Shocktoberfest: Enter The Nightmare -- A Month-Long Journey Through The Horror Game Genre

When does this start?

Shocktoberfest begins on October 1st, and will last the entire month of October, ending at 11:59 PM on Halloween night.

What should I play?

Anything that falls under the classification of a horror game. Survival horror, action horror, a horror-themed FPS, anything with zombies, etc. In the interest of having fun, this can be more of a loose definition of what defines a horror game, and constitute anything that is more-or-less "horror themed". So games like Gears of War or even Luigi's Mansion are fine.

For me, it's very much the same outlook as Backlaugust -- I've got horror games in my backlog, and it's time to play them. How many games you want to play is up to you, whether that's just one game or a few games. Any platform, doesn't matter. They can be new games, old games. Even horror games you've already beaten long ago and want to replay. You don't have to choose all of your games up front; you can if you want, but it's fine to just take it one-game-at-a-time.

Who should participate?

If you:

a. Enjoy horror games
and/or
b. Have at least one horror game in your backlog
and/or
c. Plan on buying a new horror game (such as, I don't know, ZOMBIU!!!!!!!!)

you should do this.

The purpose of this is a little less about seeing how many games we can beat, but for everyone to share in the experience of playing something scary. A good horror game can be a tough thing to get all of the way through to the end, but with some moral support from the rest of the community that's going through the same thing, maybe we can all make it back into the light by November! That's what it comes down to -- having fun, and being scared shitless. And being scared shitless is a lot more fun when being scared shitless as a group.

One last thing -- for your fellow NW-er who hasn't played every game, try using spoiler tags whenever possible for anything major that's story-related, or just in general anything that should not be spoiled. So, "I can't believe Leon died at the end!" instead of "I can't believe Leon died at the end!"


Completed (18)



Kentucky Route Zero, Act 1 (Secret_Tunnel, 10/6)
The House of the Dead: Overkill (GameDadGrant, 10/7)
Dead Space (PogueSquadron, 10/11)
Kentucky Route Zero, Act 2 (Secret_Tunnel, 10/14)
Fatal Frame (TheBigG753, 10/17)
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse (PogueSquadron, 10/20)
Dead Rising 2 (Zero, 10/20)
Dead Space Extraction (Mop It Up, 10/21)
Super Castlevania IV (Het_Nkik, 10/23)
Spirit Camera: The Cursed Memoir (GameDadGrant, 10/24)
Zombies Ate My Neighbors (Het_Nkik, 10/26)
ObsCure II (r_hjort, 10/26)
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon (Jargon, 10/26)
Resident Evil: Revelations (ludist210, 10/28)
ZombiU (Mr_Mustache, 10/29)
Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly (TheBigG753, 10/31)
Project Zero 2: Wii Edition (r_hjort, 10/31)
Zero: Tsukihami no Kamen/Fatal Frame IV: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse (Het_Nkik, 10/31)


LEFT 4 DEAD (10)

999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors (Secret_Tunnel, in progress)
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow (GameDadGrant, *has thrown in the towel*)
Dead Space: Extraction (chrisguy, through 5 levels)
Doom II (Pokefreak911, 12 levels in)
Resident Evil Zero (gojira, at the Training Facility)
TellTale's The Walking Dead (Zero, finished Episode 3)
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (Pokefreak911, through Stone Tower)
Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward (Zero, finished first run)
ZombiU (gojira, Tower of London)
ZombiU (r_hjort, whack-a-zombie)


The Players (20)

chrisguy: Dead Space: Extraction
deathly_hallows: Cult County, Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil: Deadly Silence
DrFinkelstein: ZombiU
GameDadGrant: Spirit Camera: The Cursed Memoir, The House of the Dead: Overkill, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
gojira: ZombiU, Resident Evil Zero
Hero_of_Hyrule: Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon
Het_Nkik: Super Castlevania IV, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, Zero: Tsukihami no Kamen
Jargon: Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Dead Space, Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon
kriswright: ZombiU
ludist210: Resident Evil: Revelations
Mop It Up: Dead Space Extraction
Mr_Mustache: ZombiU, Castlevania
PogueSquadron: Dead Space, Castlevania 3
Pokefreak911: The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Bioshock, Bioshock 2, Doom II
r_hjort: Obscure 2, Project Zero 2: Wii Edition, ZombiU
Secret_Tunnel: Dead Space 3, Kentucky Route Zero, 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare.
Shadowlink: ZombiU
Stephen: Alan Wake
TheBigG753: Fatal Frame, Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly, Fatal Frame III: The Tormented
Zero: Dead Rising 2, Castlevania (III or Adventure Rebirth), Virtue's Last Reward, The Walking Dead


LAST YEAR'S THREAD

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Made it to the last boss of Luigis Mansion (I think). I'm saving it to play with my niece this weekend, but just a matter of time now.

It's a bit early, but I'm throwing in the towel when it comes to Lords of Shadow. I'm not even on the 2nd disc yet, and there's no way I'm going to have the time to finish this game before the end of October.

I'm a bit bummed (and I still want to finish this before Lords of Shadow 2 comes out) but I gotta be realistic. It's just not gonna happen. Oh well. I'm not too sad though - I was able to scratch off two games for this year's Shocktoberfest, and two out of three ain't bad, right?

@r_hjort

it killed me. Doesn't look like what you're describing.

It was like..COMPOSED of electricity, or electrically shielded. It kept disappearing, too, and reappearing on top of me. Freaked me the heck out. I'll let you know if I encounter another one. Maybe I'll see if Nikki can take some video.

@GameDadGrant

What do you think of Lords of Shadow? The PC version, including both DLC packs, is on sale for $15 on Amazon. The only 3D Castlevania I've played is Castlevania 64 which, despite being incredibly hyped for, I lost interest in very quickly and never came close to beating. But I've beaten I think every 2D Castlevania else than the third one for Gameboy I believe. Thoughts?

So, crazy week and long hours at work, and I haven't gotten to play much Fatal Frame 2 over the past few nights. I'll try and play a bit more tonight, and will hopefully make a dent in the game over the weekend.

Here's my dilemma: I'm working late shifts next week since we are in "grind" mode, and will probably work 3-12 or so. I will obviously have time to play the game earlier in the day, but I feel like that's going to lose a lot of the effect. It's so damn dark, it *needs* to be played at night. At the same time, if I play from midnight til 3 or 4, I'll probably have to keep the volume a little lower since I live in an apartment. And that will also cause it to lose some of the effect. But I could always find some headphones that I can run from the stereo, which could be a brilliant/horrible idea considering how freaky the sound in these games can get.

@Mr_Mustache
No, that's OK, I know the type you're talking about, and it's the one I expected you to encounter much later than the Tower of London. I just didn't want to describe it the way you just did in case I misunderstood you before and would accidentally spoil something. They are terrifying. Strong, resilient and unpredictable. Their brains, or whatever's left of them, are still wired the same way as the rest, though.

@TheBigG753
I vote headphones! I played through the Wii remake at night with headphones on, and I was like a scared little kid after every session.

@Jargon

It's a very good game, especially if you like God of War-like gameplay. It's somewhat non-linear which is nice, and the graphics are pretty awesome IMO.

The voice a ting is kinda "meh" though, and the music doesn't have the same charm as the older series...but I still found it unobtrusive.

For $15, I think it's worth checking out. Just understand this isn't going to really play anything like the Castlevania games you've played before. If you are cool with that then the investment might be worthwhile.

Dear diary,

today Obscure 2 was nice to me. Maybe it likes me!
I beat the boss fight where I left off, did some completely tolerable exploring, and got myself through a second boss fight. It was far from being a mindblowing experience, but it was thankfully even farther from the absolute crap I had to go through earlier. After all this was over I got to explore a couple of brand new, and actually quite moody areas! The characters did their best to ruin the mood with their abysmal voice acting and moronic reactions to everything, but I'm not gonna complain too much about that now, 'cause not only were the environments atmospheric, the enemies were challenging without being cheap. It's as if entirely different people designed and balanced the different places in this game.

I've scraped together a few healing items, a decent arsenal of weapons/ammo, but still not enough of either to feel safe, and the enemies are increasing in both strength and numbers. At this point Obscure 2 seems to be doing the whole surivival horror thing reasonably well, and even the occasional puzzle is fairly well made, even if it's not exactly Professor Layton or anything.

There are exceptions though, like the lock-picking, which features what must be among the very worst Wii Remote implementations out there. You see a cross-section of the lock on the screen, and have to try and line up the bars inside in such a way that you can get your lockpick to other side of the lock. So far so good. Problem is, you aim the lockpick with the IR pointer, and insert the damn thing by moving the Wii Remote closer to the sensor bar. It's bad enough that you have to shove your arm forward to make something go from left to right, but since the IR's sensitivity changes depending on how far from the sensor it is, the potential for cocking up is limitless, and when you move the pointer too far away from where it needs to be, your character pulls the lockpick out and you need to start again.

Overall though, good day.

So I got back to ZombiU. I played a few hours and I lost my first survivor. I was heading towards the Tower of London and there was a field full of zombies. And I ran past most of them and into an exploding zombie. So with my next survivor I got through that part and then went for some fuel which leads me to looking for antibiotics now. Oh yeah I also lost my second survivor very stupidly. I had some high ground on a whole group of zombies so I threw a flare to get them together. And then I tried to throw a Molotov but I guess it hit the railing that was right in front of me and I died. I tried it again with a grenade and that worked fine.

@r_hjort

I think that's what I'm going to do. Did not play any more last night, was too burned out after another long day of work to play anything. May play some more tonight, will depend on how entertaining the late football games are. In any event, I'm planning on playing a lot of the game tomorrow night and hopefully get to a point where finishing it up next week will be manageable. Late night Fatal Frame will be interesting either way...

Glad to see Obscure 2 has turned around for you. It's tough to keep playing a game when it feels like punishment. Interesting in hearing how the rest of the game goes for you. I overlooked this game during the early Wii years, but it may be something to check out down the road.

@TheBigG753
I think the biggest issues I have with Obscure 2 would have been resolved if I had forced someone to play it with me, like I imagine the devs intended. It was alright at first, got really frustrating for weird reasons in the middle, and where I am now (think it's close to the end) it's alright again. If you can find a co-op buddy to argue over the equipment with, it might be a good choice.

@gojira
You've got fun parts of the game coming up, IMO! I almost did the same thing with a molotov, btw, back in Brick Lane flats. The collision detection for the throwables seems pretty exact, for better and for worse.

@gojira

Man, you zoomed right past me. I had to stop reading and I'm on my way to look for the fuel too.. tonight!

Phew! You can add Obscure 2 to the completed pile!

The final stretch was handled pretty well, including the final boss. It contained some of my least favourite gameplay aspects, but still felt alright. This game is such a mixed bag, it never really scared me, and I'm so glad I've got it over with, but at the same time, it did have its moments. There are definitely a few horror games one should check out on Wii before this one, and especially if you're gonna play on your own, but it's not all bad.

Take the soundtrack, for instance! It's worthy of a much better game than it was written for. Just listen to the theme song! Really, give it a listen!

If that ain't some truly epic shit right there, I don't know what... I'll eat tomorrow.

Now onto the truly scary stuff! Project Zero 2/nervous breakdowns, here I come!

@r_hjort

Got a BALLPARK (a range would be best and most avoiding of possible spoilers) on how many hours I have left? I gotta figure out what kinda checkpoints I gotta hit tonight. I only have like 2 more nights after tonight that I can play (playing tomorrow night, too).

@Mr_Mustache
It's kind of hard to say how many hours since we might not play at the same pace, and there are actually some optional parts of the game that one of us may have done whereas the other didn't. How many hours have you played for right now?

Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon is in the books. Very solid game that I had fun with. Still don't like the structure of the game, though. Pulling me out every time I finished a mission was annoying, particularly since sometimes I hadn't found the Boo yet and I would have stayed to look for him if given the option. But really, I'm not sure why they needed missions at all. I don't really see why each mansion couldn't have been an open world that you can do what you please in, but obviously with scripted events that match the missions. Maybe it's something to do with hardware limitations. Yet another reason this game should have been on the Wii U!

@Mr_Mustache
Since I gotta go to bed, I'm just gonna shoot from the hip here. You could have as few as five hours left, or as many as ten. This might be totally inaccurate, but hey.

@r_hjort

Somewhere between 9 and 15.

Thanks for the guess, I'll update where I am later.

Woot woot! Beat Zombies Ate My Neighbors LEGIT today. Only took me three tries starting over from the last continue password. The level you start at with the password has a decent amount of weapons and items to pick up, but it's also a level with ants so they can take off with the items and carry them to their holes. But I finally got a lucky run where I was able to pick up a whole bunch of items. And I also got the last boss, Dr. Tongue, stuck in a dumb loop pattern when he was on his head form so I was able to kill him fairly easily. (But his spider form still took most of my lives.)

So yeah, G, you can switch that beat date to 10/26 if you want.

Starting Fatal Frame IV tonight in about an hour and a half. I'll post a link to my stream when I start in case anyone here wants to watch.

Sorry for the double post but Fatal Frame IV stream is a go: twitch.tv/het_nkik