The 15 Scariest Video Games Of All Time

15.

Inside

Platform(s): Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac

Publisher: Playdead

Release Date: June 29, 2016

You explore a dystopian hellscape, where faceless authority figures and vicious dogs attempt to kill you. Along the way, there's also parasite-controlled pigs, submerged buildings, and hundreds of mind-controlled zombies. In some sections of Inside, you even get to control them yourself. The game's creepy ambiguity makes it a must-play, if only to figure out what it all means, but good lucking deciphering that.

14.

Doki Doki Literature Club!

Platform(s): Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac

Publisher: Team Salvato

Release Date: September 22, 2017

This is the textbook definition of a bait-and-switch. From its promotional art, Doki Doki Literature Club! appears to be an anime dating simulator, and for the first couple of hours, that's exactly what it is. But the plot takes a dark, disturbing turn midway through. And that's before the game breaks the fourth wall to become sentient. Doki Doki Literature Club! is free to play online and purchasable as a 'Plus!' complete edition. Just give it a try. The less you know going into it, the better.

13.

Bloodborne

Platform(s): PlayStation 4

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Release Date: March 24, 2015

Unlike many of the games on this list, Bloodborne gives you some pretty badass weapons to fight its monsters with. But the monsters themselves? They're nightmarish—Lovecraftian, Elder God tentacled monstrosities that are so alienating, so visually off-putting, that the sight of them inspires dread. Combine that with the surreal landscape and a foreboding soundtrack, and you have a cosmic horror classic.

12.

Until Dawn

Platform(s): PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Release Date: August 25, 2015

It's the video game equivalent of a teen slasher flick. Eight young people have to survive a night on Blackwood Mountain while avoiding booby traps and feral creatures. It was as much a game as it was a choose-your-adventure visual novel; your choices affect the storyline, and you had to think quickly. A mispress of a button could mean getting severed in half or getting hooked through the neck. Or worse.

11.

Alien: Isolation

Platform(s): Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, iOS

Publisher: Sega

Release Date: October 7, 2014

Set 15 years after the events of the 1979 film, Alien: Isolation tells the story of Ellen Ripley's daughter Amanda and her fight to survive on a space station overrun by androids and a massive Alien. Extremely difficult, the game features fantastic AI, and because it's a stealth game, the titular Alien is unkillable. You can only slow it down. Scary.

10.

Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly

Platform(s): Xbox, PlayStation 2

Publisher: Tecmo

Release Date: November 27, 2003

Japanese horror was all the rage in the early '00s, and Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly—the second game in the horror franchise—was a next-level fright fest. You play as Mio, one of two twin sisters who is investigating a ghost village in the woods. The only way you can see and/or defeat these ghosts is through a mystical camera. As opposed to other games, which have you avoid monsters, Crimson Butterfly forces you to stand your ground; you can't even damage the ghosts until they get too close for comfort, making for some edge-of-your-seat thrills.

9.

Alan Wake 2

Platform(s): Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, Windows

Publisher: Epic Games Publishing

Release Date: October 27, 2023

Part police procedural, part haunted woods mythology, part meta-commentary on the nature of storytelling, Alan Wake 2 was one of our 2023 Games of the Year. You play as police detective Saga Anderson, who's investigating a ritualistic, gory cult murder. But things take a supernatural turn, and you find yourself at the mercy of the Taken, possessed humans who fear the light. And of course, your flashlight—the only way to break through your enemies' defenses—is running low on batteries.

8.

Dead Space (Remake)

Platform(s): Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, Windows

Publisher: Electronic Arts

Release Date: January 27, 2023

So many of the recent ground-up remakes have exceeded their classic inspirations. And in 2023, we got two such games. The first was Resident Evil 4 Remake, an expansive retelling of the 2004 original. And the second was Dead Space, which casted you as Isaac, an engineer besieged by Necromorphs on a wrecked spaceship. The remake updated the 2008 original's graphics and sound while adding several quality-of-life improvements, including a better weapons upgrade system and more control over the game's zero gravity sections.

7.

Resident Evil (Remake)

Platform(s): Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, GameCube, Wii, Nintendo Switch, Windows

Publisher: Capcom

Release Date: March 22, 2002

The original Resident Evil launched in 1996, and although it's a certified classic, time has not been too kind to it; what once seemed realistic and gritty now seems blocky and stiff. The 2002 remake rebuilt the game from the ground up, with expanded areas, additional storytelling, and better rendered character designs. The 2015 HD remaster is widely considered the definitive version of the game, and it kicked off the remastering of the entire series that continues today.

6.

Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Platform(s): Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac, Linux, Android

Publisher: Frictional Games

Release Date: September 8, 2010

You wake up in a diseased Prussian castle with no memory, only a note that you wrote to yourself. The core gimmick of Amnesia: The Dark Descent is its sanity gauge. Stay in the darkness too long or run into monsters? Lose your sanity. Stay in the light to stop losing sanity and progress in the game to get some sanity back. Go too insane and you'll start hallucinating, and fear begets fear. You have a lantern with a limited amount of oil to help you stumble through the castle, but that's also a good way for the monsters to find you. It's a terrible, tenuous balancing act that you must constantly negotiate.

5.

Outlast

Platform(s): Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Linux, Windows, Mac

Publisher: Red Barrels

Release Date: September 4, 2013

Outlast was inspired by Amnesia, and it's evident from the start. No weapons. No skills. You're just Some Guy, a reporter trapped in a psychiatric hospital filled with homicidal lunatics and medical experiments gone wrong. You can hide, but they'll find you. You can run, but they'll match your speed. Your only friend is the shadows, where you can conceal yourself. And the only way you can see in the dark is with a night-vision camcorder, which is running out of juice.

4.

Visage

Platform(s): Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows

Publisher: SadSquare Studio

Release Date: October 30, 2020

This game is sadistic; it never gives you a moment to breathe and gather yourself. Combine the photorealistic graphics of P.T. (more on that fantastic game later), the sanity meter from Amnesia, and the camera flash gimmick from Fatal Frame, and you get Visage. There's jump scares every which way you turn, and the sound design reinforces it. Your nerves are eventually so shot that even the slightest creak in the floorboards has you looking around in anticipation. And often, after a slight delay, there will be something there, ready to scare you.

3.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard

Platform(s): Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac, iOS

Publisher: Capcom

Release Date: January 24, 2017

Over the course of Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 6, Capcom leaned too far into gunplay. These two games contained an overabundance of action and more ammo than you could possibly shoot. Resident Evil 7 was a return to the franchise's survival horror roots. You play as civilian Ethan Winters, whose wife, Mia, went missing three years ago. Your search leads you to the Baker family estate, where you learn about the creation of a bioweapon while being stalked by moldy hill people. Ew.

2.

Silent Hill 2

Platform(s): Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Windows

Publisher: Konami

Release Date: September 25, 2001

In Silent Hill 2, you arrive at the eponymous location after receiving a letter from your dead wife. What follows is an unsettling, unwholesome experience, where you run into and away from grotesque manifestations of your guilt and subconscious. The game designers subsumed the entire town in a thick, swirling fog to further isolate the player and parallel his widowhood. The best news about Silent Hill 2 is that the remake is coming out on October 8 (see the trailer above), and it's already getting rave reviews. Definitely check this one out.

1.

P.T.

Platform(s): PlayStation 4

Publisher: Konami

Release Date: August 12, 2014

In 2014, one of the scariest games ever made went live on the Playstation Network. Legendary game designer Hideo Kojima (Metal Gear Solid) collaborated with filmmaker Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth, The Shape of Water) to create P.T., a demo and teaser for a new Silent Hill game.

A first-person experience, P.T. had the player explore a series of narrow, photorealistic hallways that looped unto themselves. But every time you looped, something changed—a door would open or close, a baby would start crying, bugs would come crawling out of the walls. And that was all before the ghost, Lisa, began stalking you. Unfortunately, Kojima left Konami on bad terms. The Silent Hills game was shelved. P.T. was deleted from the Playstation Store. And if you want to play this game, you need a PS4 with the original demo installed. Otherwise, you're out of luck, but if you happen to stumble on such a grailed console, P.T. is well worth a play for its ominous atmosphere.