While Christmas is a season of good times and peace among mankind, the release of games such as The Callisto Protocol during the winter season proves that scares are year-round. Of course, there’s no reason to not be “festive” with one’s horror game experience by playing wintery horror games.
The dark chill of winter lends itself well to the genre of horror, and many video games use the snow setting to their fullest advantage. From frozen scenes of psychological terror to gothic castles looming over a snowy mountainside, these are great games to play this holiday season.
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (2009)
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is a complete reimagining of the first Silent Hill game, keeping the same premise but going in a wildly different direction with its gameplay and story. Although it still follows Harry Mason looking for his daughter, the game has a significantly more psychological twist to it.
In addition to these gameplay changes, the setting is also very unique for a Silent Hill game, set in a nightmarish frozen world, contrasting with the previous titles’ use of reds and browns. Still, the absence of rust and blood doesn’t make the setting any less creepy, as the frozen horrors quite literally put a chill down the spine.
Resident Evil 8
Resident Evil 8 continues the story of Ethan Winters, and fittingly, this one takes place in the snowiest of settings, a random Eastern European village planted on the mountainside. As strange villages tend to go in Resident Evil, things go south really quickly for Ethan Winters’ winter vacation.
Resident Evil 8 manages to take the series survival horror and action thriller elements up to eleven. The genuinely terrifying “dollhouse” section is widely lauded as one of the scariest segments in the entire franchise, while other parts of the game get about as silly as Resident Evil’s most absurd alternate costumes.
Kholat
Kholat follows a protagonist attempting to find out what happened to nine students that went missing on a trip to an infamous Russian mountain. As they retrace their steps, they soon find out what it was that took the students, and the player must do everything in their power to avoid becoming the tenth victim.
The game has a distinct focus on exploration, as while the player has a map, they don’t have a marker telling them where they are on it. There is a serene beauty to the horrifying Eastern European forests where the monster lurks. As far as murderous urban legends go, they have great taste for living locations.
Until Dawn
Until Dawn follows a group of young friends on their annual retreat. After a prank gone wrong sends two of their number screaming into the dark woods, they are never heard from again. One year later, the brother of the two, Josh, invites the group back as a way to mourn their fallen friends. However, something is stalking these wintery woods, and it’s up to the player to find out what.
The entire game is set in an isolated ski lodge, so there are plenty of chilling locales to be found. Until Dawn’s big hook is the “Butterfly Effect”, i.e. the importance of player choice in keeping the game’s cast alive until dawn. It’s b classic early 2000s horror movie where the player can aell the characters to do the not-stupid things. In theory, at least.
Frostpunk
While not a horror game in the traditional sense, there’s no denying that the circumstances of Frsotpunk are its brand of terrifying. In this survival city-simulator game, the player not only has to maintain a city’s technical aspects, but also the mental well-being of its residents. It does not hold back in its depiction of desperate humanity.
This game showcases why winter is the most feared of the seasons. Much like the Long Night of Game of Thrones, the Great Frost is an ever-looming force of nature, something that nobody seems to know how to stop. All that the player can do is get as many people through it as possible.
The Long Dark
If Frostpunk focuses on the macro of existential winter dread, then The Long Dark painfully zooms into the individual horrors of surviving a wintery wilderness. After a plane crash, the player must brave the wilds of Northern Canada and run, fight and hide to survive its many threats.
The Long Dark gives players plenty of good reasons to never get lost in the woods first-hand. The game takes its time building its cold atmosphere, and there’s so much horror built around very real-world accidents and natural dangers. The world is plenty horrifying without the help of Wendigos. Of course, the devs, the jokers that they are, added Wendigos on a Halloween update.
Metro 2033
If Frostpunk is about the start of a post-apocalyptic society, and The Long Dark is about surviving in the absence of one, Metro 2033 follows humanity as it slowly fights back against the threats that sent them hiding in holes. Metro 2033 follows Artyom, a young man who travels to enlist the help of the Rangers to save his home station.
As expected, the natural and nuclear winter of the surface world is about as intimidating as it sounds. Thankfully, the presence of guns as well as other people help gives the player a real sense of hope in the times after the end. After all, when things have already ended, the only thing left to do is start, and Metro 2033 is a surprisingly hopeful franchise despite its premise.
Kona
Much like The Long Dark, Kona is set in the horrors of Northern Canada. This time around, the player takes control of a private investigator named Carl Faubert to look into the mysterious vandals that have been invading the property of a wealthy industrialist. Although not as scary as other winter horror games, it more than makes up for it its atmosphere.
Kona is a slow-paced game with a focus on “show, don’t tell” storytelling. Uncovering the landmarks and crime scenes in the wicked snowstorm uncovers more clues about the events of the game. Atmospheric horror is the name of the game here, and much of the scares are left to the player’s imagination, though of course, there are real scares for the player to jump at.
Fatal Frame III
The third entry of the famed Fatal Frame franchise follows Rei Kurosawa, a student on a photography assignment at the haunted Kuze Manor. When she notices her dead fiance in one of her pictures, she starts to dream more and more about the mansion, until eventually, she realizes that she’s been trapped in the manor, with the hope of escape quickly fading.
The third entry sets the game in a permanently snowed-in mansion. It seems that night never ends in this nightmarish abode, and neither does the snow. Fatal Frame III is deeply entrenched in Japanese folklore, giving it a truly otherwordly feel that proves why horror transcends cultures.
Mundaun
Mundaun is a very strange first-person horror game that follows Curdin, a young man who is visiting his hometown for his grandfather’s funeral. His grandfather had died in the fire, but strangely, his corpse has gone missing from his grave. Now, Curdin must set out to solve the mystery of his grandfather’s death.
The Swiss alps have quite a bit of snow as the player nears the mountaintop, and it acts as a good marker for the game’s progress. As the game gets more unhinged, the environment also literally gets colder and whiter, a fantastic crescendo for a slow-paced and personal horror game.
Source:gamerant.com