Video Games to Help Kick Off the Spooky Season

Julianna Concepcion | Editor

As we start getting used to weirdly cold mornings and sweltering afternoons, it’s become more and more obvious that the fall season is approaching. You know what that means: cozy hoodies, apple picking, and better yet, Halloween.   

Personally, I am a huge fan of watching various let’s plays and playing scary games myself for about five minutes before I cave and close it out. But, if you are much braver than I, here are my recommendations for scary games:  

1. Resident Evil: Village  

This is objectively the scariest game in the Resident Evil series. Be prepared to be gang stalked by Lycans, lose a couple of fingers, and get absolutely demolished by a ten-foot-tall vampire woman in this story-driven masterpiece. Resident Evil: Village combines the eeriness of an abandoned village in the middle of winter with electrifying combat that will simultaneously make you clam up and want to play the full fifteen-ish hours in one sitting.  

2. Fears to Fathom: Ironbark Lookout   

The Fears to Fathom series has gained popularity primarily through streamers and YouTubers seeking a game they can comfortably play in one sitting, while engaging with great storytelling. In Ironbark Lookout, you play as a fire lookout who got a position in an area where children have gone missing. What will you do as you try to complete the job’s tasks while also dealing with constantly feeling watched?  

3. SOMA  

If you are afraid of the ocean, skip this one. Unless you really want to frighten yourself. SOMA isn’t classified as a horror game, but it sure feels like it: as you play as a character who was put to sleep for a brain scan, only to wake up 100 years later, he learns that everyone's consciousnesses have been uploaded to a large-scale computer, and he must navigate being completely alone in a world that no longer exists. Everything is mostly underwater, leaving the player to only their wits as they traverse the endless blue.  

4. Outlast  

I think this is one of the scariest games of our generation. In this game, you play as a journalist who has received an email about inhumane experiments in an asylum located in the mountains, owned by a corporation known for its unethical practices. Upon arriving, he discovers that the hospital has been taken over by psychotic patients, while only being equipped with an infrared camera, hopes, and dreams. Good luck with this one.  

5. Honorable Mention: Dead by Daylight  

This might be the least scary horror game I have ever played. I hesitated to sneak this into the list, only because it is much less of a story game and is a game with a bit more of a learning curve. Dead by Daylight is best described as an “asymmetric multiplayer survival game”, where you have three other teammates who must complete tasks to escape a killer. You can either play by yourself as the killer or play as a survivor with other people, which makes it an incredibly fun and flexible game to play this season.