Landrius said:
As the OP predicted, mine was Amnesia. It was the first game I played that I truly considered to be of the "horror" genre, Dead Space being more like a really neat third person shooter with a nice atmosphere that would startle me now and again.
I was mildly tense for a while in the early sequences of Amnesia, but not particularly scared, as such (scared being that full-body fight-or-flight response with excess tension in the chest). What really did it for me was the first appearance of the invisible water monster.
On a side note though, on my second playthrough of Amnesia the water monster was VASTLY less scary than the first time. Once you fully comprehend something, its scare factor decreases.
You know what makes the invisible water monster even less scary outside of the context of the game? It's model is a ball. Just a ball. The splashing it makes is because of the physics of a ball bouncing along through the water.
OT: I don't know if I would ever describe something as having
literally made me need a change of pants, but
Amnesia: The Dark Descent certainly got its atmosphere down almost perfectly.
Dead Space delivers on jump-scares with the whiny, high-pitched violins and jumpy brass sections whenever monsters jump out.
Demon's Souls. Now, I haven't played
Dark Souls yet (I will once it comes to the PC), but
Demon's Souls is a massive exercise in the futility of trying to fight back against an environment where everything wants to kill you. And most of the environments are crazy-dark, with enemies just waiting around corners to jump you when their mage friend baits you by standing at the end of a hallway.
