So I was talking with my friend the other day, and was saying about how I don't think I've ever played a truly scary horror game. I know there is a specific mindset that horror can put you in - because from reading creepy wikipedia articles and stuff like that, I've been in it before - where essentially, I've overdosed on unexplained mysteries, stuff that doesn't seem to fit, and suddenly my understanding of the world starts to crack, and there's the feeling that maybe, just maybe, everything isn't as it seems. And when that happens you can't trust anything: you recess to the mindset of a child, where every window could have a murderer behind it and death could be hiding in every shadow.
THAT is true horror. But my friend reckons that games cannot do this to you - because for horror to be truly effective it must seem like it could be real. He says that it's possible in movies, because you can get totally absorbed in them, but since you're controlling a game every step of the way, you're constantly aware that what you're playing isn't real.
I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure it's true. Because I think that the horror of this kind of fiction comes not from the belief that it's true, but from the notion that it could become true. Does that make sense? What I mean is, I think that a game which is terrifying in this way wouldn't be so because of ultra-realistic graphics. But rather, it would be because the characters had been designed in such a way that their personalities seemed like they could be real. That even though you know it's fictional, what's to stop the same thing from happening in real life? How can you really trust what you think you know to be true?
What do you think, escapists? Am I just rambling on about nothing? Is my friend right about this, or can horror games be truly effective in this way?
THAT is true horror. But my friend reckons that games cannot do this to you - because for horror to be truly effective it must seem like it could be real. He says that it's possible in movies, because you can get totally absorbed in them, but since you're controlling a game every step of the way, you're constantly aware that what you're playing isn't real.
I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure it's true. Because I think that the horror of this kind of fiction comes not from the belief that it's true, but from the notion that it could become true. Does that make sense? What I mean is, I think that a game which is terrifying in this way wouldn't be so because of ultra-realistic graphics. But rather, it would be because the characters had been designed in such a way that their personalities seemed like they could be real. That even though you know it's fictional, what's to stop the same thing from happening in real life? How can you really trust what you think you know to be true?
What do you think, escapists? Am I just rambling on about nothing? Is my friend right about this, or can horror games be truly effective in this way?
