of this action really managed to create an eerie and frightening atmosphere: monsters, semi-mystical events, magnificent dark sounding (for it, special thanks to Akira Yamaoka), an extinct city, absolutely insane camera evolution, and most importantly - this damn fog, because of which everything objects - and creatures - appear close to you, and there is little time to react in case of danger, and you don’t know where to run in open space. And the funny thing is that this fog, which is part of the mystical component of the plot, was actually introduced by the developers due to technical limitations: rendering of open spaces required too many resources.





In Silent Hill 2, which was released 2 years later, all these tricks were kept as very successful, but the quality of the graphics became much higher:

Eternal Darkness, 2002

In this third-person adventure game, the plot is served by numerous animated inserts that dilute the gameplay. Many of them were made according to the canons of Hollywood thrillers. Emotional escalation of the atmosphere was carried out with the help of a gloomy mystical plot, dark scenes, excellent acting dubbing.

Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly, 2003

The Japanese know a lot about horror. In contrast to Eternal Darkness, which was perceived more as a thriller than a horror movie, the authors of FF 2: Crimson Batterfly managed to create a really frightening atmosphere: a plot with two twin-sisters exploring an abandoned village - ghosts, mazes, dangers; gloomy scenes and oppressive sounds; black and white or just a dark and noisy image.

Condemned: Criminal Origins, 2005

You are a policeman who came to investigate the murder. Atmosphere is created in the best traditions of criminal-mystical stories. You have visions - black and white scenes in which you see a killer. Half of the story is told as scripted scenes on the game engine. The whole game takes place in some basements and abandoned houses, in the dark, under the light of a lantern and rare lamps, you are looking for and trying to catch a criminal - shadows flicker around the corner, you hear someone's presence, you may be suddenly attacked ...

Amnesia: The Dark Descent, 2010

Although the game was developed relatively recently, the authors have not brought anything new. Rather, they returned to their origins: the plot - and with it the atmosphere - is partially told using text inserts and meeting notes and other items. Alone, you wander around some castle, following the traces of blood on the floor, and on the road you come across all the known methods of horror: darkness, ominous sounds and interiors, the gradual preparation for something terrible ... And then you meet monsters ...

Alan Wake, 2010

And released in the same year, Alan Wake already told a story according to all the canons of cinema: the characters were created "photorealistic", real people served as their prototypes. The game is replete with animated inserts, behind the scenes the voice of the protagonist often tells the story, and most importantly - the plot is connected with a mystical Dark Essence, which is eager to capture the whole world. To match the plot and psychological techniques: various paranormal phenomena and opponents, nightmares.

Dead Space 2, 2011

The first game was not too scary - it was a third-person shooter in fantastic scenery. In the second part, the authors greatly strengthened the “terrifying” component: from the very beginning, the game takes its place in the quarry - you, being completely helpless, find yourself at the epicenter of an attack of alien monsters on your spaceship. Roar, screams, blood, dismemberment. Then you set off on the ship: with the light of tension, in the darkness you are waiting for the bloodthirsty mutants in which your comrades have turned. That is, you are scared with the help of high-quality graphics, lighting effects, voice acting and unexpected jumps / attacks / rebirths.

Outlast, 2013

In this quest-horror movie, the authors beat the plot very well - the investigation in the insane asylum. All the action takes place as in a movie: first you drive a car at night, go through the gates, go through a darkened destroyed building, and study evidence. Most of the time you sneak so that you are not noticed and not killed, or in a panic run away from the pursuers. A video camera became an interesting tool for creating the atmosphere - only through its screen you can see some traces and signs, navigate in completely dark rooms thanks to infrared illumination.

PT, 2014

This is a demo that could be one of the strongest horror games to continue the Silent Hill series. When you wake up in a room, you go out and find yourself in a house. Walk along the corridor, go down to the exit, exit - and again find yourself in the same corridor. Cyclical endless fear, you cannot get out of the damn house. You try to enter the rooms, find yourself in traps, see scary images, new versions of the house are different from the previous ones, and gradually you find some signs and clues, more and more explore this house ...





Alas, the project was never implemented. However, Hideo Kojima (yes, the same one, Death Stranding) even built a secret into the demo: during the game you often hear some strange sounds, as if someone is behind you, and sometimes you see strange shadows. But if you turn around, there is no one behind. One user hacked into the camera’s moving system so that the game perceived it to stop, but the field of view could still move. And it turned out that from the very beginning of the game the player has been relentlessly followed by the ghost of Lisa.

Alien: Isolation, 2014

In “Aliens”, emotional stress is created by the weakness of your character: you have to sneak a lot, snuggle up, collect weapons and equipment from feces and sticks, and try to somehow survive on this ship, which is haunted by toothy creatures and generally damn knows what.

Layers of Fear, 2016

High-quality horror, frightening not with unexpected or abrupt events, but with trifles: sounds, changes in the interior, the presence of strange objects, pieces of information. You explore the old house, find various traces, clues, clues, new places, and find out the details of some events, simultaneously encountering mystical phenomena, signs and images. Excellent graphics and a script that makes the player carefully examine the surrounding space, experiment with it, while the authors skillfully maintain tension, expect some kind of catch, the feeling that you are not alone here.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, 2017

Thanks to the chic graphics and revelry of the designers ’imagination, the authors were able to create very convincingly disgusting, scary, oppressive scenery, with a lot of details that help create the right mood for the player. The main features of the game are darkness, dirt, desolation, blood, danger, mysticism. And at the right moments disgusting creatures rush at you from the darkness. Good horror movie.





Now imagine what impressions you can get from this game in a VR helmet ... Yes, Sony has released a version for Playstation VR, and the game can be completely played in this mode.

Visage, 2018

Another convincing horror movie. Before you is a revolver, and next - a tied and sobbing woman and two children. And this is clearly your doing. Memories? You woke up in an empty room, went out and found yourself in the house of a family. Starting to explore it, you will discover a lot of vile and strange secrets, you will always be accompanied by paranormal phenomena. Classical darkness, tightness, lack of light, misunderstanding, very strange and repulsive finds, tracks, sounds.

Man of Medan, 2019

And the very peak of technology in horror games is The Man from Medan. The capabilities of the graphics engine and video cards are used to their fullest here. The developers created an almost interactive animated film with a very realistic picture, the game itself, that is, the player’s actions, is not enough. You may not agree with me, but for me the effect of the " sinister valley " in this game is almost absent. The company of five friends, by the will of fate, was on board the ghost ship of the Second World War. And what can happen on such a vessel? Nothing good: mysticism, danger, old secrets, restless souls, death. Moreover, everything is implemented very cinematically - a solid story, many dialogs with a choice of replicas, scenic forks, awesome graphics, a carefully designed script.

The future of horror

What awaits us in the future? Most likely, the tricks will remain the same, but in VR games their effect will be much stronger. It's one thing when you see on a monitor how a ghost jumps out in front of you, you can even be scared, but the brain still understands the conventions of what is happening, because the reality around the monitor is completely different. But when you put on VR glasses ... imagine what it is like when a headcrab really jumps on your face, as in this trailer at 0:17: