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

URL to share (right click and copy)

@r_hjort

I'm just taking my time, putzing along. I WOULD like to try the Survival Mode someday when I get some confidence. I'm a little worried about that early blitz you face in your Safe House Area though. Lost 3 good people that day..

@Mr_Mustache
That part ate one or two survivors of mine the first time too, but after having played through the whole game I think you will have developed enough survival skills to be able to take that on without too much trouble. That's the good news. The bad news is that there are worse situations in the game. Much worse.

@r_hjort

Yeah, I don't think I realized back then how much of an advantage you have while they're crawling over a barricade or something. Now I actively retreat to a solid position (not like I wasn't backtracking before, but yeah). I've also got the hang of running a little bit, too. I was dogmeat yesterday, but got myself out of a situation that I should've died in. Woo, running!

@Mr_Mustache
Yeah, you definitely look at the surroundings in a different way after a while, and running is definitely an option! I was kind of late with experimenting with some of the weapons, getting to know them properly, and that caused me some trouble too.

I played a few more hours of Fatal Frame tonight, and I'm a little ways into the second chapter. I'm happy (or frightened) to report that the game continues to get scarier, more suspenseful and more disturbing as it goes along.

During my first night playing the game, though I really liked the game's atmosphere and the exploration aspect, things felt pretty predictable with respect to the combat and the scares. You only really encountered "enemy" ghosts following a cutscene, so you knew it was coming, and most of the shock scares were from mostly harmless spirits. I'm starting to get the impression that this was by design, to give you some false sense of security. Well, maybe not security per se, but the game might lead you to believe that you could predict what was going to happen, and when.

That hasn't been the case over the past hour or so, as I've been on pins and needles far more often. There are times when the game gets awfully quiet...too quiet, you know? That's when you expect something to happen, and more often than not, it never comes. And then when you aren't expecting it, a ghost will appear out of nowhere to surprise you. And with ghosts taking more damage now and having more evasive maneuvers, the combat has become much more frantic than it was earlier, when you could just snap an easy photo or two. Some spots get really intense, because you know a ghost is there (and the in-game sound can give you a clue of which direction it is in), but you can't always see it.

And because they can move through walls and sometimes teleport right behind you, I've been doing a lot more running in the third-person rather than staying mostly stationary with the camera held. It's a little bit clunky, in the way that I expected the early versions of RE4 to be (the whole switching from fixed cameras to an aiming angle can be disorienting). But while the whole idea of "well, it's supposed to be that way to induce panic" in a survival horror game sometimes gets poo-pooed for being an apology of sorts for poor controls, there's no denying that it does make each enemy encounter feel much more frantic as a result.

Once again, can't say enough about how much I want to continue playing the game into the night. I love the sense of exploring the next area of the mansion, and unraveling the next piece of the mystery. I think I'm starting to maybe figure out where the plot is heading. Some of the game's files mention a few kids went missing some time ago, allegedly snatched by ghosts. One girl was returned, with no memory of what happened, and her parents also went missing around the same time and were not found. I'm guessing that girl is who I'm playing as, and the other kids that were taken are the benevolent spirits that are helping you out in the mansion. That's the direction that I think this is going in, but we'll see if any part of that theory ends up holding true.

But man, all of that stuff with ropes. Very disturbing.

I caught up to the guy that wants you to find a book in ZombieU. I'm still stressed about losing stuff, but since I'm playing on easy the frustration of dieing is gone.

@gojira

We're at EXACTLY the same place now. --You don't get killed on Easy??

EDIT- I'll probably progress on Thursday Night. Try not to get too far ahead!!

Finished the second chapter of Fatal Frame tonight. Getting into real blood-chilling territory. The haunted-ness of the mansion continues to escalate, with more and more noises and whispers (on occasion, subtle to the point where you aren't sure if you really heard it or not) and objects moving around. As the game goes along, it's becoming more and more suspenseful on a moment-to-moment basis. Some parts really made my hair stand on end.

There was quite a bit of backtracking in this chapter, which was a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, some of it seemed a bit unnecessary and felt a bit padded out (I could have done without a few "take the picture and go find the clue" puzzles). On the other hand, I think that revisiting a lot of the same areas really establishes a good sense of place for the game's environments, and makes it feel more memorable. And doing a little bit of exploring turned up a few items that really came in handy.

As I continue to upgrade my camera, and get more experience photographing ghosts, I've gotten a lot better at not desperately trying to vanquish a ghost, and instead trying to come up with the best possible photograph (which I've been achieving a lot more lately). It's the trade-off of having to face a creepy, powerful spirit head-on, but ending up getting more XP and further upgrading the camera. This part of the gameplay has been pretty satisfying, especially when I'm noticing how much better I'm getting at taking quality photos.

I'll probably push forward with Chapter 3 tomorrow night.

@Mr_Mustache

You can still die, but I haven't yet. Zombies only take 3 hits from the cricket bat to be killed. I don't know if there's any other differences. There seems to be the same amount of zombies but maybe they deal less damage or something.

Man, the escorting Rebecca mission in Dead Rising 2 was nuts. Here, we'll introduce this gas that makes a bunch of the zombies more fast and powerful and everything and you can barely take them on alone so um... escort this woman who can barely walk all the way across the game world.

ARGH.

@gojira
From what I understand, certain areas have less infected, they are easier to kill in general and also less likely to repopulate areas that you've already cleared out. There's also supposed to be a much higher likelihood of finding ammunition for the guns you have.

@Zero

Now that just sounds cruel!

@gojira
@r_hjort

Hmm. I've gone back to other areas that I've cleared out, and yes, they've been repopulated, but I've only had to deal with one at a time, really. Those frozen? ones in the Palace are scary, and seem to take a lot more damage. I got popped with that spit one time and nearly S my pants.

EDIT- And my next playage is tomorrow night. Looking for about 2 hours worth of stuff..if my heart can take it.

@Mr_Mustache
Was that on normal? Not sure if they're meant to be frozen or what, but they seem to have been insane given their straitjackets. Not sure why that makes them spit, but I don't question them, I mainly try to kill them before they spit at me. They can be absolutely lethal at the right/wrong time.

@r_hjort

They're in straightjackets? I didn't even notice. They have that..dry ice look to them.

@TheBigG753 I know! The first few times I tried it we just got swarmed and they would knock her out of my arms and we would get separated and there was literally nothing left to do but die at that point... way too freaking many of them and they just don't stop coming.

I finally got through it by realizing that, for some reason, most of them won't follow you up ramps (although a few still will) so I used the underground area and ran from ramp to ramp. Even then it was pretty tough, you see a TON of them in front of you and have to kind of draw them all over one way then cut back the other way, find holes in the midst of the swarm. I've said it before and it I'll say it again... zombie games are like football games, same mechanics. Doubly so when you have no weapons, you have to approach them like you would a running play in a football game, just keep moving and find the holes.

The game hasn't been too tough so far (except for a few bosses) but this was the first time I kept checking the map to see where the next save point was so I could save at every possible chance... had to take it one save point at a time...

Mr_Mustache said:

EDIT- And my next playage is tomorrow night. Looking for about 2 hours worth of stuff..if my heart can take it.

Man, I can't wait to hear your impressions on some of the parts later in the game (one area in particular... )

@TheBigG753

How much longer do you think I have? 10-15 hours? 5-10? Egad, 15-20?

Anyone up for Resident Evil: Revelations or RE:Mercs Sunday at 7pm? Get sone pre-Walking Dead zombie killing on.

I'm kinda thinking of playing Castlvania: Lords of Shadow just to have a game that doesn't fill me with tension at just the thought of playing the game.

@Mr_Mustache

I didn't see any straight jackets either. I just noticed the blue glow flowing off of them. They haven't been too much trouble with my handgun. Which because I'm playing on easy and haven't died is leveled up.

I got that book and am now on a trek for another. There's this one part where there's supplies on top of a vehicle. They don't really look reachable, but I thought I could jump (walk off) from a higher level and reach them. I almost died. That would've pissed me off.

I like the new upgrade for the scanner. It's much more useful now. Although I didn't quite follow the other thing you got. The syringe.

I'm also running out of room back at my safe house. I guess I should be using more stuff.

@vids

Are we talking Revelations on the WiiU? I have both versions, but I've hardly touched the WiiU version.