Condemned: Criminal Origins is hands down one of the bravest games of this generation. It was a brand new horror IP that released as a launch title. This is a game that had everything to prove and boy, was it terrifying. Its visceral melee combat was brutal to watch and the way it toyed with us, making us wonder if the nightmarish things its alcoholic lead Ethan Hunt was witnessing were real, or just fragments of his damaged mind.
Either way, I’ll never look at a store mannequin the same way, I can tell you that.
Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us is easily one of the greatest video games, horror or otherwise, to come from this console generation. We had to wait until the tail end of it to experience this beautiful, haunting and thoroughly cinematic game, but it was well worth it. This is a developer that’s built up an impressive repertoire of AAA story-driven games, including the stellar Uncharted series, so there was a high bar to live up to. I don’t think I’m overselling it when I say this game didn’t simply live up to that high standard — it surpassed it.
And it may have left some of us (me) emotionally scarred.
I’ve hyped this one up quite a bit, but if there’s one horror game that slid almost entirely under the radar of most gamers the gaming populace, it’s Shadows of the Damned. This is one of the most unique, colorful, vibrant, funny, scary and thoroughly entertaining video games I have ever played.
I wouldn’t call it terrifying, but its strong Resident Evil 4 vibes — Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami had a hand in making it — and beautiful soundtrack courtesy of Silent Hill series composer Akira Yamaoka make this one of the best, and sadly overlooked, gems of this generation.