Scariest Games to Play for Halloween: Single Player, Co-Op, & Multiplayer

Fall is about more than brown leaves and pumpkin spice — it’s also about scaring yourself so bad you pee. With that in mind, we’ve rounded up some of the most bladder-challenging games out there that aren’t just scary, but good. If you want to scare yourself, your friends, or other people online, keep reading! We’ve also picked our personal favorites in each category (single player, co-op, multiplayer), the games that we consider the best scary games — EIP approved!

We’ve given you a TL;DR with the table below — click a game on the table (or use the Contents button) to see more details about any of the games on the list!

The Best Single Player Horror Game: Dead Space (2008)

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($19.99), Xbox ($14.99), PlayStation 3, EA Play

Dead Space is the classic 3rd-person survival-horror experience. You assume the role of Isaac Clarke, a mute engineer who has been assigned to investigate the USG Ishimura, a “Planetcracker” spaceship that had recently stopped communicating with the rest of humanity. Once there, it isn’t long before you and your team are attacked by the now iconic necromorphs – sharp-limb, alien-infested zombies – and you are forced to make your way through the Ishimura in order to learn what is happening, find your missing girlfriend, and – most frightening of all – survive.

To do so, players must use a variety of futuristic industrial and military tools in order to kill the necromorphs. But, there’s a twist: the only efficient way to kill most necromorphs is to cut their limbs off, requiring precision and, more importantly, ammunition. With resources in Dead Space so scarce, players must be careful to manage them so that they don’t ever run out of what they need.

Horror Features

Jumpscares

Gore

Monsters

Despite its age, the horror in Dead Space still holds up. The necromorphs are an insidious, horrifying, and eerily fascinating villain, with each variant having some of the most frightening designs and gimmicks in gaming. And, what’s more, they are smart, using vents and flanks in order to try to sneak up on the player, so that you can never really feel at ease. This is reinforced by amazing level design that forces you to confront whatever area you most thought “I don’t want to go there” upon first seeing it. You do have a weapon, and the game is long enough that you can acclimate yourself to the horror by the end, but it always forces you to stay on your toes, or else be carved to pieces (in brutally gruesome death cutscenes). 

Even if the jumpscares and moments of fright stop getting to you after a while, though, the atmosphere, environments, and story never stop playing with psychological, body, and cosmic horror, juggling all three so well that certain images and moments are likely to stick with you long after you see the end credits. 

The Best Co-Op Horror Game: The Forest

Co-op (online)

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($19.99), PlayStation ($19.99)

The Forest is a survival-crafting game that can be played in singer player or online co-op. The player character’s plane crash lands on an island, and they must pick up lots of sticks and rocks in their quest to build shelter, survive, and discover the island’s secrets. The main gameplay loop will be familiar to anyone who’s played other Survival Crafting games, and all the familiar tropes are present: camp fires, tech tiers, gathering resources and processing them. What makes The Forest unique is how creepy the other inhabitants of the island are, and the excellent pacing in how they progressively get both more aggressive and way creepier.

It’s hard to say too much without giving it away, but there is more to the island than meets the eye, and figuring out what’s going on requires delving into some dark, spooky caves. These are definitely the scariest part of the game, with creepy sounds, complete and utter darkness, and terrors lurking in said darkness.

Horror Features

Gore

Unsettling Audio

Tension

Some people say that The Forest “isn’t that scary” — but those people must not be afraid of the dark, or weird pale naked people staring at them at night. While there are a handful of jump scares that can occur in the game, most of what makes the game scary is the tension; the setting feels unsafe and creepy at all times, and at night the forest is alive with spooky sounds. Venturing into the caves is so scary that one EIP author (who shall remain nameless) gave up trying to complete the game after their first spelunk. Bring a friend so someone can hold the light while the other keeps their axe ready!

There’s also a fair bit of gore, and you can create disgusting effigies if you so choose. Additionally, eating human flesh is sometimes necessary if you don’t find other sources of sustenance.

The Best Multiplayer Horror Game: Dead by Daylight

PVP Multiplayer

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($19.99), PlayStation ($29.99), Xbox ($29.99), Android and iOS (free) — the console versions come with additional DLC characters & cosmetics

Dead by Daylight (DBD) is an asymmetrical multiplayer PvP game set in the “Realm of the Entity”, where an all-powerful Eldritch being has brought kidnapped human to be chased around and killed by murderers and monsters. Each match, or “Trial”, takes place on a randomly chosen map, with some elements of the map being randomly generated. The game is played 1v4, with the Killer trying to catch and hook the Survivors, who have to repair generators in order to power the Exit Gates and escape the Trial.

Dead by Daylight’s gameplay is an interesting mix of hide-and-seek and tag, essentially. Survivors want to avoid the Killer, since once it finds them they have no choice but to run away, using windows and pallets to slow him down. Survivors can’t harm the Killer, only delay the inevitable — most chases eventually end with the Survivor on a Hook. Survivors must balance rescuing their teammates and hiding with getting their objectives done, while the Killer has to defend the generators while trying to hook all the Survivors enough times to kill them.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Unsettling Audio

Monsters

Despite a fairly terrifying premise, the undeniably scary concept of being revived and murdered over and over is never truly addressed in the game. That being said, new players spend most of their time in DBD desperately hiding in fear every time they hear the “heartbeat” that indicates the Killer is near. Most of the Killers are terrifying — a disgusting Clown, Resident Evil’s Nemesis, Leatherface from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Other Killers can pop out of stealth and jump scare the Survivors.

However, once you get used to the music and the gameplay, DBD stops being quite as scary. There are still quite a few killers that can jump scare you by going through walls or sneaking up behind you, so the terror never truly goes away unless you’re the kind of person who’s immune to jump scares.

We’ve got a ton of Dead by Daylight guides, including a Beginner’s Guide if you’re looking to try the game for the first time!

While the three games listed above are our personal favorites here at EIP, there are plenty more scary games to get you in the spooky season mood!

7 Days to Die

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($44.99), PlayStation ($44.99), Xbox ($44.99)

7 Days to Die (7Dtd) is an action survival horror game with base-building and crafting mechanics. Players spawn into either a randomized or pre-set world. The game takes place after a devastating nuclear war that destroyed the entire earth. Global destruction isn’t enough, so the remaining locations are infested with flesh-hungry zombies. Players will fight off the undead, gather resources, and eventually craft a base of operations. 7DtD is similar to other open-world survival games like Rust or Valheim, but with a zombie theme.

It’s jam-packed with features, including combat, resource management, crafting, and building – so much so that this game sometimes feels more like an MMO. The primary enemy of this game is (obviously) zombies, but as time goes on, progressively more dangerous variants with special abilities will begin to appear on the map. Some zombies will be stronger than normal and have increased health and damage.  On the 7th night, a blood moon will appear. With it, a horde of zombies and infected animals will swarm current player locations, so it’s crucial to be prepared and ready to defend yourself once this event rolls around.

Horror Features

Gore

Tension

Monsters

7 Days to Die may not be the scariest title, but it does feature plenty of gore. Players can dismember and disembowel enemies; this leads to copious amounts of blood and severed limbs. Since this is a resource-driven survival game, players will constantly manage their thirst, hunger, and other medical needs. Zombies become overpowered at night, meaning players will also want to track daylight, as being caught out in the open once the sun sets can be a fatal mistake. While the zombies are a little too silly looking to be truly scary, the ever-present threat of death can certainly fear, especially for inexperienced players.

Alan Wake 2

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Epic Games ($49.99), PlayStation 5 ($59.99), Xbox X/S ($59.99)

Whether the original Alan Wake is a cult classic, or just a classic, depends on who you ask. Same deal with whether or not Alan Wake was a horror game, or just an action game. The sequel, however, leans much more into the spook, while still retaining the spirit of the original game both in storytelling and in gameplay. In Alan Wake 2, you play both as the titular Alan Wake, and as the FBI agent Saga Anderson sent to investigate the weird goings-on in Alan’s town.

As both characters, you’ll need to watch the shadows for the enemies they may contain — staying in the light, or using your flashlight, is the only thing keeping you from a very rapid death by shadow person. The combat may have its failings, but the main draw is the dark, psychological atmosphere and the narrative. The story is supported by live action sequences, and you’ll need to solve puzzles and hunt for clues in between story beats.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Monsters

Alan Wake 2 is a game about tension and atmosphere, but there are still plenty of jump scares, especially from the monsters that can be lurking in any shadow. However, the scariest moments aren’t usually the combat sequences, but rather the dread and anticipation of listening to a scary soundtrack while walking through a forest at night.

Alien: Isolation

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($39.99), PlayStation ($29.99), Xbox ($39.99), Switch ($19.99)

Perhaps no other game captures the spirit of the Alien franchise better than Alien: Isolation. A single player survival horror title, A:I has you take on the role of Amanda Ripley, who has come to the space station Sevastopol to search for her missing mother, Alien protagonist Ellen Ripley. Things quickly go awry, and Amanda must play a deadly game of cat and mouse with one of the eponymous aliens as she tries to escape the station.

While gameplay mostly involves sneaking and hiding, Amanda can use a variety of weapons to scare away the monster, or to defeat the sporadic human foes that block her progress. The game also involves puzzles, as well as the need to manage resources (there’s some crafting). The alien that serves as the main antagonist is very well scripted, and cleverly stalks the player as they try to escape the station.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Monsters

Most of Alien: Isolation is spent with the player sweating nervously, wondering if the alien is hiding in the ducts above them. While combat encounters are generally rare, they are tense, as resources are limited and the alien cannot be killed. Hiding is only at temporary solution, as the longer you stay in one place, the more certain the alien becomes that you’re somewhere in the area — this forces the player to keep moving, even if they know the alien is nearby. All in all, the game does a fantastic job making you feel like you’re being stalked by an evolutionary perfect killing machine.

The sound design is perhaps the scariest part of the game. In addition to the obviously terrifying sounds of the alien crawling through a nearby duct, there is plenty of well-crated ambient noise — debris bouncing off the station’s hull, computers clicking and whirring. You’ll want to turn the sound down so it stops scaring you, but that just makes it easier for the alien to sneak up behind you!

Amnesia: the Dark Descent

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC (including Linux) via Steam ($19.99), PlayStation ($29.99 for Amnesia: Collection), Xbox ($29.99 for collection), Switch ($29.99 for collection)

Amnesia: the Dark Descent needs no introduction when discussing horror games, but allow me to give you one anyway: It is the first-person horror magnum opus that revolutionized the genre, and is largely considered one of the most important horror games ever released. As for the game itself, it is set in a decaying, mysterious gothic castle, where you wake up as an Amnesiac tasked simply to “go to the Inner Sanctum, find Alexander and kill him.” To do so, you must traverse the monster-infested halls of the castle and uncover darker and darker secrets about its (and your) true nature. It is a simple premise, utilized to maximum efficiency.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Monsters

What is there to say that hasn’t already been said about how scary Amnesia: the Dark Descent is? Not only is it widely considered one of the (if not the) scariest games ever made, it also pioneered the modern form of the first-person survival horror genre itself. Many games on this list weren’t just specifically inspired by Amnesia, but also were made by members of the same development team. The encounters with the various monsters are legendarily tense and terrifying, the themes present are disturbing and upsetting, and the atmosphere is dripping with so much gothic horror energy that Dracula would shit his pants if he visited Amnesia’s castle. If you somehow haven’t already played this, and are looking for a timelessly horrifying experience, look no further. Just make sure to play it with the lights off.

Amnesia: The Bunker

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($24.99), PlayStation ($24.99, Xbox ($24.99)

Amnesia: The Bunker is the best Amnesia sequel (by far) because it manages to both return to the series’ foundational values of terror and moral exploration, while also being completely fresh and new in its presentation. The formula is familiar: you control a character trapped in claustrophobic environments, forced to solve puzzles, all while trying to avoid a terrifying monster which you have no real defense against (Well, you have a gun, but it isn’t particularly useful). By lessening the focus on old castles, ancient ruins, and increasingly esoteric lore, The Bunker is able to focus much more on the tangible horror, wartime themes, and active danger, making it by far the best sequel to Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Monsters

While not quite as scary as the Dark Descent, The Bunker knows what it wants to be and accomplish, creating a tense, oppressive atmosphere and letting you wallow in it during the course of it’s short, intense campaign. A worth successor to Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Amnesia: The Bunker is sure to terrify and exhilarate thanks to its superior AI and its constant desire to force the player to make just enough noise to draw forth the monster. The one game where having a gun and grenades makes you less safe.

Anatomy

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Itch.io ($2.99)

Over the years, Anatomy has risen to cult status, and for good reason. A brief, harrowing experience, Anatomy sees you navigating a “normal” suburban house. As one might expect from the genre, the house is not as it seems, though not because of any monster inside of it. Instead, as it is quickly revealed via poetic and bone-chilling voice-over, the house is the monster. As each room is compared to a different organ of the house — the stomach, the mouth, and so on — strang things begin occurring, culminating in one of the most atmosphere-rich and blood-curdling experiences of modern horror.

There is a reason that developer Kitty Horrorshow is considered a horror savant by many, and her most terrifying and popular game is a big part of that. By turning the haunted house into a vehicle to explore domestic life, Anatomy managed to get you questioning every wall and entryway for weeks after playing through the game. And, at a curt 30-45 minutes and very cheap on Itch.io, you have no excuse not to experience this indie horror masterpiece yourself.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Existential Dread

Anatomy’s main premise won’t see you running through the hall and away from monsters. Instead, you are forced to consider the house you are within to be a hostile, malevolent entity — and one you already find yourself within. Audio recordings making these comparisons play throughout, heightening the tension of the beast you find yourself within and spelling your doom. It all leads up to one of the most devastating frights I’ve experienced, and one that left me viewing closests and basements suspiciously for a long time after.

Darkwood

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC (including Linux and MacOS) via Steam ($14.99), Playstation ($14.99), Xbox ($14.99), Switch ($14.99), or for free via Torrent (see below)

A top-down horror game? That couldn’t possibly be scary, right? Wrong. Indie developers Acid Wizard Studio have crafted one of the most terrifying titles around, and they’ve done so without relying on jump scares, loud noises, or even a first-person perspective. The small Polish team (three dudes and a dog) — despite not being a fan of the horror genre — manage to make their game-world one of eerie tension, punctuated by brief, heart-pounding moments of danger. The woods of Darkwood are indeed dark, and you’ll find yourself jumping at every strange sound that issues from the game’s forest — or when something bangs on your shelter door.

An interesting blend of roguelike, survival crafting, and RPG adventure, Darkwood defies simple genre classification. You’ll need to use your smarts to survive, paying attention to your surroundings and making good use of the meager resources you can scavenge during the day. At night, only safe houses offer shelter from the horrible things that lurk in the woods, and careful barricades, traps, and preparation are a must if you want to see morning. The game offers little in the way of direction, so it’s up to you to figure out how to escape the woods.

If you’re interested in trying Darkwood, the developers have uploaded a torrent of the game, DRM free. They simply ask that if you like the game, pay for it on the platform of your choice. Pretty cool of them!

Horror Features

Tension

Unsettling Audio

Monsters

Darkwood is a game about tension. This is expressed through both the pacing and the mechanics — every day is a race to see what you can collect while the sun is out and you’re safe. Once night falls, you must barricade yourself in a safe house and hope that your boards hold, and that if they don’t, your traps and whatever weapons you’ve collected will be enough to save you. While some of the environments and the monsters can be pretty gross, there’s not much in the way of baddies popping out and surprising you — when you’re in danger, you’ll know.

Faith: The Unholy Trinity

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on Steam ($14.99) and Nintendo Switch ($14.99)

FAITH: The Unholy Trinity is a collection of the first (and currently only) three chapters of the FAITH series. A send-up of 8-bit, Atari-era gaming, FAITH is set in 1986. In it, you play as a priest who is tasked with completing a failed exorcism. This demon’s many minions, however, are already present throughout the game, and the influence of its cult is widespread, and so you must make your way through the retro-visual feast in order to investigate and eventually hunt down the demon that is trying to claw its way into the world.

Inspired by the Satanic Panic and with extremely religious themes, Faith is not necessarily for everyone. It takes pages from films such as Rosemary’s Baby and the Exorcist, and repackages them into a more jumpscare-heavy, gory, and action-packed nightmare.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Unsettling Audio

Monsters

Fon’t let FAITH’s purposefully “dated” graphics turn you off: it remains one of the most effectively frightening games of recent years. Thanks to expert horror timing, a slew of horrifying monster designs (that are somehow made more scary due to the 8-bit limitations), excellent and crunchy audio whose distortions make it worse, and a story that leans into both the schlock and seriousness of the “Catholic horror” movies it leans so heavily on, FAITH will have even the most avid horror gamers jumping in their seats more than once.

Five Nights At Freddy’s

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($4.99), PlayStation ($7.99), Xbox ($7.99), Switch ($7.99)

Five Nights at Freddy’s (FNAF) is almost certainly the most iconic horror game of the 2010s. What other PC game has elementary school kids wearing its merch? Simple in premise, perfect in execution, FNAF is a great example of how good game design will always trump big budgets and market research. The game sees you playing a security guard at a Chuck-E-Cheese style pizza place, where during the day animatronic robots entertain the customers. At night, these robots come alive, and only your constant monitoring of them via the security cameras will prevent them from ending your life. You only have limited power to run the lights and the doors that can protect you from the robots, so you must resist the urge to protect yourself until it’s absolutely necessary.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Unsettling Audio

Tension

The tension is the star of FNAF, with the animatronic robots an ever-present threat. They look absolutely terrifying when viewed through the security cameras, but look you must, lest they take advantage of your inattention and make their way to your office. The jump scares come infrequently but impactfully: when one of the robots appears under the hallway lights, or when you switch to a camera and see a robot’s lifeless eyes mere feet from the lens, you’ll be hard-pressed not to jump out of your gaming chair.

GTFO

Co-Op (Online)

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($39.99)

GTFO is an online co-op survival horror shooter. While solo play is possible, gameplay relies on a team of players that fill a role within the squad, so the difficulty of solo play may be frustrating — you’ll want to bring 3 friends for this one. This high-octane thriller casts players as unnamed prisoners tasked with completing missions within a derelict research facility by a mysterious warden. The current Rundown defines gameplay as a seasonal mission pack with several expeditions of varying difficulty for players to complete. 

Players familiar with squad-based mission games, like Payday: The Heist and its sequel, will find the gameplay quite similar. What sets GTFO apart from other games is its difficulty and learning curve, which requires players to be fully aware of their situation and what their squad can handle. Failure to learn and manage the game’s mechanics can have devastating results, as, without careful planning and execution, impossible amounts of enemies can quickly overrun your team.

Horror Features

Gore

Tension

Monsters

GTFO is an incredibly frightening game and is constantly a tense experience. Players may occasionally experience jump scares or startling scenes when advancing through the environment, but GTFO mainly focuses on tension and pacing to induce fear in its fans. Brief moments of relief punctuate intense gameplay, with stress and anxiety rising as players anticipate another (probably fatal) engagement.

The game features a large variety of humanoid, zombie-like enemies called sleepers. As expected, buckets of gore will flow as players dispatch these fierce and endless monsters. Additionally, players will encounter challenging boss/sub-boss monsters that require strong tactics and strategy to defeat. With the grim atmosphere, horrifying enemies, and the anxiety that comes with the flawless performance required to survive, there are a lot of scares in this game. Since GTFO entails constantly engaging in instanced missions, the scare factor is consistent throughout the whole experience.

Home Safety Hotline

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on Steam ($14.99)

Ever wanted to be a telephone operator working for an organization that gives people advice on exactly what to do in case they come across anything that goes bump in the night? No? Well, now you can anyway, with the deliciously creative Home Safety Hotline. In it, you will receive calls from people who believe they are encountering some manner of supernatural creature. And it is your job to figure out what creature they are dealing with and to give them advise that might just save their life (or may just cost them cheese).

Ranging from silly critters like gnomes and strange phenomenons like mysterious holes all the way up to absolutely petrifying monsters that evoke folk-horror and internet-horror masterpieces, Home Safety Hotline’s plethora of creatures mix well with its (excellently voice-acted) callers’ vague and unclear descriptions, forcing you to make decisions that could be life-or-death. And, between its endless mode and its DLC, it is also one of the most replayable horror games around.

Horror Features

Existential Dread

Unsettling Audio

Monsters

Home Safety Hotline is not scary in the traditional sense. While there is a meta-plot that involves the player, there are no jumpscares or time limits, and you are given free rein to peruse the entries and decide how to help each caller. The horror of Home Safety Hotline instead lies in knowing that something bad might happen on the other side of the line, and that it might be your fault. This is enough to hook horror fans, but you aren’t going to be jumping out of your seat with this one. But, if you are an empathetic player, it likely will leave you sweating nonetheless.

Layers of Fear (2016)

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC (including Linux) via Steam ($19.99), PlayStation ($19.99), Xbox ($19.99), Switch ($19.99)

Calling Layers of Fear a “walking simulator” might be accurate, but it feels reductive given the terrifying beauty on display in developer Bloober’s psychedelic horror game. (Side note: having such a silly name for a dev that makes horror games seems, well, silly.) The game essentially functions as a haunted house, with the player moving through a linear series of interconnected rooms. Progressing involves solving puzzles that use a variety of interesting mechanics: Sometimes it’s as simple as finding something in a drawer, sometimes you’ll need to look at something specific — sometimes you’ll even need to not look at something while it’s making spooky noises.

Do note here that we prefer the original 2016 release of the game, rather than the 2023 remake. What it lacks in graphics and seriousness, it makes up for with a tighter story and more heart.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Unsettling Audio

Existential Dread

Much of the horror in Layers of Fear comes from its jump scares, which are numerous. However, the creepy environments and the story work together to fill the player with dread, making the inevitable jump scares hit even harder. The story is very dark, and some of the in-game mechanics serve to reflect the internal state of the protagonist.

Lethal Company

Co-Op (Online)

Spook Factor

Available on Steam ($9.99)

Lethal Company is not only one of the most massive indie horror titles of all time, it is one of the most massive indie games period, and certainly the biggest co-op horror game of all time. Made by young solo developer Zeekerss, Lethal Company is able to make horror work in a co-op space (something notoriously difficult to do) by meshing it with humor, unpredictability, and smart game design.

In Lethal Company, you and a crew of 3 of your friends take your spaceship and go to a variety of different planets. On each, there is a facility that you must explore in order to find loot, which you will then take back to your ship (and eventually to your company headquarters). In these facilities, of course, is a wide variety of terrifying monsters that are, more often than not, deadly in the extreme, and so you might end up hauling bodies back as well… After all, you don’t want to be fined for failing to bring them back.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Tension

Monsters

Lethal Company is surprisingly scary given its lo-fi aesthetic and co-op gameplay. This is largely due to three factors: brilliant monster design that remains tense even after you know what they are, voice cut-off ranges that keep you from hearing your friends if they get too far (or die), and the tension in knowing that if you all perish, then the day will be forfeit and your collected loot lost.

MADiSON

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($34.99), PlayStation ($34.99), Xbox ($35.99), Switch ($34.99)

This psychological horror game successfully blends tension with scares both jump and gentle, making sure the player always feels a sense of foreboding.The environments are detailed, as is the audio — the rooms are full of creaks and groans, and thunder crashes outside as you desperately try to figure out the combination or find the key. The player must use a Polaroid camera to reveal hints for the game’s puzzles, but you never know whether the image will reveal something terrifying. The story isn’t anything to write home about, but does its job serviceable, elevating the tension and motivating the player to press on through the horrors they’re uncovering.

MADiSON is puzzle heavy, and they aren’t particularly easy, so puzzle-haters beware! You’ll have to take notes, and more than a few puzzles will probably leave you stumped for at least a little while. Arguably, this can hurt the game’s pacing somewhat, but anyone who enjoys old-school puzzles that don’t hold your hand will appreciate MADiSON’s approach. That being said, the limited inventory means you’ll often find yourself having to trek back through the house to grab something you didn’t know you needed, which can kill the mood a bit.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Unsettling Audio

Monsters

MADiSON really leans on jump scares for its horror, despite having created a fairly scary setting to explore. The sound design is also very effective: threatening footsteps, strange ambient sounds, and perfectly normal but still creepy creaks from the floor below you all work together to create a tense, uncomfortable environment. The soundtrack and background music also deserve a mention for adding to the game’s spookiness. Horror veterans may be able to predict some of MADiSON’s scares, lessening the tension. Still, anyone who allows themself to become immersed in the setting will certainly feel their hair standing on end as they wait for their latest Polaroid to develop.

Outlast

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC (including Linux) via Steam ($19.99), PlayStation ($19.99), Xbox ($19.99), Switch ($24.99 for Bundle of Terror)

Outlast is a first-person survival horror game set in a psychiatric hospital that has been overtaken by the homicidal, possibly supernatural patients. You play as investigative reporter Miles Upshur, and as such are armed with only a video camera as you traverse the decaying halls of Mount Massive Asylum. The camera has a nigh vision mode, which you will be making plenty of use of as you try to run and hide from disturbing foes. But be careful; the camera runs on batteries, which you will find yourself constantly running out of at the worst possible moments.

Horror Features

Jump Scares

Gore

Tension

Outlast is one of the best designed horror experiences in recent memory, which is to say that it. Is. Petrifying. Horror games often put players in the dark, but rarely do they put you in the dark, where everything around you is pitch black. That is just one element of a whole that makes Outlast one of the scariest games ever made. The disturbing characters, perfectly timed jump scares, absolutely demented scenes of torture and pain all contribute to a distilled, chilling experience unlike any other. If you don’t plan on sleeping for the next few days, Outlast is your game.

Resident Evil 2

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC via Steam ($39.99), PlayStation ($39.99), Xbox ($39.99), Switch (October 28th)

Resident Evil 2 is a frightening zombie survival horror game that lets players pick between two protagonists for a unique campaign: Claire Redfield and Leon Kennedy. Resident Evil fans may already be aware, but this is a remake of the 1998 hit of the same name. Players will make their way through the overrun police station in Raccoon City. You’ll need to manage weapons, ammo, health herbs, and story items as you blast through the T-Virus-infected undead. RE2 features intense boss fights and exciting set pieces that keep the thrills and tension going through the entire story.

For this remake, Capcom decided to model its third-person perspective off of the over-the-shoulder view we got in Resident Evil 4. Claire or Leon will collect an arsenal of weapons on their adventure, and all of them will have 1-3 upgrades you can find hidden within RPD and the surrounding areas. You’ll need to solve puzzles in order to progress through the game, but the backtracking tends to be more challenging than solving them. Punctuating the story are several boss fights, usually a head-to-head fight with some set-piece elements added for extra engagement. 

Horror Features

Gore

Tension

Jump Scares

RE2 has some scary moments, but with a heavy emphasis on action. Players will eventually upgrade their weapons into something powerful, and once you learn the strategies of the common enemies, they don’t provide much of a scare factor.

Within the halls of the RPD, you will find a variety of infected creatures mixed with typical zombie fare. There are some gory moments, especially when you come across someone being devoured by a zombie. Plenty of rooms are likewise filled with blood and viscera.

Soma

Single Player

Spook Factor

Available on PC (including Linux & MacOS) via Steam ($29.99), PlayStation ($29.99, free w/ PS+ Extra), Xbox ($29.99)

Soma is a first-person survival horror game, and also one of the smartest games we’ve ever played. It takes place in a massive futuristic underwater laboratory called PATHOS-II. The facility has no humans anywhere to be found, aside from your character, who wakes up there immediately after undergoing an experimental medical procedure in a modern, contemporary city. While there are no humans, however, there are dozens of robots, some of whom display signs of humanlike intelligence. More of them, however, simply want to kill you.

It would be criminal to say more, as this game is very twist-heavy, and relies very heavily on its ideals. What could’ve been just a standard, aquatic-themed hide-and-seek simulator with a barebones stories instead explores some truly fascinating (and frightening) psychological and philosophical ideas. To tell you about them would ruin the experience: if you want a horror game that frightens your mind, this is the one for you.

Horror Features

Existential Dread

Tension

Unsettling Audio

It is difficult to say how scary Soma really is, as it will depend highly on what scares you, personally. The gameplay itself is repetitive and nothing special, the AI of the enemies is sometimes laughable, and the atmosphere is somewhat generic. That said, the game’s most frightening aspects are not its encounters, but rather its ideas. There were moments in this game where we genuinely felt true horror, simply at the concept of what was happening in-game. The philosophical thought experiment at the center of its story is so compelling and complex that it’s implications will haunt you for days, if you let it. If Spec Ops: The Line is an amazingly thought-provoking story wrapped in generic action-shoot clothes, this is the horror game equivalent.

Honorable Mentions

If we listed every horror game out there, we’d be here until Thanksgiving! That being said, there are a few titles that we felt bad about leaving off the list, either because they weren’t available on Steam, or just because we can only list so many games. Here are our Honorable Mentions for Scariest Games:

• Alone in the Dark (2024): Pieces Interactive’s take on the horror classic, Alone in the Dark is a schlocky but sincere love letter to the horror genre.
• Bioshock: The Bioshock series’ cramped corridors and crazed denizens create a spooky environment, even if you are too powerful to ever be actually scared.
• The Cat Lady: A psychological thriller masterpiece, this extremely dark story deals with themes of death, suicide, and redemption.
• Condemned: Criminal Origins: A classic of the genre, Condemned: Criminal Origins remains frightening to this day, despite dated mechanics.
• Content Warning: Lethal Company’s younger, sillier brother, you explore terrifying environments in order to make content. Produces absolutely hysterical clips.
• Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly: Fatal Frame’s scariest entry, if you can find a PS2 to play it on, the camera-based horror will leave you shaking.
• The Dark Pictures Anthology & Until Dawn: Taking a more cinematic approach, these titles provide spooks in the form of classic 80s slasher movies.
• Dead Space (2023): While not quite as stellar as the original, the remake’s enhancements make it well worth the price of admission.
• Dredge: Spooky fishing? Who can say no. Drenched in mystery and oddity, Dredge is one of the ultimate “something isn’t quite right here” games, and very replayable.
• Doki Doki Literature Club: A visual novel where most of the horror comes from the darkness and depression that slowly gets revealed over time.
• Endoparasitic: A very unique gimmick sees you crawling through a monster-filled facility with only one limb.
• The Evil Within: Dreams can be terrifying, something that the Evil Within series deeply understands. A send-up to Resident Evil, the Evil Within has its terrifying moments.
• Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice: What is scarier than schizophrenia and Norse horror? That, but also well-written and gorgeously rendered.
• Indika: You play as a nun who is possessed by and interacts with the devil as he aids you through the Siberian world.
• Iron Lung: So good that Markiplier is making a movie about it, this short game sees you going to a strange planet covered in an ocean of blood, though you are confined to your tiny submarine.
• Little Nightmares: The Little Nightmnares series is one of the best horror side-scrollers out there. Creative and puzzling, these games all present a uniquely mysterious world.
• Lost in Vivo: A notable entry in the “indie horror renaissance,” Lost in Vivo sees you exploring claustrophic tunnels filled with terrors in search of your service dog.
• The Mortuary Assistant: Equal parts simulator and horror game, the Mortuary Assistant’s core gameplay loop sees you having to piece together what is wrong with a body to save your life.
• Mothered: A role-playing horror game, Mothered meshes RPG and horror mechanics well, and makes surviving the horrors contingent on smart role-playing.
• Mouthwashing: A truly fantastic psychological thriller set in space, Mouthwashing explores deep themes and presents some horrible imagery as you find yourself stranded after a long-haul crash.
• Murder House: Coming right in the middle of the “PSX-style horror” boom, Murder House managed to stand above most other entries in the genre.
• Paratopic: Though extremely short, Paratopic is one of the strangest and most interesting horror games of recent years. Told achronologically, the mystery is as terrifying as anything you encounter in Paratopic.
• Resident Evil 7: Biohazard: Resident Evil’s jump to first person began here, and it paid off in spades. With some very harrowing moments, RE7 is one of the scariest entries in the venerable series.
• Scorn: Scorn sees you explore horrifying H.R. Giger and Zdzisław Beksiński-inspired landscapes filled with body horror, strange anatomy, and flesh. Flesh everywhere. Great despite terrible combat.
• Signalis: One of the best stories in video game horror, Signalis has been described as “Silent Hill in Space,” and it more than lives up to that moniker.
• Silent Hill Series: The single most celebrated and beloved horror game series of all time. Weaker recent entries and difficulty to play older titles keep it off our main list, but otherwise Silent Hill is hard to ignore.
• Spooky’s Jump Scare Mansion: A cutesy ghost tells you to go through 1000 floors of her haunted mansion. Only, those 1000 floors are a lot less cutesy.
• Visage: Almost photorealistic, Visage is one of the best-looking horror games ever made, with some of the most disturbing images and scenes in games.
• World of Horror: Greyscale, manga-like pixel art, intense JRPG mechancis, and Junji Ito-inspired visuals make this one of the most fascinating experiments in video game horror around.

We hope you find the games on this list both fun and scary! We couldn’t include every great horror game, so if we didn’t include one of your favorites, you can give it a shoutout in the comments.