Jimquisition: Scare Tactics

TheOrb

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Jun 24, 2012
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I think this is what happens when you cross Vivi with Scarecrow...
Good costume, are you going to go trick-or-treating with that?
I've never played a horror game or seen a horror movie... I just don't like the idea of being scared.
 

Techno Squidgy

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Nov 23, 2010
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I was absolutely convinced once I saw SCP that there was going to be a jump scare or something. I haven't played the game myself but I spent a good hour or two reading through the wiki and I'm terrified of it. I can't play Slender or SCP, if there's one thing that absolutely terrifies me it's knowing I'm being followed but being unable to see my pursuer. Queue frightened whimpering and rivers of piss.
 

ManInRed

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May 16, 2010
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That example of Pyramid Head appearing wasn't a jump scare, because nothing pop up at you. There was a quiet door sound, some footsteps and when you turned around you saw you were cornered by Pyramid Head. A jump scare isn't that gradual, it hits you so fast you don't has time to process what it is, so often what scares you can be something not at all threatening.

That being said Silent Hill 2 did employ jump scares, very rarely and after you had been playing the game long enough to be in the mood for them to be effective. The best example would probably be Laura hitting the keys on the piano.

The main criticism of jump scares is their over use, because people who experience a ton of horror will become immune from them over time. Still, nothing wrong with them, I'd just don't want to be made to expect a jump scare coming, since that is a good way for me not to react frighten to them. Now convincing me a jump scare will happen and then delivering nothing, well there's a quote about that:

"Being prepared for almost anything, he was not, by any means, prepared for nothing."
 

drisky

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Mar 16, 2009
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Can someone with an HD video tell me what the Kane and Lynch III: Drug Guns Gun Drugs article says?
 

MaxwellMouse

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Jun 7, 2010
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I don`t find Dead Space scary at all. That is because the monsters pose little threat. Issac Clark has space armor and the weapons to easily deal with the monsters. When you don`t fear the monster jump scares completely fall flat.
 

MortisLegio

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I will agree that a well paced and crafted jump scare works beautifully, but when it's continuous jump scare after jump scare; the scares lose alot of their edge. Alot of horror movies have this problem where they get stuck on one kind of scare and there is very little build up. Taking Dead space as an example the first time you see Necromorphs is well built (though I think it could have been longer) so when the monsters popped out it was scary. Where as later, when you see the 3rd or 4th Necromorph lying on the ground, you're expecting to pop up and it takes some of the shock out of it. Really, I (personally) have no problem with jump scares but the over use of them. There are a great number of tools in horror's arsenal; just don't pick one and keep using it.
 

VeryOddGamer

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Feb 26, 2012
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I'm kind of hesitant to watch this episode, because I keep expecting a jump scare in the video itself.
 

King of Asgaard

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Oct 31, 2011
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Wow... just wow.
It takes a special video to keep me smiling throughout the whole thing, and you sir, have created such a video. Many kudos to you.
 

T3hSource

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Mar 5, 2012
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Scarecrow's voice reminded me of this guy!



Anyway,I consider myself not very prone to jump scares.I feel if it gets me,it should scare most people.When there's actual tension,of course a jump scare will work,that's how you do it,you don't go lazy mode and just jump to the scare itself(pun not intended).
 

Undeadpool

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Aug 17, 2009
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I think one of the reasons why people are so down on jump-scares is that some people react to fear, especially unexpected fear, with anger. There have been assaults both in haunted houses (where people are paid to GET SCARED) and even outside of them after a person was done, on staff by disgruntled customers.

So naturally when there's no high schooler trying to make a quick fifty bucks to cold-cock, only your $3000 flat-screen, that anger has to go somewhere so suddenly it's "PSH! Jump scares?? More like CHUMP SCARES!! I mean they're SOOOO easy to pull off that it just becomes LAAAZYYYY...not that I got scared!"
 

Mikeyfell

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Aug 24, 2010
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Definitely, Doom 3 is the only game that ever made me shit my pants. (For the record I was holding one in while I was playing Doom 3 but still)

I don't even think the Jump scares need that tense of a set up.

I still have fond repressed memories of Youtube or Newgrounds videos that say "Cool Optical Illusion" then 30 seconds in BAM! scary face... or alternately pancake face, which is equally as scary.

There's no build up, no tension and to me that makes it even scarier.
 

kanbabrif

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Aug 30, 2011
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drisky said:
Can someone with an HD video tell me what the Kane and Lynch III: Drug Guns Gun Drugs article says?
"THERE IS NO CRANE ONLY SCARECROW" repeated over and over.
 

PunkRex

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Feb 19, 2010
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Kinectonauts...
Why would you do that Scarecrow, I thought we were friends?!
 

Jacked Assassin

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Jun 4, 2010
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Only 2 games come to mind that scared me.

The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time
The majority of the game isn't scary. Its a very exciting & adventurous place. However that changes for me every time I had to enter the graveyard. It had nothing to do with the monsters since most could be found anywhere. Just the feeling I wasn't suppose to be there & the guilt for destroying the town's water supply.

Shadow Man
I think Dead Side was the creepiest place I've ever been to in a video game. The Sky & Ground are gray. The ponds & streams are made of blood. The enemies there I can't help that I want to help them yet I need to kill them before they killed me.
The only way out of that area was by swimming through a tunnel of laughing crying & some jingle that seemed like a nightmare about pedophiles. The areas that were suppose to be hell with the fire, lava, & bats were too vibrant to be scary. Regardless of that though I found Dead Side scary enough that I ended up playing Harvest Moon 64 just for the sake of contrast.

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As for the jump scare.... Well I like being startled.... But on its own its hard to be scared when I probably already have a plan on how I'm going to kill whatever it is.

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As for the things that scare me nowadays they don't come from video games like they use to. Things that tend to scare me now also tend to offend me. Like losing my finances or apartment. Whatever is being said about Windows 8. And whatever is said during presidential elections.

So much so that even if I somehow took 12/21/2012 seriously I would actually welcome it despite being Atheist. I welcome it so much so I'll be eating TGI Fridays food on the 21st of this December.
 

xPixelatedx

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Jan 19, 2011
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I am going to have to disagree Jim, at least to a point.

Even if some of the jump scare games MIGHT require the same amount of effort, the pure psychological games require much more skill. The evidence I use to that is the fact that hardly anyone outside of silent has been able to pull it off, even after great effort, all while jump-scare games are a dime a dozen. Hell even the Silent hill games after 3 have struggled tremendously to try and capture the specific type of horror the original games offered players.

I love jump scares to, and I do think they have their place in games. But the quality of a good mind-fuck cannot even compare to that. That's the kind of stuff that slowly creeps up over you. It stays with you for a while, and it seems more disturbing the more you think about it.

ManInRed said:
That example of Pyramid Head appearing wasn't a jump scare, because nothing pop up at you. There was a quiet door sound, some footsteps and when you turned around you saw you were cornered by Pyramid Head.
Not to mention (if I am not mistaken)the first time you see him he is literally standing down a hallway, staring at you and nothing else. He doesn't attack or go after you, he is merely there to alert the player that something is stalking them. Which all just goes to show Pyramid head is anything but a jump scare.

It's a shame they changed the game before release. The original E3 videos of Silent Hill 2 showed Pyramid head randomly appearing in areas, dragging his knife slowly across the ground, all while during regular game-play in regular areas. That would have been amazing and randomly horrifying!
 
Aug 1, 2010
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I love jump scares in games because they take effort for another whole reason:

They take effort, because there is a VERY high chance the player won't even be looking in the right direction when the music jumps and a baddie leaps out.

They'll know soon enough, sure, but the effect is lost.

In a film, the makers KNOW where the camera is going to be pointed and thus have to give you no reason to look in a certain direction. They know they have your attention and they can take advantage of it.

In a game, the developers have to WORK for your attention. They have to give you a reason to look at the spooky ghost.

Take Slender. I love the game, but of course it scares me shitless. However, the jumpscares are player created. Created by the fear of not knowing what's behind you. And needing to know.

You can play Slender without seeing him more than once or twice, but it takes INCREDIBLE effort to not frantically look around for him and stay focused on the pages.

The game makes you BEG for the jumpscares because you simply have to know. Even if the knowledge kills you, you have to know.

And THAT is what I call horror.

Awesome episode by the way.

Willem DaCrow was terrifying.