The Three Scariest Video Games Ever, Ranked

Horror games are my personal favourite genre of gaming. There is something fun and exciting about turning the lights down, putting your headphones on, and scaring yourself silly, by staying up until the late hours of the morning playing horror games. It isn’t just the scares that appeal to me, however, as I think it’s often the horror games that have the best narrative stories. The horror genre is a way to explore what frightens us, and in doing so, it gives us the best and rawest view into what it means to be human. Here’s a list of what are arguably the scariest games ever created.

Number One: Silent Hill Two Remake (2024)

The Silent Hill Two Remake is loyal to the original 2001 game, but with today’s graphics adding to a deeper and scarier experience. Players control the character, James Sunderland, as he navigates through an abandoned town in search of his late wife after receiving a letter from her. The game balances exceptional body horror and terrifying jump scares with a complex exploration of human psychology. We’re still having nightmares about Toluca prison!

Silent Hill two is an excellent choice for gamers who enjoy casino gaming, especially slots, as the game has many puzzles that reflect that classic slot machine experience. Plus, returning to the best slot sites as covered by eSportsInsider, and enjoying the many options, bonuses and rewards these platforms have to offer, is a great way to take a break from the intensity and terror of the game itself.

Number Two: The Last of Us Part II (2020)

Both of The Last of Us Games deserve a spot on this list, but the second takes the crown for its more visceral scares. In the game, you mostly control a character by the name of Ellie, who was a companion character to Joel in the first game, as she tries to track down and take revenge on a group of people who have wronged her. The horror of the game comes from two key aspects: the fact that the world is in the middle of a devastating zombie apocalypse, meaning you go against zombies with a unique but horrifying design, and also what grief and rage can lead us to become.

I’d recommend this game to anyone who enjoys zombie stories, but is also looking for something incredibly character-driven in the same vein as The Walking Dead TV series. It’s also a great choice for dedicated gamers who want to challenge themselves, as it has numerous tense and visceral third-person combat moments that require effective strategy and resource management to succeed in.

Number Three: Outlast (2013)

There have been a few successors in the Outlast series, but we don’t think any of them quite have the same terrifying feel as the original. In this game, you play as a freelance journalist by the name of Miles Upshur, who is on his way to investigate an asylum. However, upon entering, he finds himself unable to leave and locked in the building with the asylum’s insane patients and in the midst of a series of dark human experiments. What makes the game particularly terrifying, however, is the fact that it does not give the player any weapons with which to fight back. Your only options in the game are to run or hide.

This is a perfect game for any lovers of real horror experiences, like horror houses or scary mazes. If you’ve been through these, you’ll know that, even though you know the place is run by scare actors, there’s a part of your brain that can’t help but feel like you’re in danger. Just the same as, even when you know you’re just playing a game when engaging with Outlast, the fear feels almost as real as if you were experiencing the horrors yourself.

Conclusion

These are the three games that we think are the scariest, ranked in order of how frightening we found them. That being said, we have not just looked at jump scares and sound design to choose these games, but also the horror of the narrative they contain. This is because it takes more than a couple of cheap shocks to make a piece of media truly scary, and it is the games and characters that stay with us, whether we want them to or not, long after we’ve put the controller down that are truly the most frightening. If you are looking to curate a list of scary games, it’s also a good idea to check out the following: Dead Space, Until Dawn, games in the Amnesia series, Alan Wake one and two, and Phasmaphobia.