Horror Adventure games.

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exelis
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Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 02 Oct 2007 22:11

...Anyone else like this genre, or am I the last person on earth that plays something other than FPS or GTA-style games?

Not that I only play Horror Adventures, but I finished Scratches recently, and have been working on Barrow Hill in my spare time. Scratches was definitely freaky, with a couple parts that made me jump. Barrow Hill is better put together in terms of puzzles and game flow, but decidedly less creepy in nature (though walking through the dark woods in general, coupled with some good musical score, does build the suspense well).

I'm a big fan of the first 3 Silent Hill games, as well, though they did have some action components.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by Seriously » 02 Oct 2007 22:53

I've never had a Playstation, so I never could play any of the Silent Hills, even though I've always wanted to.

The only one I've ever been able to play is Eternal Darkness for the Gamecube. I like it, but I haven't progressed on it in a while. It pulled a screamer-type-scare on me once, and it got me because those sorts of things always do, but it seemed out of place with the atomosphere of the rest of the game.


The insanity mechanic is simply tops. The insects crawling over the screen thing was obviously fake, but when my TV went mute and turned itself off? That screaming and gibbering and waking up in the previous room?

Blood running down the walls etc. All good stuff. I was particularly fond of when I noticed my character had no head.


You have probably also guessed that when I made that first choice I went with Xel'lotath.

I didn't even know what it was at the time, but it turned out to be so fitting.
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exelis
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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 03 Oct 2007 01:19

Interesting. I may have to steal my brother's gamecube, because I haven't played Eternal Darkness. Haven't even heard much about it, to be honest, but you make it sound intriguing.

As for the Silent Hill series, SH2, 3, and 4 are all available for PC (the PC version of 2 is actually better than the original playstation2 version). SH2 is standalone in storyline and has nothing to do with the first one, and is arguably the best in the series. 3 has some serious ties back to the first, but I think it would still be enjoyable without necessarily knowing the first storyline. Silent Hill 4 was complete unplayable trash. Too many game mechanics, stylistic hallmarks, and even the interface style were changed, not to mention the storyline was just weak.

I recently sold my PS1. I don't plan on ever getting a PS2, 3, Xbox, Gamecube, etc. (...and I loathe the fact that games are now often exclusively made for these pieces of inferior, single-purpose hardware) Scratches and Barrow Hill are both PC games.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by Steampunk » 03 Oct 2007 07:49

Does RE4 for the Wii count?

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by efilflah » 03 Oct 2007 08:05

Horror adventure games are one of my favourite genres, but not being a console owner I have a tough time finding games like this for the PC.

The first 3 Alone in the Dark games were great, as were the first 2 Resident Evil games. I haven't played the 4th Resident Evil yet because the PC version got such a panning for being such a shoddy port job, which is a real problem for the PC. Most of the developers of Horror Adventure games work almost exclusively for console makers. It's not really a targeted market anymore on the PC, and as such we only ever get the shoddy port jobs of the "big ones".

Silent Hill 1 & 2 were good. Haven't played the others yet but I will get around to it.

I really enjoy first person Horror games too. Something about not seeing your character's body in the third person kinda draws you in a bit more. System Shock 2 was probably one of the most creepy games I've ever played but it is not widely known as a classic horror game because it has a lot of RPG elements a la Deus Ex, but if you have a PC (it's old so should run fine on any PC these days) I really recommend you play it.

Another decent adventure game (with some bloody hard puzzles), is Still Life. I think you can get it on the PS2 as well as the PC. It''s a cool little mystery game where you play a female forensic photographer investigating a series of murders linked to murders one of your ancestors was investigating 70 odd years earlier. Borrowing a bit from Day of the Tentacle, you get to play in both time periods, gradually getting closer to finding out who the killer is. It was a really decent game, there were rumours of a sequel but alas, I doubt it will happen.

I'm currently making my way through lovecraft inspired Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth. It's not bad, it has a decent story so far with the right blend of mystery and creepiness. It has some nice RPG elements too, for example, if you're injured you can bleed to death if you don't stitch up and wrap a bandage of the wound (which happens a lot since I have it on the hardest mode). There's also an insanity meter, where if you see too many disturbing things your eyes start to blur and body shakes and it gets difficult to see where you're going, and you get tinitus in your ears and you can hear nothing but your heart beat afterwards. It's quite well implemented too, never becoming tiresome or overbearing, for example when you're climbing a ladder at great height, if you look down, you start to experience vertigo, but if you look back up at the ladder rungs you start to regain your composure.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 06 Oct 2007 04:42

When it comes to Resident Evil, and anything like it, we're talking about two different things, efiflah. I know what it says on the boxes, but Resident Evil was a sci-fi/action series of games, not horror adventures. If it's got more shooting than thinking, it's not an adventure. Horror, especially in gaming, has to espouse the intangible fear caused by unsettling themes with, perhaps some startling or shocking situations. I don't count being startled by the 4000th corporation-created virally mutated "zombie" or this wave's "boss creature" jumping down from the ceiling to be horror. Just startling.

I know that the gaming industry disagrees with me in their categorization. Then again, they make alleged rpg's for consoles, too (I haven't seen one yet... Seen lots of things claiming to be them, though).

I'll have to check out Still Life. That sounds like it might fit what I'm talking about a little better.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 06 Oct 2007 04:51

...and, since for some reason I can't edit my own post just minutes after posting it (AB? WTF?), let me add this:

Though I don't rule out the potential of a first-person horror game, I would have to look at it with a very suspicious eye. I'm not sure why first person seems so suspect, though. One would think that it would be easier to suspend disbelief because of the simulation of first-person view, but it has never worked for me. That, admittedly, could be a bias on my part, seeing that I think that Doom and all of its spawn (Quake, any other FPS I've ever tried to play) pretty much sucked ass.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by efilflah » 07 Oct 2007 06:50

When it comes to Resident Evil, and anything like it, we're talking about two different things, efiflah. I know what it says on the boxes, but Resident Evil was a sci-fi/action series of games, not horror adventures.
They can't be both?

Admittedly I'd say in RE the action is prioritised somewhat especially in the sequels, but it's not as though having a gun can't be used in certain scenarios to build tension, or that having a gun by your character's side in any way reduces the startle factor the first time you are chased by the mutant hounds jumping through the windows. I think excluding RE from the horror genre is a bit harsh as horror doesn't necessarily have to be horror in the classic/gothic sense of the word, infact I really like sci-fi oriented horrors.

System Shock 2 was a definite Sci-Fi horror (FPS), and although you had guns and other weapons, there wasn't an emphasis on action or fighting moreso on exploration and discovery, gradually unravelling the story by listening to ship logs and diary entries found on crew member bodies, infact you rarely see any bad guys the whole game, which is why it's so creepy, and weapons that barely had any ammo and that jammed regularly added great tension when you knew something was hunting you down.

There was a game I remember reading about, I think it only got a japanese release though. It was set in a haunted school and you were a photographer for the school paper or something and the only weapons you had were a lighter and your camera or something. Can't remember it's name though.

I think you'd really like Still Life. I think it's a solid horror/thriller title and a throwback to classic point and click adventure games. Frankly I, like you, am getting increasingly frustrated with the lack of support by developers for these kinds of games where story > action.

A classic example of getting the ingredients wrong is "The Thing". I loved John Carpenter's version of the film so when I heard a game was coming I was expecting an adventure game format filled with chills and paranoia with a great continuation of the story. Instead all I got was gunfest where all you did was shoot 3 different types of monsters whilst moving from location to location. Utter disappointment and really not the direction I think most people were expecting it to take.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 07 Oct 2007 09:27

Well, guns were available in Silent Hill, as well. That's not the issue. I just don't find the idea of running around and gunning down as many targets as you can, in every single area to be 'horror'. Quite frankly, I don't even get startled in such games, nevermind a feeling of visceral horror from the types of scares one gets other places... An analogy could be drawn to gothic horror movies of the past vs. the more recent 'gorefest' phenomenon. (Which, thankfully, some films are finally getting away from... The Ring would be one of the major examples. ...Blair Witch, too, even if I couldn't suspend disbelief long enough to be scared, at least the premise was there.) Gorefests are unsettling the first time you see one, but they get hackneyed pretty quickly. An original gothic-style horror plot will never get old.

There are many types of fear that can be invoked - fear of the unknown, fear of the misunderstood, fear regarding taboo subjects, fear induced by a perversion of what we perceive as innocent, good, or even just normal; and fear of one's own self and weaknesses. Familiarity and constantly fulfilled expectation diminish fear. Those points, on almost all counts, work against games like RE.

My opinions only, of course. Then again, I'm the one playing my game. I welcome discussion and debate on the topic.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by efilflah » 07 Oct 2007 20:26

I agree with what you're saying whole heartedly, and am of like mind when it comes to the use of cheap scare tactics and shlocky gorefests having little impact on me because of how commonplace they've become. I just think that in some games the running and gunning aspects aren't meant to be the "horror" part of the game, just a way of adding some slight tension in between puzzles and discovery of new story elements.

And anything can get old. If the market were to become saturated in classic gothic horror games, I'd be overjoyed for about a year, but eventually it would begin to grate with clone after clone of crappy games with the same story.
There are many types of fear that can be invoked - fear of the unknown, fear of the misunderstood, fear regarding taboo subjects, fear induced by a perversion of what we perceive as innocent, good, or even just normal; and fear of one's own self and weaknesses. Familiarity and constantly fulfilled expectation diminish fear. Those points, on almost all counts, work against games like RE.
When RE first came out, there wasn't much going on in the horror genre of games, and there were certainly no Silent Hills or Still Life's on the shelves. A global corporation experimenting with genetic manipulation on an innocent small town, with twists and turns involving corruption throughout your character's own organisation and with people they trust, all set in a creepy mansion linked to an underground scientific research facility where things have gone tits up. I think that ticked a few boxes back when it was first released.

Nowadays the premise has been done to death in games, and the style copied a million times over, but back then RE breathed life back into the horror genre, even if it catered more for the action loving types and used cheap gimmicks to achieve it.

I know I probably sound like it's my favourite game or something (it really isn't), but I reckon its earned it's stripes.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by exelis » 10 Oct 2007 19:33

OK, so you caught me. You're absolutely right, some of my major human fears fit with the first RE. I guess that it just morphed into action far too fast for me to find them palpable, but yes, the plot, if handled differently, could fit my hypotheses.

...And yes, it took me this long to respond for that reason. I'll have to rethink my stance. Perhaps it's the impetus to start hitting that "attack" button with such rapidity and regularity that break down the psychological walls that allow things to actually scare. I don't know. Still, I tried, very hard, to like Resident Evil's first installment and enjoy the horrors that it allegedly served up. It never worked for me. Silent Hill 1, on the other hand, despite horrendous voice acting, especially by the main character (I can only have nightmares of what it would have been with someone that didn't suck complete ass), scared the living crap out of me. Even the intro was freaky. It seems that the themes, plot, and atmosphere (including visuals, sound effect, and musical score) got me from the get go. Even SH2 had me looking over my shoulder long before anything "scary" happened.

If I could point out analogies to a non-game-playing person, I guess that Silent Hill, the movie, would suffice right up through the "janitor" scene, with taboo topics such as sexual abuse of children mixed with visuals of a horribly distorted, yet still motile form in tortuous bondage involving barbed-wire fencing. After that, the flesh ripping and burning, etc. got pretty ridiculous and predictable. Gore isn't surprising anymore. Sickening themes and, for lack of a better term, innovative visuals are. The movie went downhill precipitously immediately after the janitor scene, despite a perfect set and very good special effects. They lost the ethos/pathos of the games completely after that point, and opted for less subtle (like, as subtle as a louisville slugger) horror.

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Re: Horror Adventure games.

Post by efilflah » 11 Oct 2007 08:06

I agree with you about the Silent Hill film. I was enjoying the pace and atmosphere built up at the start, and then it just went downhill ridiculously fast as if the first and second halfves were directed by two different people.

As for RE, you don't have to like it to acknowledge that at the time, it was a refreshing reintroduction to horror for most gamers, even if for a horror it wasn't as "scary" as it could've been.

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