Speaker 1: Hello, Welcome to this spooky episode of the Game Informer Show,
a weekly podcast covering the video game industry. Join us
each and every Friday for discussion of the latest gaming news, reviews,
and exclusive reveals with Game Informer staff and special guests
from around the industry. Normally I would be your host
Marcus Stewart, but on this All Hollows Eve, I have
transformed into Massacre Stewart. Ooh spookyo. And of course, as
you can see, normally Kyle Hilliard would be here, but
not today because we've got kill Hilliard.
Speaker 2: Killiard, yes, say kill Killard.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And if we to round out our spooky trio,
we've got the one and only eviscerate Van Allen.
Speaker 3: I would have gone Van Helsing. That's where people normally go.
I don't know if Van Helsing's like spooky though. He's
the guy that takes down the spooky folks. You know,
he's he's like a vampire hunter, right.
Speaker 1: Well, he lives in a spooky world.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's like party. He's Gothic, you know. Yeah, yeah,
I think it means you.
Speaker 1: Have to be the villain. And who knows. He's probably
mean to people. He's probably the villain to other people.
You know, he's probably read to somebody, so.
Speaker 2: We all know he's the villainin Hotel Transylvania three, voiced
by Jim Gaffigan. We've all seen it. We all love it.
Speaker 1: That I've never seen those Is it that that I've
never seen those movies? Am I missing out?
Speaker 4: Kyle?
Speaker 1: Or does like Big Deals?
Speaker 2: Actually? Genuinely, Marcus, I think you would honestly like those
movies because you're like a cartoon network kid, right, Yeah, yeah,
it's gosh, this is uh, this is embarrassing. I mean
it's not embarrassing, but I can't remember the director's name
off top. I had, what the heck is this name?
This is so stupid, but I gotta look it up.
It's okay, this is altan generally related to Halloween. It's
Jendy Tartakowski, directed of the first three Hotel Transylvania.
Speaker 1: Power Girls, Dexter and that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that style is in there, like it has a
really cool like the animation Hotel Transformantia. The first three
at least are good and interesting and unique and so
genuinely as like a fan of Gendi Tartakowski, Marcus, as
I'm assuming you are you would like those movies? I
truly you would like those movies. I'm not even kidding, man.
Speaker 1: Nice, I gotta have this on my my Halloween watch list,
along with Centers and Weapons and that new Conjuring movie.
Speaker 2: I mean, right in between Sinners Hotel Transylvania, What perfect
perfect Weapons Hotel trans.
Speaker 1: Figured it out hell of a Halloween? Here are watching?
If you're watching the video version, can see we are
in our Halloween best and brightest. Kyle, do you want
to explain your fit at all? Or do you or
is this even an outfit? Is it just I'm lunch
you woke up and from Dragon Ball Go check out
the video version if you're listening. I'm I'm the famous
character who sort of disappeared when Dragon Ball Z started.
I think she's in like one episode she's like at
t M's house and that she's just kind of like,
all right, I'm not in the show anymore. I think
maybe she was in Battle of Gods. I think she
was at the party. Maybe she okay? Is it weird
to Is it weird to think that she technically died
when Blue or when Boo blew earth like like Launch
was killed at a certain point.
Speaker 2: She was poor.
Speaker 4: Launch.
Speaker 2: Yes, but she came back, so it's cool. So it's cool.
Speaker 1: That's true. Yes she did, she did.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm blue haired Launch blue haired version.
Speaker 1: Check out the video version. Yeah nice Launch. I am
a I'm a Ghostbuster. My name text say is a bankman,
specifically Peter Fakeman, Bill Murray, the best, the best, best Ghostbuster.
I got a proton pack right here, so I'm ready
to go. Whoa we need to go? If you guys
see any ghosts, I'm all set here, we can do it.
I don't have the ghost trap. I had to really
stop myself from buying the ghost trap and the PK
E meter at the store because I would have been
more money than I would have felt comfortable spending. But
I came very close, just because childhood. I've never been
a Ghostbusters for Halloween, and it was always one of
my childhood fantasies was to have the proton pack and
the whole like everything.
Speaker 2: Basically, and the one you just showed is it looks
pretty legit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a nice one. It better be for how
much it costs. It does turn on and light up,
but I don't have batteries in.
Speaker 2: It right, So you just got to use your imagination.
You know the sounds it makes of course, of course
the famous sounds. And apparently Christmas has come early because
Eric is our own resident Santa clause. I like to
think you're off season, Stanta, like you're not, You're not
ready yet, You're kind of like chilling at home, ye, Santa.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm Santa gear enough for the season. So girls
home may may know that I moved recently from Austin
up here to Minneapolis, so I'm still largely in boxes
up here, so getting a costume together was not super
on my my timetable.
Speaker 4: So for the.
Speaker 3: Actual Halloween party that I will be attending, I'm going
to wrap myself in boxes and wrapping paper and stuff
like that. The joke will be that I have just
moved here. That is my costume. But I didn't want
to do that for the pod because it would have
taken like way too long and then I would have
had to undo all the packing tape and stuff that's
going to take to do that. So instead I found
this Santa hat that says peace, love and wine on it.
It is my my wine, Santa I love. That's That's
what I've opted for.
Speaker 2: I love that you just moved to your unpacking. You
got to prioritize what do I need right away? And
I like that that made the cut.
Speaker 4: Wine Santa Hat has got to come out.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, here to have TV Santa Hat, consoles, clothes.
Speaker 3: I guess I still have all my retro games like
in boxes. Is just completely packed up, taped and everything.
But no, Wine, sayant A Hat came out?
Speaker 2: Of course you didn't. You don't have to explain yourself. Yeah,
it's just your personality.
Speaker 1: Christmas. Yeah, yeah, Well, thanks for watching everybody. Before we
jump into what will be a great Halloween themed episode
of the show, we're gonna be talking about the seance
of Blake Manner, of brand new and very spooky puzzle
game that Eric and I have been playing and enjoying
and are excited to dive into here, and then we're
gonna spend the bulk of the show just talking about
our favorite horror games, because again, it's the spooky time
of year, this is the best time of year to
play some games that's scared the pants off of you.
So we're gonna be going around the horror talking about
what horror games scared us the most, which ones do
we think maybe maybe the best horror games of all time?
Who knows, but it should be a fun discussion. I'm
a big horror guy, so I'm excited to hear what
you guys think about the horror genre and what your
favorite picks are before we dive into that. But of course,
if you would like to support Game and Former, you
can go and get yourself a magazine subscription right now.
We recently announced our next cover will be dragon Quest
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It's the best.
Speaker 2: Also, crazy, first time dragon Quest has been on the
cover Game Reformer. We've been around since ninety one and
that's this is seven Reimagine is the first time dragon
Quest is on the cover, which is cool. I was
I was happy that we finally got a Dragon Quest
cover on there.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Actually it's funny you have to like you have
like mild brand synergy just because you're yeah, a toriy
Yama character.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: Oh, I say with dragons, that makes way more sense.
Speaker 1: I mean, both things are true, it turned out, but yes,
let's let's get into it. The seance of Blake Matter
a game that I would wager until maybe last week
not neither of us on his call were aware of either,
maybe at all. And then we started seeing some yeah,
some scuttle but online of people being really excited about
We saw like Jason Schreier was tweeting saying like, Hey,
this game's incredible. This is maybe it's going to be
in my top ten. Might be goady material. You guys
need to check this out. I saw Daniel Dwyer no
clip talking about it, did a whole video highlighting how
cool this game is. And Eric, you and I have
been playing a few hours of it. Kyle, have you
started yet at all? No?
Speaker 2: I haven't. I haven't really dug into it. I'm kind
of looking at trailers and stuff while you guys tell
me more about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the premise is that it's a it's a new
sort of like what do we call these games out
like investigation puzzle games? Uh?
Speaker 4: Solve them ups? Uh, you know, solve them.
Speaker 1: That's good.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in the vein of something like a like a
root trees or dead or like an Oberden, a case
of a golden Idol, It's like it's in that sort
of family of puzzle games, uh, detective games. Maybe you could.
Speaker 3: Even say, yeah, yeah, mystery games and and I think
they share a lot of commonality with games that go
way way back, you go to things like mist and
stuff like that. I think you're gonna shine a lot
of through lines there. I would say this is more
of an Oberden. But the thing I'm liking about it
is that it's not as reliant on you making every
single connection. There are a lot of like sign posts
and guides that help with a lot of the deduction
to help get you there to the point that I
think Obradin for a lot of people was bounced them
off a little bit with how tough it could be
at times, and this one feels a lot more manageable,
but not any less rewarding. And I think it's really
interesting that managed to strike that even divide of being
a detective game that is not going to hurt your
brain to solve as much as something like even a Blueprints,
which Blueprints is probably one of my favorite games this year,
but definitely a lot of people felt a little bounced
by how how difficult that can be to put that
game together and piece together what's trying to get you
to figure out?
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Eric, you've played a bit more than I have,
so I'm going to toss it to you. Can you
explain to the lovely viewers? What is the seance of
Blake Man or what's the what's the premise of this thing?
It's a very Agatha Christie game, is what I would say.
Is you are a detective that has been commissioned by
an unknown party to go to this manor where Evelyn
has disappeared, Evelyn Dean I believe, and you show up.
It's I mean, I cannot emphasize Agatha Christy enough. It
is so in that vein.
Speaker 3: But it has a very comic book style to it,
like a very dramatic stylized style to it.
Speaker 1: It reminds me of old pulp serials.
Speaker 2: Yes, the art direction, Yeah, it's got kind of a
self shaded look too, which seems pretty cool. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a very distinct art style, and it even
does a lot of the kind of panel cut ins
and stuff like that for very dramatic moments that work
super super well. You arrive and again you don't know
who has contracted you, but you do know that a
lot of spiritualists, magicians, healers, sort of alternative medicine folks
are all gathering in this one manner that has kind
of been converted from a mansion to a hotel of
sorts for a seance. There's going to be a seance
where rather than speaking to the dead through a medium
or through a oisia board or something like that, they're
apparently just going to summon ghosts and talk directly to
the ghosts. And that's a big deal, and so.
Speaker 1: It is like a regular thing that happens apparently.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, this is this is a thing that is
big in their world. And they're all it's their E three,
it's ghost and they are a couple of years ago.
Speaker 2: Is what you're saying, and it's not coming, and then
are trying to you should probably.
Speaker 1: Put out to this takes place. I think like eighteen
ninety seven.
Speaker 3: Ireland, Ireland, and that is actually very important to the story. Yeah,
they really lean into the history of Ireland, of that
land and kind of what happened to it as wars
were waged and people take ownership of that lands.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like.
Speaker 1: Post potato famine, I think, like, yes, it's like references
of like, yeah, this wasn't that long ago, so we're
like parts of the country is though very much recovering
from that.
Speaker 3: There's there's a character that can meet who's basically a
druid who has some some pretty strong thoughts about the
way that people comport themselves on the land and all that.
And it's really really good in that sense, an incredibly
well written game. But as you go through it, you
basically are trying to figure out what happened to Evelyn,
and in the process, it is heavily intimated that you
might need to solve other people's mysteries too, in order
to protect them from danger imminent danger. There's some bad portence.
You get the sense that maybe what happens at the
end of this time a lot you have is knock
going to end well for everybody, and that you might
want to try and figure out a way to convince
them all like, hey, this is like a bad idea.
Speaker 4: So you're doing that.
Speaker 3: But every action you take, well most actions you take
eat a minute, and you have only a certain amount
of time in the day. People will move throughout the
manner and around the grounds at different parts of the day. It's,
you know, to use a very blunt comparison, it's very
maj Or's mask in that way, where you have a
certain set amount of time to do things and you
have to work within those bounds, and you can run
out of time early on. There are a few deadlines
that the game gives you that say, hey, if you
don't do X by this time, I'm going to like
call you a fraud in front of it. I'm going
to use it like a fake example, but I'm going
to like allege that you are a fraud in front
of everybody, and it will ruin your reputation in this
manner and all that stuff like that, where there are
time pressures, but I feel like it's also very lenient
in that where the time is just meant to encourage
you to be thoughtful and meaningful and intentional with what
you do, and then also bake those moments where you
have a little bit more freedom to say like, Okay,
now I want to go back and want to check
on that thing where I couldn't check on it before
because I was just rushing to get this one deadline done.
It's a really really interesting game. It's really tightly crafted,
and I think it's deceptively interesting. I know that sounds
like very strange to say, but it's like start a
party crazy to say. Yeah, it seems like it's it
seems like it's one thing on its face, and it
goes a lot deeper than I expected it too. With that,
it does a lot more with the concept because I
think at first, I was just expecting an Obradin and
I was just expecting this to be you walk around,
you check things off of a box, you do logic puzzles.
That's not to you know, say that obrat Din is
a simple game either. But I expected this to just
be you show up, you solve the mystery, you take
care of things, and there have been a lot of
really good games in that genre. But I think what
this game is doing that's a little bit different is
it's just playing with the idea of things around you.
Changing and you having to adapt to them, this sort
of timeline that you have to stick to, that it's
not just important that you do something, it's important when
you do something, and that certain openings can occur when
people are off doing things. So I had to start
noting that, oh, I want to talk to this person,
but they're only going to be available to talk to
between these hours, and so it actually becomes import and
in conversations to talk to people and be like, hey,
what are your plans for this weekend? Like what are
you doing?
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, it's like yeah, like I found a schedule,
Like here's everyone that works here, and there are times
and like the character main characters like, yeah, this is
going to be really important. Then you eventually get a
map that just kind of shows you where everyone is
in the manner at a certain time, Like you just
kind of see their their icon in different rooms. You
can kind of like in your like visualize, Okay, here's
what they are. Now. They're going to go somewhere else
at some point, So I need to work around kind
of where everyone is currently and the advancement of time
with touch On, cause it's not it's not timed in
the traditional sense. Like there isn't like a timer counting down.
It's like every action you do spends a minute of time.
So like, yeah, the first mission kind of runs down
it where like you get to the manor and you
have one hour to sort of like get like an
initial sense of like where Evelyn is, and so like
you arrive at eleven pm, you have until midnight before
you have to check into your room, and so every
time you inspect something, it spends one minute of time.
So minutes are almost like limited action is like you
technically have sixty actions that you can do before the
game is going to force you to move forward regardless
sort of like of where you are at. So you
can like interact with most everything. There's like a like
a detective vision style thing that kind of highlights all
the interactable objects in a room, but at the same time,
not everything matters. Like you can look at like a
lot of stuff and it'll you know, he'll comment on it,
but it won't update, like sort of like your web
or like you have like a flow chart of information
and like an evidence board, and so you kind of
like Eric Roseen, you'd be really thoughtful because you can
very quickly get into the habit of like I'm going
to open and look at everything, and then you look
at the clock and realize, oh, I just looked at
thirty things, so that means it's now eleven thirty. I
have thirty actions left, and I have not really gotten
closer to the main goal here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, on a path to an objective. And you start
talking to a character because you're like, oh, I've I
actually haven't talked to this character yet. I should like
talk to them and start to get to know them.
And then you realize, oh, I've been in this conversation
for like twenty minutes, and the conversation spends time too. Yeah,
everything you ask them spends a minute analyzing them too,
which is very important. It gets you a lot of
good conversation topics. And you do kind of the Sherlock
Holmes thing of being like, Okay, I see that his
hands are shaking and he has a chipped eye piece,
and so I should probably ask about that to learn
more about him and profile him. But in the process,
like analyzing does take a minute, and which is very
funny to imagine someone just staring at you for a minute,
just like slowly looking you over and being like.
Speaker 2: You, uh, you.
Speaker 4: Shake a lot. I cannot imagine anything more.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I cannot imagine anything that would strike more anxiety
into my heart. But it's that's what I think I
mean by deceptively interesting, which is a very bad way
to phrase it. It's more that it's a lot deeper
than it peers at first, and also it's a lot
more interested in the way you do things. There's something
I don't want to spoil that happens early on where
you have to make a choice just about how you
kind of enter and leave an area, and it can
affect the way that characters act around you when you
do it, and it's a really really cool moment of
the game telegraphing to you, Hey, it doesn't just matter
that you go and kind of do the collectthon. I'll,
you know, go pick up all the evidence pieces. I
think I dislike when mystery games do that, where it
feels like you're taking what is potentially the really interesting
part of solving a mystery and turning it into like
a rare Nintendo sixty four game or so, like, just
pick up everything that's on the ground. Just get everything
that's on the ground, and you'll be fine. It's like, No,
I think there's the intentionality, the constraints, the time limits,
the feeling that you can fail is important to a
lot of these games and really helps drive them forward
in an interesting way. And so having those moments of
of the game noticing that you did something and responding
in kind or saying, Okay, you need to talk to
somebody right right now.
Speaker 1: In where I'm at.
Speaker 3: In the game, I have the thing that I need
to solve a certain trunk, like a certain character's predicament.
I don't know where they are and I don't have
them on my itenterary. I don't know like where they're
supposed to be. And the manner's pretty big. It's a
pretty large manner, and I'm running around it and I'm
seeing stuff like I'm seeing characters that was not able
to talk to prior. I'm seeing people that I'm like, oh,
I should go say something to them. I have something
for them, but I can't burn minutes on it right now,
and so I need to play that game. In my
head of do I want to spend time on this?
Do I think it's safe for me to spend time
on this, Will this other character's story advance? Further and
start to create problems for me that I didn't expect
would come up. And I think that's the really really
interesting part of this game. It reminds me it's a
close show now. But there was a production in New
York called Sleep No More that was a live action
stage play that took place in a building and you
would go in and yeah, everybody, they act out the
play across all these different floors and sets and stuff
like that, and the audience wears these like crazy like
plague doctor masks, and you are explicitly you don't talk.
You don't speak, you don't discuss things with each other.
You walk and you don't touch anything, but you just
observe as everything happens around you, and you can go
where you want, and different things are happening in different
places the entire time. It's like it's kind of like
a video game in a weird way, but it's in
a stage played setting and you basically get to just
walk where you want to and see this play out
and it loops several times. And so when I went
and I was like, really, I got the chance to
do this. You end up just finding characters and being
like really interested in what this character is doing, and
so you have moments where that character has a really
dramatic interaction with another character and they both storm off,
and you have a split second moment where you're like
do I stay here? Do I chase after them? And
it leads to a lot of really cool emotions where
you have to make that gut reaction because if you
don't react, they're going to run away and you just
lost the thread. But maybe you want to stay here
with this new character. This game hits a lot of
those points. This game like gets that right in a
lot of ways, in ways that I don't always see
video games manage to accomplish, even though the concept I'm
describing as very video gamy in its design, and I
find that really really fascinating. And also, this is like
a good scary game. I've been jump scared several times.
Speaker 1: I think that's something to point out, like this is
a great Halloween game because it's got not only just
like a spooky atmosphere, like you're in this creepy, strange
manner and you're dealing with like you know, spiritualism and stuff,
but there are like legit it scares and you're like,
maybe there's things that happen where like like like freaky
things start happening as you're doing investigations where you're kind
of like it can put you on edge a little bit.
And I liked that about it. It's weird because like
Eric and I were I were talking about this game
and saying how it's like it's like a weirdly cozy
experience for us, because like, yes, we like these kind
of games like Root Trees Are Dead. I is in
my top ten for the year, Like I love these
kind of games, and they are like a weirdly kind
of like comfort food for me of just sitting in
front of the cute at the computer, like late at night,
maybe like raining outside with like a nice cup of
coffee and just feeling like a detective for a few hours, like, Yeah,
I'm gonna got all my clues here, I'm gonna go
talk to this weird guy and look him up and
down and see what's going on with him. And then
you know, putting two and two together.
Speaker 2: But now you have to kind of the added thing
of like, oh, there's like a I think I just
saw like a weird like an apparition out of know where, and.
Speaker 1: I don't know what to make it.
Speaker 3: I saw something in the corner of my vision and
I don't know what it was, but when I turned
to look at it disappeared like, Yeah, there's a lot
of that in this, and I think it plays its
hand very well with that too, where I never felt
there was only one time where I like jumped and
just like had a reaction. Every other time it's been oh,
this is just you know, spine tangling. It's bone chilling.
But it's not like, you know, it's more mood. Yeah,
it's not five Nights of Freddy's where you're just gonna
get jump scared. I really, I really like that about it.
And yeah, to your point, this is cozy because there's
something about seeing the sort of logic of it all
and I think the game, I think Seance at Blake
Manner and the team behind it really understood. There's a
very cozy logic to this where you learn something like again,
I'll use a fake example like the killer wore a
gold watch, and so you can say like, okay, well
who has a gold watch and who doesn't have a
gold watch, and you can start to be like okay,
this that you start playing the guess who game of Okay,
well he ball, but he had a curly mustache and
all that, And there is like a very cozy logic
to that that I think especially for people you know,
who want something just a little bit more relaxing to
sit back. It is like a little logic puzzle, and
those are very relaxing to me at least.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, I'm excited to play more of it.
I've not looked up like how long it is or
or whatever. I kind of I'm curious, but I also
kind of don't want to know, but I'm trying to
squeeze it in in the midst of all the like
nineteen hundred games that we're trying to cramp through for
Game of a Year right now.
Speaker 3: I have a sneaking suspicion about this game that I
don't know if I should voice, so maybe I won't,
But I do have the sense that maybe this is
not necessarily a game that wants you to replay it,
but a game that wants you to go back with information,
if that makes sense. It's kind of reminding me a
little bit of games like nine nine to nine and
zeros late, like the Zeroscape series in that way, and hey,
that's also scratching an itch for me, so.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, what a seance of Blake Manner everyone. It's
available now on PC only, but check it out. It
seems like a great option to play during this, uh,
the scariest time of year. And speaking of scary things, guys,
we love us some horror games over here, at least
with this panel, am I ride. We love being scared
playing video games, and I want to talk about some
of our favorite horror games of all time. And I
kind of want to start with this might be like
like a two prong question, but you might have the
same answer for both, but sort of like what was
the first horror game that you each remember playing? And
what was the first time you remember like being visibly
or like maybe not visibly actively scared in a video
game if it's different than the first horror game that
you played. Hm, Because for me, like in early like
the first of what I would consider playing like a
true horror game to my memory would have been the
original Resident Evil. I remember playing that at a friend's
house because he had it, and I'll never forget inviting
me over and asking me like, hey, have you heard
of Resident Evil? And that's what he sounded like as
a fifth grader, just like he smoked a pack of
cigarettes and I was like, no, it is this and
he we played like the first like probably like in hindsight,
like the middle of the game, like maybe the early middle.
He just loaded up safe that he was, you know,
in products going through and I saw like the Dog's section,
like the jump the dog jumping through the windows, really
famous section, and like freaking out, and I remember being
like scared out of my mind, but it was like
that awkward thing where you don't want to be scared
in front of your friends, so you're like you're trying
to keep it cool like next to him, but in
my mind, like I've never seen anything like this. It's
like half of me wants to like like to earn
the game off and be like this is too much,
But then the other half of me is like, what
is There's something cool about this? I think it's like
having an awakening of like I think I like this,
and then eventually borrowing it from him. And that's how
I played the first Residvil for the first time, but
the first time I can remember being actively scared in
a game. I don't know if this would be considered
a horror game in the way that the movie that
this game is based on, whether or not it's considered
a horror movie. But I played the Jurassic Park game
for sake of Genesis. I think it's just yeah, okay,
I'm okay.
Speaker 2: I'm glad you guys aren't agreement here, because I was like,
do I sound silly saying that this game scared me?
Speaker 1: Because I remember playing.
Speaker 2: It super scary, Well okay, maybe not super sick, Definitely
a scared, definitely a creepy.
Speaker 1: Game for sure.
Speaker 2: I mean, Jurassic Park is a horror movie, you know.
I mean we kind of almost don't think of it
that way anymore, but you know.
Speaker 1: I still don't know if I could see it if.
I always think of it of like an action adventure
movie that is scary at times.
Speaker 3: I think of Jurassic Park as this. This might sound
really crazy.
Speaker 4: It's like a.
Speaker 3: Young adults, not maybe kids, but like I think of
it in that sense where I feel like all of
us watch Jurassic Park at an age before it was
theoretically intended for us to watch Jurassic Park. But I
also feel like that's the age when you probably should watch.
Jurassic Park is about ten to twelve is where most
people saw that movie, and it was like, oh, this
is there's dinosaurs everywhere and stuff like that. But it's also,
I don't know, loses some of its luster when you're older.
It's not quite as as creepy and scary the velociraptors are. Well,
it probably would be nowadays.
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a lot of scary scenes in them.
I mean, you guys, it's just so or like I mean,
because the perspective of child right and now, I was
like her, no, I know what I'm saying as a parent,
Like I showed it to her like as a hey,
this is your introduction to scary movies, you know, and
there's like a lot of scary sequences in that movie.
I mean, I think I would call Jurassic Park it's like,
you know, it's like a slasher but with dinosaurs.
Speaker 3: I think it's weird because modern Jurassic Park feels very
just generic action movie where it's like the stores are
going to battle each other. I almost called it a
battle anime, which is like maybe not too far off,
but the indoor raptor is vegeta or whatever. But uh, yeah,
I think original Jurassic Park is probably it is a
really good first thriller, first scary movie.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I had a phase where I had nightmares about velociraptors
the first time I saw Jurassic Park. Like I had
the same nightmare of a raptor being in my house
and finding me hiding under the covers of my bed
and like killing me with his big hook his hook
foot or whatever. But that was all to say that
the really the intro to the Pega Genesis Jurassic Park
game scared beat.
Speaker 2: Like yeah, remember shows the gate right, and it's like, yeah,
I think, yeah, yeah, No. I played the kind of
recently because what was it lined run like re released
them like the whole Jurassic Park yeah right, And I
like sat down and played because I have a lot
of good memories though, and I played through them and
then I was again playing just I was playing with
my daughter and I gave her the controller to play
as Alan Grant, you know in the in the Jurassic
Park Genesis game, and I told her at the time,
I was like, if you beat this tonight, I'll give
you I'll give you fifty dollars because that game is
like impossible. She was not able to do it, unfortunately,
but she got further than I expected. It. Were sweating
a little bit of why, oh crap, No I would
if she dude, if she beat it, I'll totally give
that up. Man, you could. But it was just funny
to like. I was like, I just want to see
if you can do it, and I want to give
you a little incentive. You know, it is the start
of the sports like Prestige film. Yeah, but yeah, no,
I that that game's creepy, you know what I was thinking.
I was like, because my my answer, Marcus is resumeble too.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: That was the first one I sat down and played to.
I played the N sixty four version. But in terms
of like being creeped out by a video game, I
think my first samples would probably have to be missed.
And the PC adaptation of Rendezvous with Rama, which I
don't know if you guys are familiar with this, but
there's like it's like an Arthur's c. Clark book about
an alien ship just showing up near Earth and in
the novel they just send a bunch of astronauts to
explore it, and the book is just about like they
don't know what this thing is, they just enter it.
It's very cool book. I read it kind of recently
for the first time through, but there was like a
PC point and click game for that, which is like
it's a different era, but that that's it's a creepy
idea of just like entering just this alien this empty
alien ship that just happens to be kind of like
going by Earth, you know. So that's that's my first
memories of being like like creeped out by a game.
But yeah, Resuable two was the one I played through
and beat and and the liquor jumping through the two.
Speaker 1: Way mirror in therogation.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, my.
Speaker 2: Brother always describes it. He was like in another room
and he just heard me kind of playing and you know,
the footsteps of resid Evil, and then he heard a
crash and I just went like ah, and then I
just like her he heard like gunshots and then I
was like, I was like, ah, just be goes the
crap out of me. He just like heard that from
the other room, just like, you know what.
Speaker 1: I'm disappointed. And so currently, if you're watching our super
replay a Resident Evil outbreak, we had our first encounter
with a liquor not too long ago, and they teased
a window break that I felt was like, Oh, because
it's resident evil, you have to have something jump through
a window at a certain point because you see a
liquor crawl outside the window. Like they have a nice
shot where you're inside this hotel and a shot of
like just it's it's panned out enough where you can
see the liquor crawl down in the window that you're
in front of, and you're like, oh, this is coming.
And then it just appears in the hallway, just on
a wall. And I was like, oh, you could have.
I thought we were gonna get something there, But okay,
what about you, Eric.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, it's funny you mentioned the older
PC pointing clicks because my earliest experience with Horror was
The Seventh Guest. My mom actually really love that game. Yeah,
and uh so my my dad would play Quake and
Command and Conquer and stuff like that. My mom would
play The Seventh Guest on our PC and that game,
I wouldn't say it was really scary, but was definitely moody.
Was definitely like like there was a vibe to the manner. Yeah,
And I remember all the puzzles just being darn near
impossible for my very small brain.
Speaker 2: That was when I played at like not a friend's house,
but a parent's friend's house, you know what I mean,
where like there were no other kids there, so they're like, hey,
why don't you send your kids off in the dark
little computer room and they could play Seventh Guest and
I remember.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a wholesome kids game. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: I played the VR adaptation a little bit recently, which
was cool, which is like just I'm glad that exists,
But it wasn't one that I played for more than
like a like a thirty minutes or so.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine for VR.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like a it is a full remake they
did all the FMVs that got new actors in and stuff.
I mean, it's cool. It's a cool project. You know.
Speaker 3: FMV is back in vogue and it's kind of awesome honestly,
like like people are doing obviously Sam Barlow's been doing
a lot of stuff. Imagine we'll be talking about Sam
Barlow's work in just a little bit here, But like
FMV games broadly are like back and it's really fun
to see what's being made in that space. But I
think for my first scare, this is going to be
really weird. So obviously everyone here has played Super Mario
sixty four.
Speaker 1: Correct this.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a specific noise that happens if you try
to jump into a painting or a door that you're
not supposed to be able to get into yet, where
Bowser kicks you back out and he goes ha ha ha,
and it when I was, when I was a tiny kid,
scared the Jesus out of me. Like it was there
was something haunting about that echoee laugh that just infiltrated
my nightmares.
Speaker 4: Could not get it out of my head. Uh, yeah,
that was that was That was bad.
Speaker 2: So I thought you were played piano. Oh I could
see the piano. I didn't really play much.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I.
Speaker 3: Was at a Mario sixty four guy, like like my
brother played a little bit more. My dad played a
lot more. I was never I've never been a platformer guy.
Speaker 4: I don't know why.
Speaker 3: Just never worked for me, But maybe it was that
maybe Bowser just bounced me out of the genre forever
with that laugh.
Speaker 1: Kyle, was there a point where you thought Majors Masks
was the scariest thing ever? Because doing that super replay
with you and having that be my my first, like
ever play through of the original version of that game.
There was so much just imagery in there. I'm like,
if I was a kid in two thousand, terrified me
some of the things I'm seeing in this game.
Speaker 2: That's you. Sorry, Marcus, it's just had a sneeze. Yeah, No,
Majora's Mask creeped me out for sure because it's like
tonally just like overall a dark game, you know. But
the if I'm thinking of Zelda, it's actually the Graveyard
dungeon from Oquery of Time. I don't know if you
remember with the big boss like hitting the bongos and
stuff like where you're like you actually fight the boss. Like, yeah,
that was scarier individually to me because of the rest
of the game is kind of light around that one sequence.
But Majora's Mask overall is just had like the beginning
of that game with the happy mask salesman being so
creepy and like it's so dream like in the beginning. Yeah,
there's definitely like it's just creepy, but like Ockery of
Time had moments that really like like singular moments that
scared me. I guess you could say.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess going off the sort of the threat
of not horror games that wind up being scary, like
the original Metal Gear Solid the Cycle. Mansa's fight creeped
me out as a kid, Like it's weird to think
back to a time when you didn't know that he
would do to things that he would do because it's
become so well known now and a lot of people
play it now for the first time. Kind of maybe
going in knowing it that's gonna happen, just because of
cultural atmosis, but as a kid that got it pretty
much at launch and just no idea, never seen anything
like that. And again like reading the memory card doing
weird stuff with the control, like it.
Speaker 2: Feels like you're jealous distinctly because I knew about it
going in, So I wish I had had that experience. Yeah,
did he read your memory card? Did you have anything
on there?
Speaker 1: I had Symphony the night?
Speaker 2: Oh oh perfect, Yeah, that's awesome, excellent.
Speaker 1: So it was like, it feels like your systems like possessed,
like genuinely when you don't know what's happening and you're
also a.
Speaker 2: Child, I can't imagine I, like I said, I'm jealous.
I wish I had played the way that way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm a little surprised I didn't just like
chuck my controller at the screen like I think I
was scared, but I had enough sense to be like,
I think this is supposed to happen, even though I've
never seen anything like this ever and anything, but I'm
sure this is this is intended, because I get easy.
There has to be stores of someone that legit like
chuck their placetation out the window.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's kind of how I felt about the
end of Metal Your Solid too, like true, where I
was kind of like, I don't this almost feels like
something is like outside of the video game here, you
know if like I was, I really gave myself over
to the end of Metal yourselid to the first time
I played it, and it freaked me out in a
way that I was like.
Speaker 1: This is incredible. The line where we won't spoil it,
but when a certain character starts like his his portraits
comes at like a skull, and there's a line where
he says like, seriously, don't you think you've been playing
a little too long or something like that, he breaks
the fourth allus addressing the player directly.
Speaker 2: Like and like I had been playing like three hours
straight at that point, Like it really like it was
like I was like the perfect Like Couldjim imagining that
whole sequence was like I was the perfect player in
that moment, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, i'd say you like favorite horror games of
all time for me? I mean it's shifted off, of
course over the years, but kind of ones one that
sticks out, and I know it's not technically a game,
but I would almost go to bad and fight on
that in terms of like sheer scares. PT is still
my number one in terms of just like the scariest
thing I've ever played, because it's the only game. As
much as I love horror games, and I've played a
lot of horror games, but I've never and even in
horror movies too, PT is the only piece of horror
media that has ever made me scream out loud, like ever,
like I'm not that kind of person that like sort
of reacts that way, like it's all internalized. And I
remember playing the PT demo of the day it dropped
and it was broad daylight outside too, which makes it
and you didn't know what it was yet, right, no,
this is when people still didn't know what it was.
Like I just picked up on like the buzz of
like there's this weird thing that just dropped and we
don't know what it is, so I just downloaded it.
And because it was during a Gamescom if I remember correctly,
that I was paying attention to Gamescom News and saw that.
Speaker 2: Was connected to Kojima, he announced it.
Speaker 1: I don't remember. I don't think it was. I can't
remember if he was known from the beginning or if
it came out a little like a few hours later
that it was him.
Speaker 3: Maybe came out a little later, if I remember correctly,
but it was definitely something once people started beating it,
I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I remember a like hours later that day, like the
sort of twitch kind of being like wait, hold on
a second, you know, and like seeing like the first
couple of people that got through it and seeing what
it was. That was cool, man, that was like a
cool time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, because I play didn't one had beaten it yet,
and again not having no idea what this is and
not knowing what you're getting into, just completely unprepared. And
I still that's still like my gold standard maybe for
like atmosphere, like I still don't know if I've been
in an environment in video games that's felt that oppressive,
where it's like the moment you stepped in a hallway
and it's just like, Nope, don't want to be here.
Speaker 2: Nope.
Speaker 1: Like everything like all of my like my my fight
or flight. It's like kicking in in a way that
I can't recall ever being feeling so intense and again
not knowing what it was. And then the you know,
the looping and all the like just the how masterfully yeah,
the feet is in the sink. But I mean the
thing that got me to scream out loud was the
least a scared when she kills you, because it's like
everything at that point had been so subtle and so
subtle and so subtle, and it would tease like a
big jump scare, but not do it. And that was
like the first like in your face like jump scare.
So they had like they had primed for it for
a while and then it like and it happened so unexpectedly,
and then it had a little bit of like before
people started kind of figuring out the gears behind the demo,
it had a bit of like mystery to its it
seemed like it didn't happen at the same time for everyone,
So once it started people hearing about it, then people
would play kind of scared, not knowing when it was
gonna happen.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was inconsistent. I mean, I imagine people know
exactly how to get through PT today, but I remember
in those that first day, even the second day, it
was like people weren't really sure what they had done
to see the ending, you know, which was which was
cool and it's creepy, you know it is separately like
even just the sort of community aspect of it, right, Yeah,
there's something about that where it's that almost the closest
thing we have to a found footage game, where like
when when Blair Witch Project came out, it was this
whole thing about people being like was that real? Did
that really happen? Like did that really happen?
Speaker 1: In real? That was me as a kid, I thought
it was one hundred percent real.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And like that is part or like paranormal activity
was the same way. It's like this is this seems
a little too realistic, This seems a little too normal,
and so it's that feeling. But then also using the
interactive element to introduce that element of am I doing
something that's affecting this or is this set in stone?
Or can I change it? And that suddenly adds a
new layer because all of a sudden, you're like, I
just did something. It could be good, it could be
really bad.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, It's like I said, it's still like I I
still hold pt in like incredibly high regard for for
horror experiences, and I will always anytime you do like
a best horror game ranking, I willy fight to put
it on there, even though some people be like, well
it's not a game. I'm like, it's got a beginning, middle,
and the end. It's a game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's got in the middle and well it was
the end for that. That's the project. Yeah yeah, we'll
see what looks like I guess, but.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's why I'm so excited for OD
just because it's like, Okay, we've seen and like I said,
Kajima is really good at like unintentional horror with metal
geared or so many instances like you know, once we
even even touch it of like metal gear being like
weirdly scary, so.
Speaker 2: Like like just the first hour of Phantom Pain is
like creepy as hell where you're like your way to
the hospital and stuff that.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like he has a mind for horror. And it's
like I don't even know if he knew it until
he started doing you know, Silent Hills, which is what
PT was gonna be. So again it's like, Okay, you
don't even you're you can scare me when you're technically
not trying to, or at least not. It's like the
dragon Ball thing of like you've only seen five percent
of my power. Yeah, yes, right, So seeing him go
like no, I'm going to try now and freak you
out is exciting and also, uh, it makes me nervous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's not to sidetrack an od too much. But
I remember I think it was your story that you
wrote for the site, Marcus, or maybe I think it
was you maybe, but you there's like Coajima released a
quote or he said something of like knocking is scary,
like the act of knocking is scary, right, or something
like that, and I remember kind of thinking like what
are you talking about, man, Like what is what? What
do you mean? And then I watched that trailer and
I was like, God, that is creepy. Just that knocking
like this is effective. You know, maybe he does what
he's talking about.
Speaker 1: If you heard a knock and you didn't know where
that was coming from, that would be scary.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, knock of an unknown origin for sure, even known
origin is freaking. If somebody knocked on my front door
right now, I would not feel normal about.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 3: No, it was really tempted to, like knock the underside
of my desk when I did that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I got one. I want to talk about that.
I there's like because to me, there's like scary games
and then there's like horror. There's there's like horror games
that I love that aren't super scary to me, which
is it's funny. I really like horror games a lot,
but I'm not a big horror film guy. I don't
really like the genre. I mean, I have horror films
I like, but it's not a genre I seek out.
But horror games. I think it's having the control or
something that really like makes the difference for me. But
still one of my favorite horror games is Dead Space Too.
I really love Dead Space Too. I like the whole franchise.
I like parts of three even but in the remake
of one recently was good, but two is my favorite
just because my favorite, you know, I I like, I
just said, I don't really seek out horror generally, but
I do like sci fi horror. Like I I'm always
there for the new alien stuff. I like when stuff
goes wrong in space and Dead Space too, I think
is like the best version of that. And it's just
this fantastic like Resonu belfour inspired shooter that's just this
really compelling, like horror story, like I and I love
the ending of that game. I don't know if you
guys remember the ending, but the ending is so cool
and really plays with your expectations, and there's like the
sequences where you up to space jump between stations, and
like it is a game that kind of did the
one shot like camera follows you the whole time with
no cutsk like before God of War did it frankly,
which I think just works really well for a horror
game in space and being stuck with Isaac as he
like goes through this whole sequence and like, yeah, I
just it's like it probably it might be my favorite
horror game, even if I don't think it's the scariest
horror game. I just like I played through that game
like twice, two or three times in a row when
it came out. I just it totally uh like hooked
me in in a huge way. And yeah, Dead Space too,
Like I would put it in my top three like
favorite horror games probably.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know how you guys feel like the franchise.
I think it's the best that Space. I love that Space, yeah,
And I think one is great, but I think I
think two is the pinnacle. And I know everyone talks
about like the eyeball scene is like one of the
kind of like standout scenes in that game, and rightfully so,
it's it's it's rough seem to get through, but I
think that the nursery or the school, whatever it is
that sens like genuinely I still think one of the
most disturbing kind of like sequences in any game, because
like you're fighting like these necromorph kids and when you
kill them, they just scream and they just sound like
normal kids. Like they don't sound like, they don't sound
like monstrous, they just sound like children dying, and it's
like this really haunting reminder of what they used to
be and I remember the first time, and I have
a really really thick skin with horror media, but even that,
like the first time I remember killing one of them,
I like stuff like, oh, oh my God, like you're
gonna make me do not I did not expect to
hear that what I killed, this little baby monster thing.
And I actually knew a guy in college who he
could not get through it because he he was a father,
and he said I could. I couldn't do it. He's like,
I've never been dead space.
Speaker 2: To that happens to you. I wonder if I could
go back to it, Like there's movies now like I
can't watch train Spotting anymore, you know, after becoming a
dad and stuff like that. But yeah, I wonder if
that would affect me differently nowadays. But it's funny that
that game's not really jump scare heavy to my memory,
but in the in the nursery, there is one jump
scare where like this like son just like falls down.
It's like it's like a stage prop that just like
comes down and like skins. That's like the big jump
scare in the game.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 4: It's funny.
Speaker 3: It's the cat in Alien where it suddenly the cat
just jumps out of nowhere and you're like, oh, and
it's it's not the scary thing, but it is enough
to kind of take you out.
Speaker 4: Of your your kind of lull there. You know.
Speaker 3: I love Dead Space as a series. Dead Space one
and two. We used to play them in college. We
would literally just be a Saturday morning, like after we'd
hung out the night before. We'd be like, what do
you want to do today? Who wants to play Dead Space?
And we'd loop runs of that game.
Speaker 2: And so the multiplayer and Dead Space too that wasn't
destination freaking.
Speaker 3: And the Dead Space remake I think gave me like
a new appreciate appreciation for the craft that went into it,
because you mentioned all of the different stuff that goes
into just focusing on that one shot, but also I
think having the health on the spinal column and having
the AMMO indicator and all that. Basically it doesn't just
mean that there's no uys, there's there's a thinner veil
between you and the action that's happening on screen. But
also it keeps your eyes like focused on the center
of the screen like almost as effectively as a crosshair,
and you're constantly looking there which means that things happening
in the periphery can kind of unnerve you and unsettle you,
and you have that moment where you're like, I just
see something move on the wall or something like that,
and it just works so well for that game. I
love the Dead Space games absolutely fingers for ass we
get that remake of two? Yeah, I mean I like,
I love it, but yeah, I think too. I mean,
to be fair, I haven't played two in a while,
but I think it probably still holds up. I played
through Dead Space one with min Max for a deepest dive,
like I don't know, a year or something before the
remake came out, and I was like, this is still good,
Like this this holds up well?
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I don't know. I mean, it's one of
those things, is like I don't really need a remake
of two, but if you guys gave it to me,
I would play the hell.
Speaker 1: Out of it, you know.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, what about you, Alex?
Look at like we're talking about our favorites, right, Like,
what's your you got?
Speaker 4: Like a I got Alex by Kyle? You love to see.
Speaker 1: I wasn't gonna call him out. Yea, I know it's
fun to do. Just keep it moving, keep us moving.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So Immortality, if we want to talk about FMV games,
I think Immortality is one that's got to be in
the conversation for best horror games because I think that's
one that uses game mechanics in a way that I
didn't expect it to. It's one of Sam Barlow and
half Mermaid's games.
Speaker 1: That's about.
Speaker 3: You have a film archive of this actress named Marissa
Marcel who has made three movies over the past several
decades and then disappeared and no one's heard from her since,
and you are scanning through the archives trying to figure
out what has happened. Ostensibly you're trying to build a
film archive, a collection of her lost works that have
been difficult to find over time anyways, but you're also
kind of encouraged to solve the mystery as you do
and figure out what happened. And you know, it would
feel like giving away the game to tell you much
more than that, but there is I think it is
that perfect marriage of you know, digging too deep where
you ought not to have and looking further and further
into things and it does this very clever thing, the
whole mechanic that kind of pins the thing together. It's
a film archive. But the way they have for you
to go through it is you match cut, So you
have a little crosshair and you can freeze frame and say,
I want to match cut this, I want to match
cut this apple, or I want to match cut this
person's face, and it zooms in and then zooms back
out to a different scene. And it could be in
the same movie, it could be in a different movie.
It could be in behind the scenes footage, it could
be in sort of like location scouting type stuff, or
even just maybe somebody with their little handheld camera behind,
you know, with the cast and all that, there's all
kinds of different places it goes, and it is. It
is a horror game, you know. It is very much
a scary game and maybe has one of the most
frightening things I've ever seen in a video game ever,
like the scene that still gives me chills.
Speaker 1: I might know what you're talking about. Yeah, it feels
like there's multiple ones, but there's one that Oh yeah, again,
without spoiling, cause it's like it's kind of a spoiler
to even explain why the game is scary, but it's
the closest comparison is sort of like if you've watched
it enough, sort of like Haunted House or Possession or
like like ghost hunting kind of movies. Like there's usually
a scene where like the people investigating the occurrence will
like record something like Okay, we're gonna record or take
pictures of this house. And then there's always a scene
where they're going through their footage and they see something
that they did not see why they were there, like
like physically in the house, but something shows up in
the film that is like really unnerving. It's it's kind
of like that, like as you're scrubbing through footage, you
just see things You're like, I, what is that all?
What is happening there?
Speaker 4: Wait a minute, What's what's that? What? What is that?
Speaker 3: And you start investigating and it's the idea of you
have to match cut it. It's funny. Someone I think
compared it to Time Crisis and said, it's like it's
kind of like that where if Time Crisis was a
horror game, and I was like, that's that's interesting. Yeah, yeah,
but like that's that's an interesting thought that the idea
of you have to intentionally pull the the you know,
metaphorical trigger to go from one place to another. And
another one of my games that we'll probably talk about
when it wheels back around to me, the idea of
people walked where they ought to have, crawled, they dug
where they ought not to have. That's it's that sense
of oh, I shouldn't be here, this is not for me.
I if I was a normal person doing this, I
would walk away. And honestly, it does give you that
feeling of, even as a player in the removed sense,
being like I don't know if I should be looking
into this, and it gets it gets very very good.
I highly recommend it, especially if you have a group.
I think a lot of horror games, the likes of
Until Dawn and things like that lend themselves well to
one person driving, but a lot of people engaging in
the activity with you. Not only does that make it,
you know, less scary in some ways, but there's something
fun about everybody participating in the activity. And Immortality is
one where I actually played it with the friends and
we were sitting there and just looking through stuff and
they'd be like, oh, look at that, Like oh, what's
that and I'd be like, oh, I don't know, should
we look at it? And it's there's really something engaging
about that. So if you have if you have someone
in your life that you've wanted to kind of have
a scary game with and maybe they don't want to drive,
but they want to experience it, Immortality is a pretty
good one for that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, kind of on in a similar vein I guess
for my next game. It's also a little hard to
talk about, but uh, Dokey Dokey Literature Club a game
that I really really like and I really really enjoy,
and it's it's a tough game to recommend because it's
it's very much a spoiler to sort of get into
what makes it scared, because if you just look at
the Steam page, it sort of the presentation is like, oh,
it's an anime visual novel with like pretty girls, like
a dating sim. There's like a million of those on Steam.
Why should I care about this one? And it's something
where I've had to explain the friends of like I
know what it looks like. I know it doesn't look
like your thing, trust me. Just it's like you have
to kind of commit to, like play the first like
forty five minutes hour of it, and like, stick with it.
You'll like sort of the only clue that you get
when you boot it up that's something is a miss
is that there is a constant warning in the beginning.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you're just like that's weird because and you
almost forget about it when you keep playing it, because
it's like it plays it straight for a good while,
like long enough to kind of lully you into a
false sense of security, so you're like, oh, this is
about what I would expect from this, and then things
start to go off the rails and in ways that
like it's creepy because it's very very kind of fourth
wall breaking, like it's very meta. Yeah, and it's it's
it's like if you were if you were a person
that when we were talking about sort of the way
it's middle Gear Solid too sort of breaks the fourth
wall and kind of is aware that it is a
game being played that is kind of the core of
Dopy Doky Literature Club. And I'm almost hesitating to kind
of go much deeper than that, but it's sort of
like a game that knows what it what it's trying
to be, and kind of knows what you expect out
of it and sort of takes what you think about
it and flips it on its head, and a lot
of very surprising and like really well done ways, uh,
and also in like really really like unsettling ways.
Speaker 3: It's a really fascinating game because I do think it
kicked up a lot of discussion around because it is,
I mean, ultimately a game that wants to catch you
off guard on your expectations, but when the way it
catches you off guard is in a lot of ways
that could be very affecting for some people.
Speaker 4: It it actually kicked up.
Speaker 3: A lot of really good conversations I think about content
warnings in this sort of circumstance, which are probably good
for us to have because I think for a lot
of these games they do come with some level of
often content warnings, and that was stemming out of a
lot of discussions that happened around this, uh. And it
can sometimes be like, Okay, well if I go in
knowing that it's gonna happen, and you know, is that
going to ruin the experience for me? But also I
feel like now you see something like Dokie Doki, because
there have been many imitators, many spiritual successors to Doki Doky,
and even Doky Doki arguably not the first to do this.
There was a I can't remember the name of it.
There's a visual novel that did something very similar before it,
And I think now, if we see something that's a
little too saccharin, a little too like everything's hunky Dory
and happy Ville, it's like, okay, there, you're you're gonna
You're gonna do something at some point. Yeah, yeah, it's
it's the the Simpsons bit where he's like, oh, I
don't want to go yet.
Speaker 4: That guy hasn't done anything that. Yeah, when you're not looking.
Speaker 3: Ah, favorite Simpsons bits by the way, Yeah.
Speaker 4: It's it's a good one. Uh So.
Speaker 3: I but I think Dokie Doky is really fascinating and
that it didn't just become this obviously very interesting, very
fascinating story of what you can do, even like what
you can do with I think it's all in renp
if I remember correct. So it's a really interesting story
of what you know, small devs, small cycles, small tools
can still do and still affect on a larger scale.
But also, yeah, it kicked off a whole wave of
stuff and a lot of cool conversations around it. So
Dokie Dokie definitely like a very very important horror game
when we look at the landscape of the last ten years. Yeah,
and unconventional, like it's sort of different, a different way
to do horror.
Speaker 4: Kyle, how about you?
Speaker 2: Oh, it feels like most a I don't know, like
an easy one to call out, an easy guess, but
Silent Hill two was a huge one for me. I'm
kind of like feeling I'm referencing like older games here,
but like, yeah, I and the remake is good. I
really like to remake a lot. There's a lot of
stuff I like in it. But yeah, like that first
through playthrough of Silent Hill too, especially after I'd played
like Resident Evil and more action horror games that were like,
this game's scary because it has a big monster in it,
you know, And Silent Hill two does have monsters in it,
but just tonally, just the mood of that game and
the quietness of that game, we're just so affecting for me.
And there's a sequence I don't know midway through the
game where you're sort of making your way deeper and
deeper and deeper underground, and you just keep going down.
You're down like seven or eight levels, and you just
keep going. You're going down these like hugely long stairwells,
and you come into this room that's just this like
concrete room that has like grass on the ground, and
there's graves and there's one with your name on it
that's open, and to progress forward, you have to step
into that grave. And I just remember like like it
was like this time, like like where I played a
video game where I was like, I don't I don't
want to do that, Like I'm like so deep underground.
I feel like I'm in a hell right now, and
you're just like and now I have to like enter
my own grave. And it was such a like perfect
effective moment of horror that wasn't anything jumping out at
me or scaring me necessarily. It was just this cerebral
kind of horror. And that's how a lot of the
game is, Like it's broken up with these sequences of action,
but like I don't really remember the action from the
original Silent Hill too very well. I just remember these
unsettling cut scenes and just the strange mood of the
town and just moving through these like creepy places. It
just was like incredibly effective, and there's a reason that,
like it was just sort of held as this classic
and continues to be held as a classic for so long. Yeah,
Silent Hill too, just like one of my favorite horror games.
I love Silent Hill too, and I like the remake too.
The remake is different, but it's good and it's fun
to play.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, have you played a Sound Hill F yet?
Speaker 2: I started it. I'm like three or four hours in. Yeah,
I'm enjoying it so far. Yeah, okay. Yeah, of all people,
I've been most interested to get your take on that game. Yeah,
it is the one. It is my Like you know
how we all have like those single player games that
we're working our way through right now, if that makes sense, Like,
we have the one that I'm working on. It's Sold
Hill F. That is when I go to play video
games on my own time. That's what I'm booting out.
But I am taking it slow, but I'm enjoying it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, cool, Eric.
Speaker 3: I want to shout out another more recent game in
the survival horror genre that I think I have shouted
out on this podcast before, but it once is never enough.
Signalis is a really excellent isometric survival horror game, isometric
top down and somewhere in between, where you are playing
as an android that is going into a facility where
something has gone very wrong and you are looking for
someone who means a lot to you, And it has
a lot of that Silent Hill two vibe to it,
I think, where it's very spacey, it's very strange. It
is a sci fi game, which you know, is really interesting.
It makes it really different, and I think the world
of Signaledge that it builds around itself is really fascinating.
But also just the gameplay of it just sticks with me.
It's so straightforward, but there's so many little moments that
mean so much. Where I remember runs from one room
to another where I only had a few inventory slots.
I knew I'd have to pick something up on the way,
so I could only bring so many bullets. And do
I have a flare? Do I want to flare something?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 3: Do I want to take out one of these enemies
is going to come back at some point later? Or
can I leave it on the ground or can I
just dodge around it? Just constant tension, and I think
that's one of the underrated aspects. We talk a lot
about scares and even chills and thrills, but tension is
such an important part of a good horror and Signalis.
Speaker 4: Does it so well.
Speaker 3: Where you are always just a little bit undergunns. You know,
you don't have the perfect setup for what you need,
you don't have a limitless inventory, you don't have all
the tools that you wish you had. There's always something
that is making you the underdog in every situation, even
though you are this futuristic android that's supposed to be
super powerful. It's like if to be was in the
middle of a horror game, and I really like that.
I think it's a really cool mood that they established.
And then the art direction is just incredible. Like I
struggled to think of many other games that look like Signalis.
It has such an amazing art style that just you
see it and you immediately recognize it.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I love that game.
Speaker 2: That was one which I don't into a lot through.
Another horror game I did it with was Loura Lai.
But where I started it up to just play like
ten to fifteen minutes of it. Let me see what
this thing is, let me take a look at this
and then it was like an hour past and I
was like, oh, well, I'm not not beating this, you know,
Like I don't have that often, but Signalis was a
recent one where I was like, let me check this
thing out, and I was like, well, I'm finishing this.
There's I can't stop playing this, and it was It's great.
It's a great game.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Also, I'm glad you called Loralai a horror game
because I kind of thought that it's like it's scary,
it's creepy. Yeah, yeah, it's.
Speaker 2: I remember I was talking I was on a Blue Sky.
Rebecca over at ign was talking about like how she
was like turned off by elements of it because it
was like it seems like too scary, like monsters coming
after you and stuff, you know, but it's like, that's
not that's not actually what's happening when you play that game.
Even the sequences were enemies are coming, enemies quote unquote
are coming after you are actually the game trying to
be like, hey, we're gonna give you a puzzle because
you're clearly stuck right now, so we're gonna chase you
down and give you a puzzle. So yeah, don't don't
get scared away by that game. If you see, if
you're playing it for a bit and it's like you
start getting chased by things, it's like, no, it's it's
all just creepy mood. It's not really gonna, like, you know,
kill you.
Speaker 4: It's fine.
Speaker 3: You should let the monster catch you. It's totally chilled
the Monster Commission.
Speaker 2: They're just trying to keep you engaged when you're stuck,
that's all.
Speaker 1: Yeah. If someone approaches even the woods at night and
you don't know who it is and let them come,
they might have a puzzle for it.
Speaker 4: Puzzle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, wait, are we talking about Laura? We talking about
real life? Now? What's on here?
Speaker 1: What's the difference? I guess I'm start to wind down here.
Just a few sort of like quick hits of some
some standouts for me that I've always kind of hold
near and dear. One is the original Fear. Yes, it's
one that doesn't get talked about a ton, but I
love the first Fear, like and it scared the crap
out of me at the time, which I always thought
was impressive because it's like half of it's like a
first person shooter, which and it's on its own isn't
like terrifying, Like you're like gutting down soldiers for like
a good portion of the game. But then you get
into these like psychological horror segments with all the antagonists
who is this like weird super powerful psychic girl, where
like the walls are bleeding and it's just messing with
their head and it's like it's like genuinely unnerving. And
I remember being so scared playing that game back, and
like god, it was like oh seven, if I remember correctly,
when Fear came out, and I've always held a hope
that we would get another one, because I call Fear
two was solid Fear three. But you know we lost
oh yeah, I'm sorry, yes, Fear three.
Speaker 2: H Okay, you know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, yeah, you know, and it sucks. You know,
we lost Monolith, the developer earlier this year was shut down,
so you know, who knows. It's highly unlikely we'll see
another Fear game ever again. But yeah, I highly recommend
people revisit that that first Fear. I think it's it's
a gem of the sort of PS three Xbox three
sixty generation I talked about PT earlier. I think like
PT has spawned countless sort of like imitators, and I
think probably the best one is a game called Visage
that came out what was that twenty nineteen twenty twenty
terrifying game. It's set in a spooky house. It's going
for like the PT sort of like almost like photorealistic visuals,
but it's like this really well rendered house. It's haunted
like they the way they do tension of like like
the subtle things are what scare you? Where you're questioning
like is that just house no noises or is there
something else going on here? And you're kind of forced
to go through a couple of different sort of like
campaigns almost trying to Like the hardest thing about PT
is trying to solve puzzles while actively being terrified beause
you don't know what is going to come around a
corner and do something to you while you're you know,
inspecting things. And this is is kind of that time
ten dreamed it a couple of times. Probably one of
the funniest dreams you've ever done was having known Scaredy Cat.
Alex Stadnik played that game and some some really great
last and South there. I encourage people to look to
find the archive of that on YouTuber sometime. But yeah,
this is is great. And in terms of Resident eviluse,
I'm a huge Resident Evil fan. It's one of my
favorite just series in general. Uh So, it's like it's
it's hard to call out one in particular because there's
so many great ones, but I'm gonna go with Village
strictly because of the Dollhouse segment, which is the best
part in the game. Like, the the castle is great,
the Lady Dematresca stuff is great, but in terms of
like the the most scary thing in that game is
the dollhouse and I remember being so surprised at how
effective that section was because it's it's basically like, oh,
we're just gonna do Resident Evil seven here, just in
this one spot, We're gonna do some Resident Evil seven stuff,
like you're gonna don't have any weapons, you gotta sneak
around as very creepy doll. I'm fun fact about me.
Creepy doll stuff is like terrifying to me. Like that's
like my like I don't know what you would call it,
but like the thing that gets you in horror, like
the tropes creepy dolls and Mannikins or Minus.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like Chucky's the scared of hell out of me
as a kid. Uh so, like being in this house
full of these weird dolls and then being stalked by
a thing I won't spoil, but it is absolutely horrifying
when you see what it is. Yeah, yeah, so I'll
shout out Village, which overall is a is a great game.
But yeah that that, to me is one of the
best sort of like singular segments of any game in
the last sort of like five years.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would like I would say two remake and
four are probably like my favorite ones to play, right
but like overall, over like Larger seven, I think maybe
the scariest overall, even if he squence, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I Also I want to shout out sort of as
we're doing a couple rapid fire ones in here or at
the end of Inside and Limbo. Absolutely adore those games,
Like Inside is, like I've played through that game so
many times now it's hard for me to remember like
how much it creeped me out the first time I
played it, you know, and like that little that that
girl that like is chasing you in the water and
stuff like that I love that game so much inside
I was probably in my top five favorite games of
all time, and it's like it's it is horrifying unless
you play it, you know, eight times, and then you're
just kind of enjoying it for what it is.
Speaker 3: I think, if I'm going to popcorn, if you a
recent one again, Mouthwashing, I just don't say anything about it.
Just just go play Mouthwashing. You'd like, go go play it.
I hope it hurts. It's that one's great. Until Dawn
mentioned earlier, I think the original, the remake it you know, like, yeah, yeah,
it's perfect, such a good game. It's a really fun one.
And I think they actually added this with the remake,
to sit down and say everybody gets a character and
they play that character, and that's actually a really fun
way to play through that whole game. But it's also
just if you love more of the slasher side, the
campy horror side of things, absolutely a great one to play.
Speaker 4: And then the last one.
Speaker 3: I'd popcorn is I tried to pick one from among
this kind of uvra of games, and I'm gonna pick Soma.
I think Soma is absolutely fantastic, maybe some of the
best writing in games that I've seen. Just the story
of it is absolutely incredible, and there is a mode
where you can turn off the monsters. Whether you don't
like the scares or whether like me, you don't like
run and hide gameplay all that much. I'm just not
a personal fan of it. It never feels very rewarding
to me, which is why I wouldn't mention something like
Anisia the Dark Descent, which also scared the Bejesus out
of me once I played it. But I wasn't always
a fan of just hide behind crate until big stompy
guy goes away and then go like do half the
puzzle and then go hide again because it triggered and
now he's coming back and all that. I'm just never
a huge fan of that. But that, oh, an Alien
Isolation didn't get messing. But Alien Isolation is great also
really really scary, and get some really clever scares out
of the alien and the way the alien moves and
I really like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, awesome. Well, I hope listening to this you guys
all have a very large list of horror game recommendations
for you going into the spooky season Halloween tonight. At
the time you're listening to this probably. I hope everyone
has a great time out there. Are you guys doing
trigger treating? I like to think you're never too old
to do it, as long as you wear a mask
or you look vaguely teenagers.
Speaker 2: I think this might be. I think last year was
my daughter's last time trigger treating. I think maybe, which
is which makes me sad. But we'll see. Maybe we'll
find out tomorrow.
Speaker 1: I guess. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, thanks for watching, everyone,
Just some quick housekeeping before we dip out here. Of course,
you can follow the three of us on social media.
I am at Marcus Stewart seven on Blue Sky. You
can find Kyle at Kyle M. Hilliard and Eric Van
Allen at Sea Moosey correct, see moosey Sure, Son, Alex.
Speaker 4: You're gonna this is my horror game?
Speaker 1: Is I show? Sorry?
Speaker 3: By the way, No, that's incredibly funny when it happens. No,
but that's that's my personal horror game. As I show up,
and I've been Alex all along, I've been I've been
like living split lives this entire time.
Speaker 4: Has it?
Speaker 1: Has it happened? The other way? Is anyone called Alex Eric?
Speaker 4: Yes? That has also happened.
Speaker 3: Okay, Yeah, if it only happened one way, I would
you know, that would be not great. But it happens
both ways, so I find that very funny. Can make sure,
I guess you can go follow Alex too, since we
brought him up somewhere. But yes, be sure also to
check out our Twitch channel and YouTube channel. We've got
some ongoing series every Wednesday streaming new games, usually with
Eric and Alex, so you can't confuse themcause they're both
there to get there especially confusing. Yeah, and of course
myself and Charles Hart we have our ongoing Resident Evil
Outbreak super replay. At the time you're listening to this,
there's a chance we might have beaten the game because
we are at the beginning of the final scenario. I've
got a special costume prepared specifically for this episode because
it's airing on Halloween that I'm excited to bust out.
Speaker 1: I think it's gonna be indistinguishable from the character that
I'm portraying, as You're gonna be like, wow, It's like
it's like playing the game twice. It's like, how was
he here and there at the same time. Who would
have thought? But yes, fingers crossed. We'll see we can
put this to bed this week. But that's been a
very fun series. Check out the twitch channel and the
YouTube channel for the VODs on that, and of course
you can also go once again to gamiformer dot com
slash subscribe. Subscribe to the magazine ten issues a year,
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proud of to support. And yeah, guys, thank you for watching.
I hope you guys all have a fun and safe Halloween.
I hope to see both of you alive and well Monday.
I say, you know, in case you know, creepy things
happen on Halloween, we'll see you know. If you guys, approach,
if someone approached you when you decided to embrace them,
hoping that you would get a puzzle.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I would.
Speaker 3: There should be people that just distribute puzzles. This is
how my theory of why the world should just be
Professor Layton, there should just be puzzle distribution happening at
all times.
Speaker 1: I always thought The Riddler was a cautionary tale, but.
Speaker 2: It was gold hashtag.
Speaker 3: I realized recently that if I was going to turn
into a Batman villain, it would not be the Joker,
it would be the Riddler. I would absolutely go down
that path. And the Riddler is kind of just Jigsaw
when you think about it.
Speaker 1: So yeah, Jigsaw is basically the Riddlers where you go yes, yeah, yeah,
you're right. Yeah. Well, thank you for watching, guys. We
will see you next week on the Game of Former show. Bye.
Speaker 2: We