Nobody does unconventional and unexpected quite like indie devs, which is why they do horror so well. Here are our picks for the 10 best indie horror games ever.
major AAA game studios, with their big budgets and ever-looming corporate overseers, don ’ deoxythymidine monophosphate frequently make the types of games that are out to actually scare you. They ’ ll throw all kinds of awful enemies at you, certain, but they ’ ll besides make surely you have a rocket catapult to fight them off with .
Developers of indie horror games aren ’ triiodothyronine afraid to alienate the broader bet on consultation, angstrom long as they can capture those die-hard horror fanatics who live for the fight-or-flight epinephrine rush that only disempowerment, despair, and isolation can provide .
Amnesia: The Dark Descent
No desirable list of indie repugnance games would be complete without a place for Frictional Games ’ Amnesia : The Dark Descent.
This game does Horror with a capital H. Alone, without even your memories for company, you must traverse the darkest catacomb of Brennenburg Castle. Fighting is not an option, only fleeing and hiding. even cowering for besides long in the darkness will deplete your most valued resource – your sanity .
Check it out before you play its sequel amnesia : rebirth .
Doki Doki Literature Club
If you ’ re a fan of indie repugnance games, skip ahead. Doki Doki Literature Club is best meet unspoiled, and even the cognition that it ’ s a horror game is spoiler enough. Developer Team Salvato goes out of their way to make the game appear adenine innocent as possible, warning only that “ this game is not suitable for children or those who are easily disturbed ” .
Doki Doki Literature Club plays with its metier masterfully, twisting the well-trodden genre of the dating sim ( accomplished with cute anime girls ) to create a product that seeks to unsettle the player on a surprisingly personal tied .
FAITH
While ex post facto aesthetics are common amongst some of the best indie horror games, adding eerie distortion effects while besides helping with restrict budgetary constraints, Airdorf Games ’ FAITH is rightfully unique. It borrows its look from early Atari or Apple II games, using a limit color pallette and low-resolution sprites to capital effect .
The player takes the function of a priest who must revisit a abandoned ship house in the woods to correct an exorcism gone amiss. FAITH sells its atmosphere with off-putting synthesize dialogue, and it scares with its fantastic rotoscoped animations .
Five Nights at Freddy’s
As Amnesia : The Dark Descent benefited from viral marketing created by reaction videos, Five Nights at Freddy ’ second revealed the extraordinary influence wielded by popular streamers. Audiences of millions tuned in to watch the likes of PewDiePie and Markiplier get the pants jump-scared off them, transforming Five Nights at Freddy ’ s into a gambling phenomenon .
As security system guard covering the night stir at Freddy Fazbear ’ south Pizza, it ’ s your job to monitor the cameras and control the doors to protect yourself from a cast of animatronic horrors, all of whom have become just a morsel murder-y now that business hours are over .
IMSCARED
IMSCARED, created by Ivan Zanotti ’ south MyMadnessWorks, is another indie horror game that loves to play with the video game medium to create its impression. In fact, IMSCARED being a game is region of its own narrative, and even invites the actor to manipulate its files to proceed.
The extremely short view distance gives the game a natural horror atmosphere, making the player hesitant to charge ahead for concern of running head-first into whatever might be lurking in the black .
Paratopic
Arbitrary Metric ’ s Paratopic leans hard on the wyrd to achieve its repugnance, accurately described on its Steam store page as “ a travel through a barbarous fever dream earth ”. If you like indie repugnance games with the baron to disturb, this one is for you .
Everything in Paratopic is crafted to convey a sense of incorrectness, from the false soundtrack to textures that don ’ t properly stick to characters ’ faces. The narrative is intentionally break up and disjointed, inviting the musician to progress through its abbreviated narrative multiple times in order to better grasp its meaning .
Phasmophobia
2020 seems to be the year for a chain of social games to become the latest big swerve, with Fall Guys : ultimate Knockout, Among Us, and now Phasmophobia, brought to us by Kinetic Games. This VR-compatible game invites you to assemble a crew to go ghost-hunting in a crop of skittish locations .
While having the company of friends or allies might undermine an indie horror entitle ’ s unnerving standard atmosphere, Phasmophobia has a trick up its sleeve – listening to players ’ microphones and responding to their communications .
Slender: The Eight Pages
Another indie championship that achieved far-flung recognition thanks largely to streamers and YouTubers. slender : The Eight Pages is surely skittish in its own right, borrowing from and contributing to the democratic Slender Man mythos .
The treasure-hunt gameplay works absolutely with the repugnance atmosphere, building tension and danger with every valued page located. The game ’ mho masterstroke is a automobile mechanic that makes Slender Man himself is more probable to attack if he ’ randomness being looked at immediately, meaning that you ’ re never certain precisely where he is – unless that place is mighty behind you .
Trilby’s Notes
Created by popular game critic, developer, and generator ‘ Yahtzee ’ Croshaw ( best known for his review series Zero Punctuation ), Trilby ’ south Notes is a stand-out entitle in his excellent Chzo Mythos series .
The game follows cat-burglar-cum-paranormal-investigator Trilby as he traces the origin of a dangerous wooden keepsake to a hotel in Wales, where he slips back and forth between the real world and a demon-infested nightmare version of it. Trilby ’ sulfur Notes borrows its gameplay style from older parser games, requiring the players to type out text-based commands to interact with the game ’ second earth .
You are Jeff Bezos
“ When you wake up this good morning from unsettling dreams, you find yourself changed in your bed into a atrocious vermin. You are Jeff Bezos. ” That ’ s the opening line from text-adventure game You are Jeff Bezos.
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In a number of games that seek to thrill you while you ’ ra play or leave you feeling perturbed for a while subsequently, here ’ s a game that ’ randomness designed to leave you with a deep, pervading repugnance of the real world. Placing you in the shoes of the earth ’ s richest parasite, You Are Jeff Bezos achieves its effect by helping you appreciate the measure of thoroughly that his hoard wealth could, but will never, achieve .
After playing through this, you could be forgiven for wanting to escape into one of the vastly more comfort worlds offered by the early nine games on this tilt .
