Killdrone: ever seen a Legend of Zelda ocarina of time fast? theres one guy on youtube who was on ganon and Died because his batteries for his game cube controller, although funny as hell, his "restart" ended him all the way plus 8hours Back into the beginning of the game.

the thing with horror games is they are usually very far fetched not that horror movies are any more realistic i always keep thinking what are the odds i will be stuck on a spaceship filled with monsters get what i mean

I think the thing is that videogames aren't not scary, they're just scary in different ways than other media.

I must be a puss, cause RE 1 scared the shit out of me! In my defense, it was the GCN one, not the PS1 version.

Great article, made me think. Here's what I came up with:

The thing is, to compensate for all their lack of traditional scares, games have one ace in the hole that other forms of media don't: you can, and will, lose. You can't watch a movie and have your actions cause the death of a character- there's a far different feeling you get when watching a movie when you know someone is about to be killed than when you're in a game and you directly control the "life" or death of your character based on your decisions and your decisions alone.

Playing good games causes many people far more anxiety than watching a movie, because there's no guarantee that death isn't going to come at a completely random time, without any prep or dramatic build. Which is far scarier, if you think about it, because it better resembles reality. You could die at any time, any place, not just when it was the "right" time. No dramatic final scream, no blade lifting, just you, the chainsaw, a horrific animation of your lifeless head bouncing on the ground, a shower of gore, and a big fat "YOU ARE DEAD" to look at. And it's nobody's fault but yours. Pretty unsettling, isn't it? RE4's deaths were horrible enough for me to want to avoid them, and it was freakin' scary when I failed and had no one to blame but my shitty aim. That scared me good. Pause or no pause.

what if they made a virtual reality system where you actualy experience the movie but you have no control over yourself. like watching the movie through the characters eyes

Maybe I become too engrossed when gaming, but I find that the more I play, the more I forget about things like being able to pause, the HUD, etc. Which is why the sound of the chainsaw in RE4 still gives me chills.

I thought Halloween was completely lame. Not at all scary. And what the hell am I supposed to read here to verify my humanity and enter my comment? spered dicate? What the hell?

Wait, I'm confused: people complained about SH3 because you literally had to run for your life compared to actually fighting "your demons" in the previous iterations so...is this hypocrisy or has gaming created some rift to the meaning of horror?

You sir, haven't played dead space. and to tell you the truth I find horror movies less "scary" than games. In a game i can control what happens to the character and whilst you do die and then reset, who wants to die at all in the first place? But that's my opinion.

So, A first person horror game with weapons being just what you can find lying around (if you're that lucky), an enemy or enemies you can only see if you make it possible to see, no pauses, no continues or restarts (if you die you have to play as a new character every time)...if you get stabbed, all you see is from first person (you looks down and there's a knife, but that's all you see...is it coming out the back? Check a mirror or try to look)...this is actually starting to sound kinda fun...

It's a shame because most of these things are only problems because circumstances, game companies, or gamers make them a problem.

Oh man Nosferatu made me cry. When I was much much younger of course...I haven't played too many scary games myself but I just got my hands on a copy of Dead Space so we'll see.

I agree with most of these, but I have been scared by many games. However, each time you get scared in a game its, 'Ohshit scary thing I'm dead now start again'. The horror is gone instantly, whereas other media such as stories have literally given me nightmares. When I first started playing Bioshock I was completely freaked out by the environments, the splicers, and especially the sounds. But once you die a few times, and realise that all you have to do is keep running out of the vita chamber and firing the shotgun over and over, it's not scary anymore.

Like horror movies, if your too into on the details than the moment as a whole, you'll end up ignoring everything all at once. There, the effect will never be fully experienced. Take Silent Hill 3. It's absolutely terrifying situation, but it's gameplay was so annoying to me, I was more focus on the handling of the main character than the scary ass shit that was happening in the game.

I noticed how only latley released and incredibly popular games were mentioned, doom 3 i found to be very scary, im probly on my own here but altho i kinda got used to the scares around the middle. but when cast into hell i was afraid all over again.

good article tho :)

Horror movies of today are shitty. U know what's gonna happen and it's all torture porn.

I agree with spacecase610. Ravenholm scared the crap out of me. Big daddys dont scare me, the splicers do. Im not to fond of jump out and scare you games.

I've just started playing Dead Space and apart from a seemingly dead enemy jumping up to attack me, making me jump it's not what I'd call scary. I mean my little sister could creep up behind me and go 'BOO!' and it'd have the same effect. I'm finding it more frustrating IE: running out of ammo, and having to run away, I WANT TO CHOP OFF THEIR LEGS GODDAMMIT!!!

the only time i have ever even been close to being scared in a videogame was in resident evil 4 when on the first level you go into that village...seems not so scary...but when you run out of ammo its a different story