Our five favorite survival horror games
Written by @StaggerLee
’Tis the season, but certainly not to be jolly—more like the season for mayhem, tricks, treats, and all types of scares! So what better time to share our favorite survival horror titles?
Survival horror is a genre I’ve always loved. It’s not that I’m particularly talented at living through terrifying zombie attacks, solving obscure puzzles, or hunting down eldritch monstrosities. But good survival horror demands the fortitude to stick with it despite unease and in spite of the natural instinct to lock away the offending game and throw it into the bottom of a river, never to be played again. Yes, that was a Jumanji reference.
Here’s our list of five titles that are must-play if you’re looking for a good scare.
Alan Wake
Alan Wake is a tortured writer on vacation with his wife, Alice, in a sleepy town known as Bright Falls. As the pair arrives, a strange evil emerges and shrouds the Pacific Northwest in darkness. It’s up to Alan to put away his typewriter, pick up a flashlight and a small arsenal of guns, and uncover the truth behind the awful shadow creatures terrorizing this small town—hopefully while saving his wife. This phenomenal game relies on a clever flashlight mechanic, and it’s loaded with Stephen King references. What's better is there’s a sequel planned for release next year!
243278Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem
In the midst of the endless debate over whether Resident Evil or Silent Hill was the best survival horror franchise, Eternal Darkness showed up and changed the game. This GameCube cult classic tells a chilling tale that takes place over centuries, but the addition of the sanity meter made me question my own reality. The game’s psychological teasing went so far as making players think they might have hardware issues with their console! The effects of losing your mind in the game were so cool that I often waited to kill monsters just so I could see what happened when my character went insane.
243288Silent Hill 2
When the original Silent Hill came out in 1999, I was way too scared to play it on my own; instead, I would go to my friend’s house and watch him play. By the time Silent Hill 2 was released in 2001, I was ready to stop sitting on the sidelines of survival horror! Silent Hill 2 is arguably the best entry in Konami’s troubled psychological horror series and managed to raise the bar from the original. It also served as an introduction for a character that would become the face of the franchise: Pyramid Head! Now that Konami has announced a remake of this masterpiece, soon we’ll all be able to return to the special place that is Silent Hill.
242742Resident Evil 2
Yes, I’m talking about the original Resident Evil 2—the one that came out on the PlayStation in 1998. The 2019 remake was undoubtedly excellent, but I’ve got to give love to the classic. This was the first survival horror game I owned, and introduced us to characters like Leon S. Kennedy, Claire Redfield, and Ada Wong. Perhaps most memorable of all was Mr. X, a big bulking undead monster who relentlessly hunted our heroes all around the Raccoon City Police Station. And I'll go ahead and settle the argument now: Do the Claire scenario first, and then play as Leon. I swore by it in 1998, and I swear by it in 2022!
243268The Last of Us
The Last of Us was my favorite game of the last decade and for good reason! The haunting storytelling painted a grim vision of a postapocalyptic near-future and the fate of humanity. That dark story was bolstered by incredible voice acting and motion capture to a level of quality rarely seen before. The deep themes of The Last of Us intertwine and build to a powerful conclusion that makes it much more than just another horror story. Hell, we're even getting an HBO show based on the game next year.
243308We could go on for ages with more choices—and perhaps we’ll return to do just that next Halloween!—but for now those are our five favorite survival horror games. If you haven't played any of these titles, stop what you're doing and get to it right now! If you have, they may just be worth revisiting before the trick-or-treating begins.
💬 What are some of your favorite survival horror games? Let me know in the comments.
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