Videogames Make Better Horror Than Movies?

Wired author Clive Thompson has up an article stating that, with today's jaded audiences, videogames are more effective horror-conveyances than movies. Thompson argues that the removal of the fourth wall, placing the player directly into the story, overcomes the obstacles movie-makers face when telling a scary story. "I'll start down a corridor, hear something freaky up ahead, then freeze in panic. Maybe if I stay quiet the monster will go away? S^!t, maybe it's already headed this way, and I should move! But if I move the monster will hear me ... so maybe I should stay quiet ... gaaaaah! Games already seem like dream states. You're wandering around a strange new world, where you simultaneously are and aren't yourself. This is already an inherently uncanny experience. That's why a well-made horror game feels so claustrophobically like being locked inside a really bad -- by which I mean a really good -- nightmare." Do you agree? Is your favorite scary tale a movie ... or a game? (Silent Hill, I'm looking at you.)

Comments

no

[jollyreaper]

The thought of playing a video game in no way fills me with the same sense of horror as the thought of watching a Uwe Boll movie based on the game.

Re:no

[Skevin]

Actually, video games lately have proved to provide much better horror than movies.

I bought a game recently, with which, my first scare was that it required me to install Steam on my box. I broke out in a cold sweat as it quietly inserted its own root kit and changed several registry entries that an unprivileged user could not otherwise touch. I was kept at the edge of my seat every time it phoned home, and I could only guess who it may have been calling. By the time the lawyers were knocking down my door to subpoena my entire neighborhood for illegally downloading music of bands we've never heard of, of a genre we don't even listen to, I was a gibbering mess. Now that I'm being assumed guilty until I prove my innocence, I'm pretty well horrified well beyond what any movie could do*.

Solomon

*This account is satire only, but it could be true for anyone else living in any small US community.

Don't pick up that gun!

[Dr. Eggman]

You know a demon's going to teleport into the closet when you do! Video games just provide a better environment for horror. Yes, the whole forth wall thing, but also the environment you play in. You often play them alone, in a dark room. You choose how long the suspense lasts before you pickup that gun. In the end, however, you do pickup the gun... and when nothing happens; it gets worse because the environment didn't react the way you expected. Until you turn around of course.

It can be better

[pthor1231]

Video games can be much more effective, if the player actually gets immersed in the game. Maybe it could also be that horror video games are a relatively new thing compared to horror films. Once you have seen the one millionth horror movie preview, you are like, sure, whatever, it will be boring because the same shit happens. Maybe video horror games will reach that point eventually. Also, obligatory PA reference:

http://penny-arcade.com/comic/1999/09/29

Re:No.

[WilliamSChips]

But take a good scary movie like Jaws where it's based on real places with real creatures and real situations, and it can be incredbly powerful Marty McFly: "The shark still looks fake!"

Re:Absolutely.

[TopShelf]

There's just no CG replacement for the human imagination.

A few minutes ago, my low-level @ just rounded a corner and say a host of red a's headed right for him. Backpedaling and missile weapons bought some time, but soon the biting started, the ! began exploding and the ?'s were burning, until the dreaded ASCII tombstone appeared. The horror... the horror...

Re:Absolutely.

[FlopEJoe]

You could have at least put a M rating or warning on this post! Now who's gonna rock me to sleep tonight??!?