Have Horror Games Peaked? - Scribe Speaks

Hello fellow Traveler and welcome to The Hard Light Network!

What is your biggest fear? Are you scared of snakes and spiders? Maybe Ghosts and Spirits are more frightening to you. Maybe you're afraid of something a little more... Silly? [Clown] Horror games offer us an outlet to explore the darker elements of the human psyche through the (relatively) safe medium of gaming. However, when was the last time you played a horror game that didn't rely on excessive gore or jump scares to create fear and tension? Have Horror games peaked?

Horror as a genre has so much potential to create stories, with numerous sub-genres attesting to its versatility. The convergence of ominous sound design, uncanny environments and often deeply self-reflective themes is capable of transporting players into their worlds with seemingly greater ease than any other genre. Fear elicits physical as well as emotional responses and one can tell a good horror game from an increased heart rate, sweaty palms, and paranoid reactions to the house creaking.

Images of Ghouls, Goblins, Monsters, Murderers, Werewolves and Witches occupy some of our oldest nightmares. Stories from all places, across all times accounting for the things that go bump in the night. With so much source material to draw inspiration from you'd think game developers would have an easy time creating thoughtful and horrifying narratives. Unfortunately nothing is scarier than corporate greed, and the commercialization of all things spooky has really taken a toll on the creativity on display.

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