30 Scariest Horror Games Ever Made

Five Nights at Freddy’s is in a similar position. It’s seen as one of the godfathers of the YouTube jump scare era, which some people consider to be the cheapest form of horror imaginable, but actually playing the game reveals something much more interesting. While Five Nights at Freddy’s often warns you of impending scares via a gameplay language that you must learn to decipher, the game’s animatronic monstrosities feel unpredictable at first, as you scramble from camera to camera trying to figure out their next move. 

Through its minimalist design, lack of gore, and fascinating premise, Five Nights at Freddy’s helped usher in an era of horror gaming that aimed to show that scaring the living hell out of the player was a selling point in and of itself. 

Alien Isolation

2014 | Creative Assembly

It’s kind of amazing that it took so long for someone to make a proper Alien horror game. We’ve been shooting at Xenomorphs for years, but few games based on the Alien films treated those creatures as the legends of horror that they truly are. 

Alien Isolation uses a single Xenomorph more effectively than any piece of Alien media since the original movie. You know that feeling when you just saw a big spider in your room but it runs off and you have no idea where it went? Replace that spider with a Xenomorph that is just waiting to pounce on you the moment it reemerges, and you’ve got the basic Alien Isolation experience.

While Isolation’s late-game shift towards a slightly different kind of experience does hurt the game somewhat, this is still one of the most effective and brilliant uses of a license in gaming history. 

Resident Evil 7

2017 | Capcom

Resident Evil 7 is the scariest Resident Evil game ever made. While there are some notable contenders to that title (a couple of them are on this list), Resident Evil 7 brought pure horror back to the Resident Evil franchise in the biggest and best way possible. 

In fact, Resident Evil 7’s opening moments rank right up there with some of the scariest games ever made. Great survival horror games should make you feel helpless, and that’s exactly what Resident Evil 7 does. From the game’s isolated Louisiana location to the number of times it forces you to simply run, Resident Evil 7 expertly blends roller coaster pacing with atmospheric scares. 

Of course, only the bravest souls will be able to get through the incredible VR version of this game. 

SOMA

2017 | Frictional Games

SOMA is certainly scary in all of the “traditional” ways. After all, this was made by the same team that delivered Amnesia. You can expect a ton of scary visuals and expertly executed jump scares. 

However, SOMA really is that kind of horror game that gets under your skin in other ways. There’s a sense of hopelessness in this sci-fi horror game that only becomes more pronounced as you slowly unravel its many mysteries. You’ll start to welcome those more traditional scares for the way they break up the deeper feelings of dread this title inspires. 

By the time you reach SOMA’s incredible ending, you’ll be left staring at the screen wondering if you’ll ever get back the piece of yourself that this game steals. 

Prey

2017 | Arkane Studios

Prey flew under a lot of radars when it was released in 2017. Perhaps partially burdened by its association with the uneven Prey games of the past (an association its developers never really wanted in the first place), Prey failed to reach the one audience who would have most appreciated it: horror game fans. 

Prey is a lot of things, but it’s the game’s horror elements that really turn the entire experience into something special. After all, Prey‘s central gimmick is the idea that just about any object in its world can secretly be an alien creature just waiting to jump out at you. Given that this is the kind of game that asks you to examine and collect a lot of objects…well, you do the math. 

Jump scares aside, Prey is really all about its wonderful sci-fi horror atmosphere and the ways you’re forced to both appreciate the beauty of the game’s world and respect that it can kill you in so many ways. 

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl

2007 | GSC Game World

You would think that the scariest thing in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. would be the mutants that roam the wastelands of Chernobyl. At the very least, there are few games that offer anything more terrifying than suddenly turning a corner and staring at something you couldn’t find the words to describe even if you weren’t currently occupied with screaming. 

Yet, it’s this game’s survival elements that make it so special. You are not prepared to endure the cruel world this game throws you in. Yes, ammunition is scarce, but so is water, food, and hope. Simply existing is a threat in this game, which is why you’ll often find yourself wondering why you’re even bothering to continue to exist. 

There are all kinds of horrors in gaming, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl expertly utilizes just about all of them. 

Detention

2017 | RedCandleGames

Tragedies can be strange things. Most of us can relate to certain tragedies like the death of a loved one or the loss of something sacred. Yet, there are other tragedies that we may understand or empathize with but could never truly feel in the way that the person most affected by them must feel them. 

The magic of Detention can be found in the ways it forces you to feel every part of so many tragedies. This game sets itself up as a ghost story set in an abandoned school, and it is certainly an effective piece of horror as nothing more than that. Yet, the more you learn about this game’s characters, world, and history, the more you realize that Detention is actually the story of a series of personal and historical tragedies that are almost too much to process. 

The greatest burden of living in a world of nearly infinite knowledge is the realization that we may only be equipped to handle and know so many things. Detention will test the limits of your ability to process so many different kinds of nightmares. 

The Suffering

2004 | Surreal Software

I don’t know why there aren’t more works of horror set in prisons. Most prison systems are basically the biggest living nightmares possible, so you’d think we’d have more notable works of horror that push that natural nightmare to new extremes. 

The Suffering is certainly one of the most notable works of prison horror in any medium, and I think it would retain that title even if there was a little more notable competition in that category. As the story of a mysterious convict forced to battle demonic forces within the confines of hell on Earth, The Suffering certainly makes the most out of its often underutilized setting. 

Don’t be fooled into thinking that The Suffering is nothing more than ghouls behind bars, though. Indeed, only the bravest gamers will discover the darkest depths of where this game dares to go. 

The Evil Within

2014 | Tango Gameworks

To be entirely honest with you, The Evil Within is kind of a disappointing game in many ways. Expectations were high for Shinji Mikami’s return to horror, and those expectations were somewhat deflated by this title’s iffy gameplay and pacing problems. 

In terms of scares, though, The Evil Within does everything but disappoint. Mikami has suggested that this will be the last horror game he ever directs and, if that holds true, I can hardly think of a better way for such a legendary figure to go out than this museum of the macabre that comes at you in so many ways. 

This is a relentless horror game that features a variety of funhouse-style scares that are as effective as they are darkly amusing. Good luck summoning the courage to return to this game after you inevitably need to step away from it. 

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream

1995 | Cyberdreams

Many of the scariest horror games tend to be a little more modern. Various advancements in technology and developers’ knowledge of the genre have led to increasingly scary games over the last 20 years or so. If you’re looking for the scariest game of the pre-Resident Evil era, though, it may very well be I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream. 

Blessed with one of the greatest names in horror history (a name it shares with the short story it’s based on), I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream lives up to every word of its intimidating title. You may not think that a point-and-click adventure game can be scary, but that’s only because you haven’t played a point-and-click adventure game that forces you to explore the personal hells of five deeply disturbed people. 

This is the kind of game that will leave you feeling like you need a shower. It’s truly amazing that this was unleashed upon the world way back in ‘95. 

Silent Hill 3

2003 | Team Silent

Silent Hill 3 exists in a weird cultural vacuum. It’s clearly overshadowed by its legendary predecessors, and I’d argue that it sometimes gets lumped in with some of the…lesser Silent Hill efforts that would follow. However, there is a strong case to be made that Silent Hill 3 is the absolute scariest Silent Hill game ever made. 

Like the first two Silent Hill games, Silent Hill 3 is really a deep dive into its character’s psyche that forces us to confront a lot of personal demons. The ace up this game’s sleeve, though, is its somewhat surprising number of well-placed jump scares that usually feature one of this game’s all-time great monster designs. 

Whereas some other Silent Hill games are content with letting you stew in a vat of vague uncomfortableness for as long as they’re able, Silent Hill 3 is perfectly happy to interrupt your cesspool soak from time to time with something that will remind you that should never be so comfortable as to get lost in your own thoughts again.