Editorials
6 MORE Upcoming Horror Games That Look Terrifying!
There’s no shortage of horror games to look forward to right now, but of the bevy we have on the way, only a select few have the singular goal of being truly terrifying, and fewer still aim to “chill you to your core.”
Actually, only one developer has said they want to achieve that, but you’ll have to read on to see which one it is. I’ve spent a fair amount of time scrounging up some of the more promising horror games that are on the way — you can find the rest here and here — and today, I’d like to share a few more.
Read on for my list of 6 MORE Upcoming Horror Games That Look Absolutely Terrifying! (Part 3)
The makers of Amnesia: The Dark Descent, considered by many to be one of the scariest games of all time, revealed their next project last October through a clever (and thoroughly unsettling) viral marketing campaign. The game is called SOMA, and their goal is that it chills you to your core.
It’s slated to release in 2015, but I’m willing to wait — mostly because I have faith in Frictional, but also because the following games, most of which should arrive much sooner.
Continuing the theme of sci-fi horror is the indie horror game Routine. It’s a roguelike that’s set on a seemingly abandoned lunar outpost where some thing is hunting you down. The problem is, you have no real way of defending yourself, and when you die, it’s game over. Such is the unforgiving nature of the roguelike genre.
If you’re beginning to notice a trend here (i.e. sci-fi games where you’re unarmed and being chased) that’s only because there are a lot of upcoming horror games that are taking that familiar formula and running with it. Literally. I mean, there’s so much running in most of them. I get winded watching some of their trailers.
Whereas Routine takes place on the Moon, Quadrant is set in a NASA lab in the 1970s. It’s being a period piece certainly helps to set it apart from the growing number of games that are doing something similar, though in it — you guessed it — you’re being chased by something. You’re also unarmed, so when given the choice between fight or flight, the latter is always the best option.
The trailer for Ti West’s upcoming adaptation of A Christmas Carol raised a lot of eyebrows when it dropped earlier this week. While plenty of folks initially dismissed Ebenezer as a derivative project meant to cash in on the recent wave of unnecessary prequels that expand the backstory of beloved characters (such as 2023’s Wonka), Charles Dickens’ original novel already made a point of exploring Ebenezer Scrooge’s origins in detail – meaning that this new film is likely just a particularly faithful adaptation of the source material under a different name.
Couple that with the fact that the movie is being helmed by a genuine horror auteur and I think it’s safe to say that the latest iteration of the first modern ghost story is in good hands.
That being said, one detail that immediately jumped out at me during the brief teaser (other than a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nod to Johnny Depp’s iconic bedroom death scene from the original A Nightmare on Elm Street) is the fact that many of Ebenezer’s ghosts appear to have been directly lifted from the iconic John Leech illustrations that accompanied the first edition of Dickens’ novel.
Here are a couple of stills from the trailer compared to the original artwork:
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
The Phantoms in ‘A Christmas Carol’ and ‘Ebenezer’
Marley’s Ghost in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
Mainly working with old-school wood and steel engravings that would later be transferred to print, Leech was instrumental in crafting the iconic look of history’s most influential phantoms – especially since Dickens is said to have been deeply involved with the creation of these so-called “comic illustrations.”
And since the novel is commonly said to have popularized spiritualism in Victorian England, much of the ghostly iconography that we still see in genre media to this very day (including some of Ti West’s previous films) can be traced back to the author’s partnership with Leech.
Ebenezer won’t be the first A Christmas Carol adaptation to borrow heavily from these designs, but I can appreciate how Ti West is incorporating an important part of horror history into his latest film.
Ebenezer will be available in theaters starting November 13.
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