Horror and video games have always gone hand in hand, scaring millions of players around the world with tense atmosphere, horrific creatures and the fear of knowing that there could be a monster around every corner. While the games were once thought to be largely made for adults, modern horror games have undergone an unusual transformation over the past decade. The medium has been overwhelmed with children, which has resulted in the emergence of many similar types of games that appeal to that target audience. While not necessarily good or bad, this change in the modern horror game landscape is both strange and fascinating.
Horror games have always existed and have always been relatively popular. Historical titles like Resident Evil and Silent Hill defined the genre with their foreboding atmospheres and variety of creepy monsters. One of the first major changes in the genre came in 2010 with the release of Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It was praised not only for its atmosphere, but also for its restraint. Instead of constantly bombarding the player with monsters and chases, there were few encounters with enemies. The game often scared the player with the threat of a monster, rather than someone coming out to chase them.
Most importantly, Amnesia proved that independent horror games can be very successful. This was – in large part – due to the rising popularity of video game playback on YouTube. Many YouTubers entertained their audiences at the time with videos from Amnesia, allowing others to experience the game without actually playing it. Amnesia was a huge success because of this and it inspired many modern horror games to come after. Its success may have even inspired the video game that would come to define the modern horror genre: Five Nights at Freddy’s.
The Creation of Five Nights at Freddy’s
Created in 2014 by independent game developer Scott Cawthon, Five Nights at Freddy’s morphed from a minor cult game to an internet sensation that seemingly overnight. The gameplay was based on the same philosophy as Amnesia, with the player keeping an eye on the murderous Chuck E. Cheese-esque animatronics over security cameras. The fears were rare, but the fear of knowing you could be scared at any moment made them all the more effective.
Like Amnesia, Five Nights at Freddy’s attracted a huge audience thanks to YouTubers. This is perhaps the main reason why Five Nights at Freddy’s primary audience is children. YouTubers often filled their videos with bombastic thumbnails and overreactions that attracted a younger audience. The game was terrifying, but there was nothing so grotesque that kids couldn’t watch it. It was based on a childish idea – animatronic restaurant characters – but gave it a dark twist.
All of these components made Five Nights at Freddy’s hugely successful, with sequels, books, spin-offs, toys, and all sorts of official merchandise. The extreme success of the game also influenced a number of imitation and fan games; it wouldn’t be far off to say that the game has single-handedly redefined horror. These imitations also made some odd quirks, originally unique to Five Nights at Freddy’s, so ubiquitous in horror games that they can now be considered standards for the genre.
The rise of trend chasing in horror games
The most obvious quirk is appealing to children. Many horror games based on Five Nights at Freddy’s, such as Bendy and the Ink Machine, Poppy Playtime, and Tattletail, have the same idea and theme. They focus on dilapidated children’s attractions and murderous toys and try to entice the same audience with different ideas, especially by not showing anything too creepy for children. The plots often contain mature ideas such as murder, but rarely show anything on screen that would deter their primary audience.
Likewise, the plots tend to draw on aspects that made Five Nights at Freddy’s popular. These modern horror games tend to have veiled, almost nonsensical plots, with the story instead being hidden in so-called ‘deep lore’, forcing players to play the game continuously, finding hidden secrets and even outside of the game itself. to find out the true conspiracy. This forces ongoing engagement and interest by increasing the game’s playtime and flooding the internet with theories as to what the true story might be.
Perhaps the strangest trend to emerge from these Five Nights at Freddy’s-inspired games is the obsession with becoming a franchise. The aforementioned Bendy and the Ink Machine and Poppy Playtime had official merchandise before the projects were complete. Hello Neighbor, yet another survival horror derivative game, also forced its way into a book and merchandise franchise, despite being very poorly received when it came out.
This trend chasing isn’t a new phenomenon in video games, but it’s been around for so long that it’s starting to look less like a trend and more like what modern horror games are now. While lovers of this formula should be thrilled, others may be disappointed by the lack of originality. This obsession with bringing in a prepubescent fanbase and releasing merchandise as quickly as possible can certainly be off-putting, and make developers seem more interested in making quick bucks than making something truly awesome. Not only that, but new trends in horror games tend to wear themselves out quickly because of this trend chase; this can be seen with the concept of liminal spaces, another idea that has oversaturated the market.
The landscape of modern horror games cannot be classified as good or bad; while the lack of originality can be frustrating, it’s good that independent developers are finding ways to make money. At the same time, it has pushed horror games into a strange situation where obsessive trend-chasing and fixation on making money tend to drown out original ideas. Above all, children are fickle and their tastes can change overnight. Since developers of modern horror games have to meet their demands to survive, these games could stay that way for a long time or change completely tomorrow.
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