Furthermore, the amount of money in gaming today means that many studios can now afford high-quality voice actors capable of nailing layered, disturbed characters; enhancing the horror even further. Psychological horror games are tough to get right, though there have been some fantastic entries into the genre that have provided memorable experiences for players.
Updated on April 21, 2022, by Jack Pursey: The psychological horror genre continues to make strides in the gaming industry. This is particularly thanks to how much more aware the general public is of serious mental health issues, which have played an important part in games like Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice(more on that later).
There’s no shortage of great psychological horror games to play today, so we’ve updated this list to include a few more entries.
13 Detention
Detention is a 2017 psychological horror game developed by Red Candle Games that takes place in 1960s Taiwan, which was under martial law at the time. The game’s atmosphere, visuals, and sound design are among the best in horror gaming today, while the “lingered” enemies are some of the most disturbing enemies that the genre has ever produced.
Detention was well-received by both fans and critics, exemplified by its 83 Metascore and Overwhelmingly Positive All Reviews score on Steam.
12 Layers Of Fear
Layers of Fear was developed by Bloober Team, who have created numerous psychological horror games over the past decade, including Observer, Blair Witch, and The Medium.
Layers of Fear puts players in control of a troubled painter who is desperately trying to create a masterpiece. The game isn’t for the faint-hearted, as Layers of Fear is packed with jump scares that made the game a hit with reactionary streamers.
11 F.E.A.R.: First Encounter Assault Recon
There are two kinds of people in this world: those who don’t find little girls scary and those who have played the original F.E.A.R.
Monolith Productions’ F.E.A.R.: First Encounter Assault Recon was first released in October 2005 and introduced the gaming world to Alma Wade, a psychic spirit out for revenge after the Armacham Technology Corporation due to their disturbing experiments on her. Unlike many other games on this list, F.E.A.R. is a combat-heavy shooter that features surprisingly excellent FPS mechanics for a horror game.
10 Silent Hill
The first game in the iconic Silent Hill series was developed by Konami’s Team Silent and first released on PlayStation 1 in 1999, before arriving on Game Boy Advance in 2001.
Silent Hills stood out from other horror games at the time with its disturbing but encapsulating atmosphere and for putting the player in control of a regular person instead of a trained soldier or policeman, which was uncommon at the time. While Silent Hill’s visuals and many of its gameplay mechanics struggle to hold up today, its storyline is still gripping, and it ultimately deserves to be mentioned among the genre’s best releases for its influence on horror gaming alone.
9 Silent Hill 3
From one Silent Hill game to another, Silent Hill 3 was also developed by Konami’s Team Silent and was released on PlayStation 2 and PC in 2003.
The game puts players in control of a teenage girl named Heather, who finds herself alone in a shopping mall following a nightmare. Silent Hill 3 doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel with its gameplay, as exploration and puzzle-solving are again at the forefront. Silent Hill 3 was a hit with fans and critics, exemplified by the game’s 85 critic score and 8.6 user score on Metacritic.
8 Doki Doki Literature Club!
One inherent issue with making a psychological horror video game is that, when a game brands itself as psychological horror, players will boot the game up already expecting shocking imagery, key characters losing their mind, and other quintessential aspects of the genre - making it difficult for the developers to create a genuinely unsettling experience.
Doki Doki Literature Club! aimed to solve this issue by trying to hide that the game was in the psychological horror genre. The game was originally branded as simply a visual novel, and images of the game made it look like some sort of dating simulator, which is exactly how the game appears to begin. However, Doki Doki Literature Club! will soon take some disturbing turns based on the player’s choices, which can affect not only the main character but also the player in ways they would never expect.
7 Outlast
Like many indie horror games from the past decade, Outlast can attribute much of its success to streamers and influencers, who would have large audiences watching them to see their horrified reactions to many of the game’s scariest moments. Along with a handful of jump scares, Outlast also aims to frighten its players by not allowing them any weaponry - meaning their only choice is to run and hide - creating some extremely tense moments.
Outlast received a sequel in 2017, which struggled to have the same impact as its predecessor but is certainly worth checking out for fans of the first game.
6 Soma
Soma was released in 2015 by Frictional Games, the same company that made the psychological horror game Amnesia: The Dark Descent (more on that later). Consequently, the game was highly anticipated by psychological horror fans which, as mentioned before, can make it difficult for developers to unsettle players, as they will already know roughly what to expect. Frictional Games did a fantastic job of subverting expectations, however, by misleading players in a subtle way.
The game begins with the protagonist suffering a serious brain injury and agreeing to let a doctor perform experimental treatment on them, which results in them waking up in an unfamiliar, eerie place. Seasoned psychological horror fans’ ears will have perked up at “brain injury,” and many will have expected the protagonist to have awoken in some sort of manifestation of their inner thoughts - an expectation that the developers were likely leading players down. Instead, what follows is a Black Mirror-like look into the possibilities of technological advancements and what they could one day do to the human brain.
5 Observer
Observer was first released in 2017 by Bloober Team, the same studio that created The Medium, Layers of Fear, and Blair Witch. Like the aforementioned Soma, Observer received some criticisms upon release for its gameplay, which put a lot of players off purchasing it. However, the game’s world design, atmosphere, and story are all among the best in the psychological horror genre, making it a must-buy for anyone wanting to be immersed in such a game.
In November 2020, an enhanced version of the game was released titled Observer: System Redux. The game features more story content, improved visuals and is ultimately the best way to play Observer today.
4 Alan Wake
Alan Wake was initially released exclusively on Xbox 360 in 2010, before coming to PC just under two years later. In October 2021, a remastered version of the game was released with both DLCs on Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC, PS4, and PS5.
The game’s psychological horror story takes a healthy dose of influence from Stephen King, who is referenced in the opening. This is particularly clear in the abundance of supernatural enemies and occurrences present, which accompany the story’s focus of a writer worried that he’s losing his mind.
3 Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice
Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice was developed by Ninja Theory and is an unorthodox psychological horror game in the sense that - unlike most games in the genre - it doesn’t take place in the modern-day with an immediately relatable protagonist but is instead set in a dark fantasy world inspired by Celtic and Norse mythology.
Despite this fantasy setting, the game’s story focuses on the all-too-real mental illness of psychosis. Hellblade’s depiction of psychosis, which was constructed with the help of neuroscientists, has been central to the game’s praise and significantly contributed to the game’s impressive 88 Metascore on Xbox One.
2 Amnesia: The Dark Descent
Amnesia: The Dark Descent was released in September 2010 by Frictional Games and is one of the most influential games in not just psychological horror history but horror history in general. Like Outlast, much of the game’s success can be attributed to frightened YouTubers playing through the game to the amusement of their audience, most notably PewDiePie.
Amnesia: The Dark Descent was particularly influential for not giving players any weapons, which went against the grain of horror releases at the time, as they were becoming more and more like action games with zombies simply taking the place of soldiers, aliens, or whatever else.
1 Silent Hill 2
As mentioned before, psychological horror games are, generally speaking, getting better and better as technological advancements allow developers to create more detailed, immersive, and ultimately scary horror experiences. This serves as a reminder as to how special of a game Silent Hill 2 is, as despite releasing over 20 years ago now, it still offers one of the best horror experiences in gaming.
This is predominantly due to how great Silent Hill 2’s storytelling is, as the journey of discovering what happened to Mary is still as interesting today as it was upon release, while the depiction of James’ psyche remains as one of gaming’s best visual storytelling achievements.
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