The Last of Us, Story Layers and A Brief History of Action

Games
By Thomas Grip on 07/05/13 04:29:00 am

This was orginally posted on the official Frictional Games blog.

I have now finished playing The Last of Us and feel it has quite a
few things worth discussing. Overall it is a great game and there is a
lot that can be learnt from it. Especially noteworthy are the nerve
wrecking encounters. When at its best they top even the ones in
Resident Evil 4 (2005), which I think features some of the best
action gameplay ever. It also manages to use just about every trick
in the book to tell its story. It is a very solid package and masterfully
crafted. At the same time, while wrapped in an emotional plot, it is
really just a game about combat and part of, what I think is, a
worrying trend in video game storytelling.

Before The Last of Us can be properly analyzed, we need to go
back to the early days of the game industry. At the beginning of
videogame history, games were just about doing a few simple
actions over and over. These games did not have a recognizable
story as such, but simply provided a rough context for the action.


In Asteroids (1979) the visuals consisted of simplistic line drawings,
but in the mind of the players they controlled a spaceship blasting
incoming chunks of rock. While this thin veneer of story was not
really important for the game as such, it greatly enhanced the
experience. This was clearly shown in early advertisements where
the screenshots are small and concept art showing off this fantasy
takes up most of the space.


For the remainder of this article I will refer to this extra high-level
concept as the story layer. This essentially refers to any part that
does not directly support the core gameplay but is there only there
to add an extra sense of purpose and narrative. Important to note is
that the gameplay can still incorporate parts of the game's story; all
of the narrative experience does not reside in the story layer.

While these high level concepts were (and often still are) very
simplistic, it is pretty clear that they are essential. There are very few
games that do not share this quality and just go 100% abstract.
Even a weird game like pacman has some form of story layer to it.


This slowly gave rise to storytelling in action games. Rudimentary
plots were added, for instance a summary of the background story
at the start, and this eventually expanded to cutscenes in between
the levels. The extra story content was not connected to the
gameplay as such but simply provided context and rewards. But
while it did not directly influence the gameplay in any meaningful
way, cutscenes and an explicit plot could still improve the feel of the
game.


The biggest evolution in storytelling came from Another World
(1991) where the story layer and gameplay fit almost flawlessly into
one another. No longer were the narrative elements superficial, but
instead carefully ingrained with the gameplay. Actions that were
made in gameplay smoothly transitioned into a cutscene and vice
versa. The interactive scenarios were also carefully designed in
order to make sense in the games story. Despite this tight coupling,
it is important to point out that the focus of all gameplay segments
was still about challenge and "fun". The game contained a number
of mechanics and each section tested the player's skill in one or
more of these. While the non-interactive plot elements improved the
experience, they were still not crucial. Were the story layer to be
taken way, the gameplay sections would still work fine in their own
right .


Another World was a ahead of its time and it took a lot of years
before the rest of the industry got up to speed. But when it did, the
idea to close the gap between the gameplay and story layer really
caught on. Earlier, the story layer had mostly been seen as an extra,
but ultimately superfluous, feature. But it rose in prominence, and
was seen as increasingly crucial. Along the way, a host of new ways
to add a story layer emerged. The audio logs from System Shock
(1994), in-game cutscene from Half Life (1998) and the omnipresent
narrator from Portal (2007) are probably the most important ones. All
of these provided tools to merge the two conflicting elements. Along
the way, the complexity and maturity of the story layers increased as
well.

Even though modern action games now come with a wide variety of
stories, the basic format is still the same as in the early days. The
player is given a narrow set of mechanics that needs to be skillfully
used in order overcome the challenges provided. On top of this is an
extra narrative wrapping, the story layer, that helps shape the
experience into something more meaningful. This is a recipe that
most recent high profile games use, including Dead Space (2008),
Uncharted (2007), Tomb Raider (2013), Halo 4 (2012), Portal 2
(2011), Bioshock (2007), and many more.

Here is where The Last of Us comes in; it is the latest step in this
evolution. It is probably also the game that, so far, managed marry
the gameplay and the story layer most elegantly. This makes it into
an emotional journey, but it is crucial to remember its pedigree. It is
still an action game with an additional story layer.


Just like a number of recent games with narrative ambitions, e.g.
Spec Ops (2012) and Hotline Miami (2012), it takes the gameplay as
a starting point for the story. This is different from a game like
Uncharted where the high concept came first. In Uncharted's case it
was to replicate an Indiana Jones-like adventure movie. Because of
this, the gameplay's need for constant bloodshed has a hard time
fitting the happenings in the story layer. This caused a very
noticeable discrepancy in the game's narrative, the so called
"ludonarrative dissonance". The game's protagonist would slaughter
hundreds of people and afterwards crack a joke and worry about his
relationships. But in a game like Last Of Us, the violent gameplay is
taken as a given and the whole world shaped accordingly. The
game is set in a story where butchering hundreds of people makes
sense, giving the holistic experience a strong feeling of consistency.

There are still a few problems between of the story layer and the
gameplay, but on the whole the played narrative is quite coherent. It
has been rightly celebrated for doing this, but few voices have been
raised by the troubling development it is part of. If we agree that The
Last of Us represent a high note of videogame storytelling, an
example to follow, then our boundaries for telling stories are very
narrow indeed.


The game has a lot in common with the recent Spec Ops: The Line.
Both feature a dog-eat-dog world, takes place in the destroyed
remains of a city, and have you play as violent and deranged
characters with no qualms about butchering countless people. Both
of these games have also been praised for their mature and
intelligent storytelling. And sure, they both feature deep and nicely
portrayed characters, but what it all really boils down to are neat
ways to justify a lot of violence. If this represent the future of
videogame storytelling, then we are doomed to play as broken,
murderous protagonists living in worlds populated by antagonists.

When faced with the problem of reconciling a character like
Uncharted's Nathan Drake with the massive violence, the proposed
solution is simply to make the character better fit with the killing. I
find this close to giving up on the problem altogether. In a way
games like Uncharted are, despite their gameplay and story layer
discrepancy, much more interesting as they try to be about
something other than raw survival. Embracing that videogames is all
about violence feels very cynical and uninspiring to me.


It is also crucial to keep in mind that the core gameplay has not
changed much over the years. These games are still about doing a
few actions over and over. When these actions do connect to the
story, like they do in both Spec Ops and The Last of Us, it is not so
much because they are proper narrative devices, but that the story
has been shaped to fit with them. The repetitive action is still king,
the need to have a massive body count is still a must. This is not
bad as such, I thought Last of Us was a great action game. But, I
have problems with it being seen as good interactive storytelling, it is
really just good usage of the story layer. This might seem like play of
words, but there is an important aspect to have in mind: Like games
of the past, The Last of Us would have worked very well with its
story layer removed.

When taking a closer look at The Last of Us, its action heritage is
quite evident. It is very clear that at the core lies a straightforward
game about looting, sneaking and killing enemies. Here are a couple
of examples:

The goal of the player is always to go forward to a place
highlighted early on. Once there, a cutscene takes over and
reminds you of your next goal. It is basically a modern
incarnation of the the ancient "walk left to right"-mechanic.
Every non-combat challenge of the game is a combination of a
few simple elements: ladders, planks, pushable dumpsters,
floating pallets and generators, all used in predictable and
streamlined ways. This is typical of what you see in old actions
games; there are a few well tested puzzle devices that gets
reused throughout the game.
During gameplay, NPCs turn into combat objects and are
streamlined to support the action above everything else. This
is evident in how they do not affect your ability to sneak, can
stand a lot more damage than the protagonist, have infinite
ammo supplies, etc.
The game features plenty of looting and crafting which is just a
revamp of what we have seen in Dead Space, Resident Evil 4,
and many more. It is there to give the player something to do
when going through the world and is used as a way to provide
more variety to the combat.
Environments where combat encounters occur are almost
always crafted in such a way that it is possibly to know that a
fight will ensue long before it actually happens. Strategically
scattered bottles, carefully placed cover spots and early
depots of ammo are among the things that hint that the game
is now all about making sure the core mechanics of an
encounter work.
There is more that can be pointed out here, but I think this is
enough. The takeaway is that this is the core of the game; all of
these elements are what sum up the game's underpinnings and
what provides the central experience. I think it is an incredibly
important point. Before we speak of the game as some highpoint in
storytelling we must realize where it comes from - it is an old
fashioned action game. And if we do not realize this, we will be stuck
in a dead end, because there is not much in terms of storytelling that
can be done with this. The Last of Us probably represent as far as
you can go with stories that are based on this foundation.


This is when things get interesting. We can now see that the
emotional narrative is not part of core gameplay, but comes from a
totally different direction. Here The Last of Us has a lot that can be
learned from and be inspired by.

First of all, the game uses just about every trick in the book to get
the story across outside of the cutscenes. And not only that, pretty
much every one of these elements has an excellent implementation:
Notes. The game feature scattered diaries, audio logs,
manifests, letters and more, almost all of which have
believable content and placement. They also have great length
so they feel very fluent to pick up and read through.
Overheard conversation. This can either come from hostiles in
combat situations or from the characters in one of the few non-
violent section with other people. They are effectively used
both to convey the state of the world and to give more
information about the characters.
In-game cutscenes. In a few areas, events takes place as you
walk past them. For instance, at one location the military can
be seen rounding up infected people. And if you go in for a
closer look, the armed personnel act accordingly and push you
away. This makes the scene feel alive instead of becoming
some kind of carnival ride (as was the case Bioshock: Infinite
(2013), for instance). What I also think makes them work is
that the game use these events sparingly and make sure they
happen in appropriate places. For instance, in the above
military scene it makes perfect sense why the player cannot
get close to the civilians.
Artifacts. Various artifacts can be picked up that tell something
about the world. These are things like maps, dog tags, photos,
etc. All help to build up setting and are lot easier to fit in than
notes (which easily feel contrived).
Protagonist and partner banter. As you walk through the
environment there are conversations back and forth between
the protagonist and his partner (for most of the game a
teenage girl). This is also one of the few places where some of
the responsibility is placed on the player. Once a conversation
starts, the protagonist can be made to go off in whichever way;
it is up to the player to act in a way that makes sense.
Because of this a lot more and varied content can be put in
these dialogs.
Graffiti and billboards. Here and there, texts are placed on the
walls that help explain what has happened to a place or to just
give some more texture to the environment. Survivors scratch
words of warning, a settlement have lists rules and so forth.
Environments. The environments themselves is a great source
of the storytelling. Abandoned homes, fortified warehouses,
etc, all help to build up the world the game takes place in and
tell the story of what has occurred.
None of these are new or revolutionary tricks, but they are put
together really well and are never overused. It is so easy to just use
one trick for everything, but Last of Us show restraint and use its
devices where appropriate. Much of the time these devices work in
tandem and that is when they really shine. A common example is
walking around in a derelict building while the characters comment
on the surroundings and notes found; this really increase the sense
of presence and feeling of being inside a narrative.

One has to have in mind that the world of Last of Us fits perfectly for
the above devices, but there is no inherent problem with using them
in just about any sort of story. Also noteworthy is that, apart from the
overheard conversations, the narrative devices have very little
connection to the core gameplay; they are all part of the story layer.
It is incredible how many elements that make up this layer now.
What began as a simple intro text or just a painted image is now a
large collection of systems. While the story layer was once a fragile
structure, merely having a supportive role, it is now so complex that
is can pretty much stand on its own. In fact, that is just what it does
a few times in The Last of Us. And it is now that we enter the really
intriguing territory. We have now come to a point in the evolution of
videogames where a once upon nonessential element has gotten
enough substance to branch off and become something in its own
right.


The best example of this is The Last of Us' opening. Here the player
takes on the role as a young girl who finds herself home alone while
it becomes increasingly apparent that something terrible is
happening in the outside world. Just about all interactions here has
something to do with the story and minor details like the girl's
animations help set the scene. It features just about all the narrative
devices mentioned above and uses them to tell the player a story
through play.
The opening is also a good showcase for how and when to use
cutscenes. I normally see the goal with interactive storytelling is to
let the player play from start to finish. However, in order to play
certain parts properly you need to be in the right mood and have
certain background information. The opening cutscene helps
establish just that, and makes the gameplay so much more effective.
While I still feel that cutscenes should be used sparingly, I am
thinking more and more that it is wrong to dismiss them entirely.
Many interactive scenes are not just possible to jump right in to, but
require some kind of setup. Many times this setup is just not
possible to play through, and needs to be carefully directed. In these
cases a cutscene is required and lets the player play through a
scenario that would not be possible otherwise. I think the main rule
is just to make sure that the interactive part is where the engaging
actions occur. The cutscene should not be the main attraction, it's
role is merely to be there as support. It is also worth mentioning that
the opening cutscene works so well because it happens at the start
of the game; the player has not become used to being in charge yet
and is much more willing to be passive.



The next great story layer sequence is the deer hunting scene. Here
you are hunting a deer in order to get food. The first arrows are not
enough to bring it down, so you need to find it again and take
additional shots. As you are doing this, you will eventually figure out
that the best way to find it again is to follow its tracks. Having hit it
once the deer will also leave a trail of blood, making tracking easier.
While following the wounded animal you will eventually find yourself
right outside a previously unseen building, the deer lying dead
nearby. By letting you track the deer, the game has managed to lead
you into finding a new location all on your own. This transition is
really awesome and great way to progress the story simply by
playing.
One could argue that this scene use the combat system and
therefore part of the core gameplay, but I argue that is not really
correct. It does use some combat mechanics, but the scene itself
contain none of the dynamics of an enemy encounter. Therefore I
think it is okay to say that this is scene is almost purely part of the
story layer.

The final sequence I want to discuss is the giraffe scene. Like the
previous scene, it is quite simplistic but extremely effective. It starts
with the protagonist's companion, the teenage girl Ellie, getting
excited over something she has seen and then running off. This
starts sets up a mystery, and gets the player curious over what it is
she has spotted. She continues to run ahead of you, seeing the
mystery object more times and getting increasingly excited. You run
after her, but are never able to get a peek of what it is she is seeing.
Finally you come to an opening and see that what she spotted is a
herd of giraffes. It all ends with a serene scene as the couple watch
the herd walk among a city block overtaken by trees. The build-up
and final comes together very nicely.
Worth mentioning is that part of the power comes from all the
hazards you have had to face earlier, but I do not see that as
evidence that the core gameplay played an important part. These
hazards could just as well have been made using other techniques.
The scenes I have described takes up a tiny part of the The Last of
Us. Most of the game is about combat, looting and solving repetitive
puzzles, elements that you are expected to find in a classical action
game. But these sequences and a few others shows that there is
much more to this medium than repeating a core gameplay
mechanic. The truly poignant and yet fully playable moments of this
game is a testament to this.

So when talking about how well The Last of Us does storytelling, it is
not productive to discuss how consistently it manages to merge its
gameplay and story layer. I hope to have shown that this is a dead
end. What is important are the other things, the elements that used
to be fluff but has now become a force to be reckoned with on its
own. There is a lot to learn from The Last of Us, but it is important
that we look in the right places. It might be an classical action game
at heart, but also contain elements that show the way forward.

Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_of_Us
In case you are in need of more info on the game, wikipedia is a
good place to start.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlBrenhzMZI
To get some more insight into the workings of Spec Ops: The Line, I
recommend this Errant Episode. It is an excellent overview of how
the game uses its violence to send a message.

http://frictionalgames.blogspot.se/2013/04/thoughts-on-bioshock-
infinite.html
In case you enjoyed this critique of The Last of Us, you will probably
also like my thoughts on Bioshock Infinite. There is a lot of similar
topics discussed.

Notes:
My history of videogames is a very quick and dirty overview.
For instance some early games like Project Firestarter have
some of the story integration seen in Another World, but I
skipped those in order to make it a bit more clear. Also, many
of these early games never really caught on and did not have
nearly as much influence as the games I mention. I would
have liked to do a more in depth article on the history of
violence and storytelling in games, but not sure I will have the
time in the near future, so this will have to do for now.
Once the story layer got more prominent the discussion about
"story" versus gameplay started to grow. Many people thought
that the extra story segment was really distracting and that
games should only focus on the core gameplay instead. I
cannot recall this discussion ever being about the incoherence
between the two, but simply that the extra story elements were
not very engaging. It took a lot longer for the idea to pop up
that there was a sort of friction between the story layer and the
gameplay.
It was not until the story layer had grown quite a bit until the
idea of "ludonarrative dissonance" was brought up. First
coined by the Far Cry 2 (2008) lead designer Cliff Hocking,
the core issue that it address is that the storytelling layer and
gameplay disagree with one another. This of course has
always been the case, but in a game design equivalent of the
uncanny valley, it did not become apparent until the gap was
small enough. So while the problem is true, the whole idea is
kind of a truism. The gameplay and story layer has always
been separate elements, and are conflicting in their very
nature. I am not really a big fan of the term, as I think it is a bit
backwards way of thinking. If the goal is to do interactive
storytelling, all is already lost once you start dividing gameplay
and narrative into different categories.
As I played The Last of Us, it also hit me that sometimes
cutscenes work best when you there is no need for interaction.
First of all, it makes the project so much easier to manage.
Scenes with extensive dialog often require quite a lot of
preparation and if they are to be highly interactive, then there
is a constant need for tweaking. If the interaction is very simple
(like button mashing), or not present at all, then you can
evaluate these bits of the game at a much earlier stage and
save a lot of headache.
It may also be good for the narrative if the player does not
have anything to do during certain sections. In most cases a
real life dialog is not a very active experience as many
utterances come almost automatically. So not having much for
the player to do might actually feel more natural. Also, if the
player is forced to perform actions then it might detract their
attention from what is being said. So instead of trying to make
the dialogs highly interactive, it might be better to just make
sure they are short and keep them free from gameplay.
This is actually an approach that we are taking with our new
Super Secret Project. We scrapped many of the more wild
initial approaches because they were too hard to do and often
made dialogs less engaging.

An Investigation into the Effects of Horror Games
By Darren McKettrick on 09/09/13 12:30:00 pm
Introduction
It isnt what you see, but what you cant see. Its the suggestion; the
subtle teasing of the subconscious; the lonely creaking of the
floorboard resonating throughout an empty hallway; the slow
advance around the corner; the swelling sense of dread as the ever-
present evil looms near refuses to reveal itself. Fear is not an
adrenaline rush. Its that helpless feeling of be alone in the dark.
[Fahs, 2008]
This introduction to Travis Fahs Alone in the Dark Retrospective
illustrates the direction of this project. The horror genre has featured
in games since its creation. Going back to the text based game Zork
(1980) a section of the game had the player stumbling around a dark
cave scared of being eaten by a Grue, a situation no one had
experienced before in a game. Horror games then continued to be
produced, including The Lurking Horror (1987), Alone in the Dark
(1992), Resident Evil (1996), Silent Hill (1999), F.E.A.R (2005),
Dead Space (2008 and Slender (2012). Horrors present a new
challenge to players after years of game where the player must
learn new fighting skills; horrors required the player to escape from
the threat.
Horror games are interesting to analyze for several reasons. In
terms of emotional content, horrors can affect almost every emotion
possible raging from disgust to happiness, suspense and fear to
relief. The emotional effects of horror can be seen as suspense, fear
and worry, further studies suggests that horrors relies on monsters
creating a feeling of horror and disgust.
This Dissertation will examine:
How players are affected by horror games - do their hearts
start being faster, do they move about more, do they run from
the room terrified
The psychology behind horror games why are you afraid?
Which factors within horror game create the biggest scare it
is the atmosphere or enemies that make a player terrified or is
it the relationship with the character
Definition
The aim of this project is to investigate how players are affected by
horror games, and which factors within these games create the
greatest scare from the player.
The Oxford Dictionary definition of scare is: 1 cause great fear or
nervousness. 2 a sudden attack of fright.[i]
The purpose of this project is, therefore, to investigate how horror
games can cause the player to be scared.
Aims and Objectives
Research
At the research stage of the project, multiple sources will be viewed
which will show the creation process behind horror games, the
effects of horror games on people, the psychology behind the genre
and how to improve horror games.
A number of critically acclaimed horror games will be played and
examined to determine why they are rated as some of the best
games of all time.

After all the research has been completed, it will be split into two
different sections. The two sections are: Atmosphere and
Psychological. The atmosphere section will detail the aspects that
create a sense of dread and terror from the environment, sounds
and non playable characters. The psychological section will examine
the elements that are left to the players imagination.
The aim of this stage is to gather information that can be used in the
creation of horror games. This information can also be used by the
game industry for the creation and improvement of horror games or
any other game where it could be applicable.
Testing
The testing section will require a number of participants to play
several horror games. This experiment will be used to find the
factors within the horror games that produce the biggest scares for
the player.
Research
The research section will focus on what makes horror games scary
and the psychology behind horror games. After both sections have
been researched and detailed, they will be split into two further
sections which are: Atmosphere and Psychological. These two
sections will reveal how each element can be used.
What makes a horror game scary This section will look into the
methods that are used within a game to scare the player. This could
be the music that is used, where the game takes place or how
combat is dealt with in the game.
Atmosphere This section will detail which methods are used to
create an atmosphere in a game. For example how the audio track
could consist of a heartbeat, beating faster as the character gets
closer to an objective.

Psychological This section will examine the methods that will
alter the players mental state. This could be done be the player
thinking that they are being chased by an enemy when there is
actually nothing chasing them.
The psychology behind horror games This section will describe
why a player feels the emotions they do when playing a horror
game. For example, how the player feels empathy if a character is
being chased by a monster and so will feel afraid as well.
Critically acclaimed horror games This section will be a review
of horror games which have been noted to be some of the best
horrors created.
What makes horror games scary?
Ambiguity In horrors it is the things that are left unsaid that will
engage the players imagination. The player must be guided through
key areas and key points of information, but they should have a
hunch that something just isnt right. For example, the introduction of
Silent Hill 2 makes the player walk to the town. The area is covered
in a thick fog so the player cannot see if there is anything in front of
them until it is too late, and while walking, all the player can hear is
the characters footsteps, a minimal sound track and occasional
sounds as if a dog is running near the character and
growling. However, the player encounters no enemies, but because
of the audio and visuals the player is put on edge.
Dont show; persuade the player to scare themselves.
Strong Sense of Place Within horrors there is a wide array of
places that the player will instantly understand as a dangerous and
spooky, for example abandoned schools, hospitals and hotels. If
there is a safe place within the game, this should not be used by
the player as a hub or base, but as a place for them to cower in a
corner and to contemplate the next horror. But if there is a place that
the player must return to again and again, it is more terrifying when
something about it changes. In the game Silent Hill 4 the player is
given a home which they leave and come back to throughout the
game. As the game progresses, the room becomes vulnerable
because enemies have the ability to invade it.
Within a horror game no place is safe.
Subtle changes to the environment When something becomes
routine within a horror game then it is not a horror anymore because
the player knows what will happen. But if minor changes are made
they can both excite the players curiosity and increase their fear. If
the game is taking place within one building then items should
slowly start to disappear, the music should change while
progressing through the story, and if the character can receive
messages they should eventfully become warnings that make very
little sense.
The player must never feel as if they have mastered the
environment.
Relationship with the Protagonist This is essential. Most horror
games use empathy as the emotion of choice so that the player
feels for the hero, and will fear for the characters safety. But other
kinds of emotional relationships can be used to create more
opportunities to unsettle the player. In the video game Haunting
Grounds, the player is cast as a powerless young girl who can only
run from the cultists who are chasing her. This makes the game
more frightening as the player often experiences distress at the girls
circumstances. However, in the game Spec Ops: The Line, the
player takes the role of Captain Martin Walker. Walker is a soldier
who can defend himself, so the player should not fear for his safety.
But the game forces the players choices and the degree to which
the mental condition of Walkers mind deteriorates, to express
horror. During one scene in the game the player is given a weapon
which can cause massive destruction, and told to use it against their
enemies. But after doing so, the player learns that there is an
unexpected consequence to what they have done. When the scene
was being focus tested, after the players had realized what they had
done, they were pausing the game and leaving the room.[ii] This
shows that both the player and the character are experiencing some
of the same emotions about what they have done within the game,
because the player who was controlling the character was oblivious
to the consequences of their actions.
Fear Must Have a Purpose Fear must be grounded within
something real. All emotions are personal. Fear should be made
personal by linking it to something that is mundane.
It should bring the fear home for the player.
Human Interaction Bringing a human drama into a horror will
deepen the players emotional attachment to the characters.
However, simulating a human being within a game is a difficult
problem; this can be overcome with simple actions. For example, in
the game Ico the protagonist must hold a girls hand and guide her
through the game. Without this contact the girl would be lost or
taken by the monsters that are chasing her.
Anticipation Horror games need a sense of anticipation. This
must be drawn out for as long as possible. The player needs to
know, at all times, that something horrible is waiting for them just
around the corner. However, when the horrible thing actually
happens all of the tension is lost. When the player has finally seen
what it is they must face or overcome, something becomes defined
which doesnt need to be feared as much as the being their own
imagination has created.
Combat Combat in horror games should be simple. However, the
player shouldnt have full control over the situation, whether the
enemys behaviour is hard to predict or the character is weaker than
the enemy. Actual combat is not as scary as the implied threat of
combat. If the game does require the player to fight enemies, the
combat should be up close and personal. Defeating an enemy by
shooting them from across the level does not add any sense of fear
because the character is not in any real danger. If ranged weapons
are used, having limited ammo ensures that the player is constantly
afraid that they will run out.
Sound Sound in horror games allows the game to scare the
player even before they see an enemy. It also creates atmosphere
and in some cases a build up of tension. The music is usually
composed of long dawn out notes or repeats of harsh sounds mixed
with soothing ones. Some music that is not in horror games can
nevertheless instil a sense of dread in a player. For example, during
the underwater levels in Sonic the Hedgehog, as Sonic started the
run out of oxygen the musics tempo would increase, which would in
turn cause the player to start panicking. Within some horror games
sounds are linked to certain events so that when the player hears
them they will begin to get anxious because of the link they have
made with the sound and the event. For example in Resident Evil 3:
Nemesis, when the player hears the Nemesis theme played, they
start getting nervous because they know that Nemesis is nearby. If a
horror game did not include audio, then it would not be as immersive
or scary. This has been proven by Raymond User who created an
experiment which investigates the importance of audio in computer
games[iii]. In this experiment a number of participants are required
to play a number of games while being monitored for physical
responses. The participants played the games with, and without,
audio. After the experiment was finished, it was discovered that
when playing the game Amnesia: The Dark Descent, there was a
significant difference between the two groups. The group with audio
had a significantly increased heart rate compared to the group with
no audio.
Enemies An enemy in a horror must either be unsettling,
threatening or a combination of both in design. An example of this is
the difference between a Werewolf and the Wolfman. To begin with
they are both wolf based but they focus on different designs. The
Wolfman is a twisted distortion of mankind. When you look at it you
are afraid because you know at one point it was human and
somewhere inside it there still might be a shred of humanity left. You
are terrified because you can put yourself in its shoes and see it
happening to you. On the other hand, the Werewolf has a complete
lack of humanity. It is a pure beast which just follows its instincts
with rage and savagery. It is the unconscious thought of being
haunted by something that will not show mercy and which is doing
this for no peculiar reason other than its own nature. Another way to
scare players in the enemy design is the use of innocence. In
horrors if the enemy has a sign of innocence it will disturb the player.
Innocence is scary for a number of reasons. It shows the fear of a
persons own children performing horrible acts against others,
becoming something hideous, and the fact that most peoples own
moral conscience would stop them from killing something like a
child.
Atmosphere - In the Oxford Dictionary atmosphere is defined as:
the pervading tone or mood of a place, situation, or creative
work[iv]. This section will therefore detail the elements that create a
tone or mood of a horror game. The elements are: - Strong sense of
place, subtle changes to the environment; fear must have a
purpose, combat and sound.
Strong Sense of Place This factor creates a sense of
atmosphere because of the players knowledge that most
horror stories happen in an abandoned hospital, school, hotel
or dark woods.
Subtle Changes to the Environment - As items start to
disappear, the music starts to change and other characters
start acting bizarrely, this will alert the player that something is
not right.
Fear must have a Purpose Something within the game
should relate to the player, whether this is the setting,
characters or story.
Combat Depending on the setting of the game, a character
will have to fight according to it. For example, if the game is
set in the medieval ages the character will have to fight their
enemies with swords or bows.
Sound In the game Max Payne, during a nightmare-like
sequence, the background music is a baby crying and if the
player falls off the maze the baby will start screaming. This
creates a very disturbing section of the game.
Psychological
This section will examine the aspects that affect the players mental
and emotional states. It will examine the elements within a horror
game that will change a players emotional or mental state. The
elements are: - ambiguity, relationship with the protagonist, human
interaction and anticipation.
Ambiguity A horror game should never show what the
enemy looks like at the beginning of the game. This will allow
the player to create their own monster and will have the player
scared at every corner while they wait for an enemy to appear.
Relationship with the Protagonist - By creating a relationship
between the player and protagonist, the player will have an
emotional connection to them and will feel fear when the hero
is in danger.
Human Interaction By having the players character interact
with other characters within the game it will increase the
players attachment to them.
Anticipation Anticipation is the build up of tension. As tension
builds throughout the game the player will become more and
more tense until it can be released.
The Enemies aspect can fit within both sections. It fits into the
Atmosphere because design and look of the enemy could be a
reflection of the environment. For example, Splicers in Bioshock.
Splicers are the citizens of Rapture, due to abusive ADAM
consumption, their minds and bodies are mutated beyond repair and
are dependent on ADAM. It also fits in Psychological because the
enemies could show innocence which would cause the player to be
hesitant when faced with them.
The Psychology behind Horror
Mirror Neurons In the early 1990s, a team of neuroscientists
made the discovery that a certain group of neurons in a monkeys
brain fired when it performed an action and also when it watched
others perform actions.
Mirror neurons are believed to be very important for a humans
ability to empathize with others. Dr Marco Iacoboni says Mirror
neurons are motor cells. That is, they send signals to our muscles to
move our body, make actions, grab a cup of coffee, smile, and so
on. However, they differ from other motor cells because they are
also activated by the sight of somebody elses actions. For
example, a mirror neuron is fired when you reach for a drink, but
also when another person is reaching for a drink. By being active
even when we do not move at all and simply watch other people
moving, they sort of create an inner imitation of actions of others
inside us. [v]
Wondering how exactly this happens, Iacoboni and several others
conducted a study (Carr,Iaconboni and Dubeau 2003).[vi] In this
study they used equipment to monitor the brain activity of subjects
who watched images of faces expressing different emotions. Upon
seeing facial expressions mirror neurons fired, but also the neurons
in the limbic system fired. The limbic system is a portion of the brain
which is related to emotions. So in a way the subjects were actually
feeling the emotions themselves to some degree.
The effect of mirror neurons can be seen in the game The Walking
Dead, because the game frequently shows the player, the faces of
the characters and their facial expressions. Therefore when a
character in the game is angry or disgusted, the mirror neurons in
the player activate as if they are making the expression themselves
and so feel some of the emotions to some degree.
Empathy Empathy is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as the
ability to understand and share the feelings of another.[vii] Empathy
is the ability to understand another persons emotional condition
from their perspective.
The psychologist Mark Davis suggests that there are three types of
empathy. The first is Perspective Taking. This is putting yourself in
anothers shoes. It is used to understand where others are coming
from, but not understanding their emotions.
The second type of empathy is Personal Distress. This is feeling
anothers emotions. For example, while playing a horror game, you
may start to feel scared when the character in the game is being
chased or threatened. This process is called emotional contagion.
Emotional contagion is the process where emotions are treated like
a disease and spread. [viii]
The final type is Empathic concern. This type is what the majority of
people think of when they hear the term empathy. It is the ability to
recognize anothers emotions and understand them.
For an example of this in a game, during one scene in The Walking
Dead the player has the task of giving the last four pieces of food to
a group of ten people, all of whom have not eaten for days. Some of
the characters are children, and one is an old man with heart
disease. Throughout the game the player has made relationships
with all the characters, so the player will feel upset if the people they
do not feed get upset or angry.
Fight or Flight The fight or flight response is a psychological
reaction that happens in the presence of something that is terrifying.
The body will prepare to either fight the threat or flee from it. It is
also noted that this can happen even if the threat is imaginary.
This was first discovered in 1920s by Walter Cannon[ix].Cannon
discovered that animals react to a threat with a general discharge of
the sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system
regulates our internal organs and controls some of the muscles
within the body. So if there is a general discharge of the sympathetic
nervous system it means the body involuntarily takes over and
causes the animal to either flee or fight.
This can seen in horror games in the experiment performed with this
report. When the participants were playing the game Slender, some
of them when seeing the monster for the first time would panic in an
attempt to escape, which in most cases would end up with the
characters death. But the participants that remained calm had a
better chance of escaping.
Research Analysis
It appears from the articles read and games played that it is
important that the Atmosphere must be believable and that the story,
characters and enemies should be a reflection of the protagonists
mental state. For example, in Silent Hill 2 the whole town and its
inhabitants are a reflection of Jamess mental condition.
The setting should be as realistic and believable as possible so that
the player will be immersed into it. For example, Bioshock creates a
whole city which the player can explore. It is believable because
from the audio logs the player can gather they had a sense of what
happened to the city before they arrived and why everyone is crazy.
The enemies in the game should not be easy to defeat. This can be
achieved if they have more amour or health than the player, have
powerful weapons or they are greater in number. This should be
done so that the player does feel fear for the character, however if
the monster can be defeated, then make sure it does not take the
player a long time to do so as they will just get irritated and quit the
game.
Testing
The test will be an experiment. In this experiment a number of
participants will play several horror game levels. During play the
participants heart rate and physical reactions will be recorded and
analyzed. The experiment will take place in a university lecture
room. This was decided because the room had the capabilities to
play the games and it had a black out feature so that the players
would be playing in darkness.
The aims of the experiment are to examine horror games, see if
there are any common features in them that will increase a players
heart rate or cause a physical reaction and to find which elements in
a horror could be classed as the scariest.
The design of the experiment is to identify which elements in a
horror game are scary. This will be determined by the participants
heart rate, physical reactions and the responses from a
questionnaire, which will be completed after the experiment has
finished.
Each participant will be asked before the experiment to fill in a form
(Appendix 1)which will ask them about their previous experience
with horror and if they have played any of the games beforehand.
They must also sign a consent form (Appendix 2). After the
experiment is finished they will again be asked to fill in a form
(Appendix 3). This will ask participants which games they found the
most and least scary and the reasons for this. The participants heart
rate will be measured by a heart rate monitor which will be clipped
onto the players ear or finger. (Appendix 4) Their physical reaction
will be monitored via a video camera with audio recording
capabilities.
The games that will be played for the experiment are Resident Evil
5, Dead Space 2, Silent Hill 3, Bioshock, Slender and Spec Ops:
The Line. Each game has been chosen because they all have
received praise from a number of game reviewers and each creates
horror through different means.
Resident Evil 5 During this game the player must survive while
waiting for a helicopter to destroy a gate blocking their path. The
player will face a large number of enemies and one boss-type
enemy who wields a giant axe. The player starts the game on a hill
which they must descend; the player then enters a house where a
cut scene begins. In this they see another character being executed.
The enemy leading the execution then sees the player and orders
the crowd of people to attack them. The player can then fortify the
building they are in by pushing shelves in front of doors and
windows, and gather ammo from the area. Eventfully the boss-type
enemy destroys a wall of the building allowing other enemies to
enter and the player is allowed to roam a bigger area. The player
must then survive until the helicopter arrives to destroy another gate
so the player can escape. If the character dies, the game is stopped.
This level was chosen to see how players cope with constant attack
from enemies while having nowhere to run.
Dead Space 2 The player must complete the beginning of the
game. During this the character the player is in control of is stuck in
a straight jacket and must flee from enemies who are chasing him.
The game begins with the character being interrogated and
hallucinating. Eventually the character blacks out. When they
awaken they are being released by another person who gets
attacked and starts to mutate in front of them. The player must then
escape. They make their way to an observation area where they are
then grabbed by another character who holds a knife to their throat
but releases them from the straight jacket and directs them to a
locker with items inside. When the character turns around, the other
person then cuts their own throat in front of the player. If the
character dies they will respawn and continue. This section of the
game was chosen to see how players coped with not being able to
fight back against their enemies.
Silent Hill 3 The section of the game chosen is the introduction.
During this the player has no knowledge of where they are or what is
happening, so it is up to the player how they proceed. The player
starts at an entrance of an amusement park where there are a
number of rabbit costumes all with bloody smiles. When the player
leaves this area they go to a retail section where they encounter the
first enemy. The player will eventually reach a rollercoaster and start
to walk down the tracks, only to be met by a cart coming from the
opposite direction. Once the character dies, the game is stopped.
This game has been chosen to see how players cope when there
are no clear instructions on what to do and to see how players cope
with the disturbing and unnatural atmosphere of the game.
Bioshock In this game the player will play the introduction. The
player must navigate the first area of Rapture during which they are
given their first weapons and plasmids and introduced to the
population of Rapture. The game starts with the plane which the
character is aboard crashing into the sea. After finding a light house
with a biosphere inside, the player descends into Rapture. When the
biosphere resurfaces they see another character being killed by a
splicer. The player then makes their way through the level while
fighting a number of enemies. The player can respawn during the
game. This game was chosen because of the atmosphere and how
it creates a believable world.
Slender: The Eight Pages In this game the player must search
dark woods while looking for eight pages and being stalked by
Slender. When the player encounters Slender, static will start to fill
the screen until the only thing the player can see is static and
Slenders face. Slender will only start stalking the player after they
have found the first page; the soundtrack will change to a beating
drum. After finding the second page, short bursts of static will occur.
The player will only have one life while playing. This game was
chosen to see how players dealt with being chased by an entity
which they cannot fight against or reason with.
Spec Ops: The Line The player takes the role of a soldier who
must use a mortar to kill a number of enemies. When all the
enemies have been disabled, the player must then walk through the
carnage they have caused. When they reach a trench they see they
have mistakenly killed a large number of innocents. The player can
respawn during play. This game is not classed as a horror game, but
it was selected because it shows the player the consequences of
their actions, and to see how players cope with killing a large
number of innocents.
The hypothesis for this experiment is that the game Slender: The
Eight Pages will cause the highest heart rates and create the
greatest physical reactions because of how it builds tension and has
numerous jump scares. However, the game that will be rated
highest by the participants will be Silent Hill 3 because of its dark
and unsettling atmosphere.
Control Subject
This participant has played all the games previously and has a high
tolerance to horror since he is a fan of the genre. He is a 22 year old
male, currently a student within the games industry and plays games
for 6 12 hours a week.
He rated Slender as the scariest game that he had played. He chose
this because of the high level of tension, the jump scares and
excellent audio. The least scary game in his opinion was Spec Ops:
The Line. He says it was not really scary - more psychological, and if
he had played it since the beginning or had more knowledge of the
situation, he might have been more distressed.
In the questionnaire he was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games he played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Out numbered Strongest enemy
could not reach you
when you were on
top of the bus
Silent Hill 3 Chaos, not
understanding of
what is happening
Difficult controls and
the camera
Dead Space 2 No chance to fight
back
Felt scripted
Bioshock Excellent atmosphere Instant respawn if
you did die
Slender High tension and
brilliant at making
people jump
Low graphics and
was laggy
Spec Ops: The Line Gore More of an action
game than horror

While playing these games his heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 No significant
increase
-
Silent Hill 3 At the end of the first
cutscene and first
encounter with
enemy*
jumped at first
encounter with
enemy *
Dead Space 2 Increase when
watching a patients
interview **
-
Bioshock Increase when
character first injects
the plasmid***
Looked uneasy at
injection***
Slender Major increase when
caught by Slender
Swearing at the
computer
Spec Ops: The Line Increased when
seeing burnt person
-
talking to the player

*He later said he forgot about that enemy
**Not really a scary or disturbing interview and does not need to be
watched to continue the game
***He later said he does not like needles
Participant 1
22 year old male, is a student in music technology spends 12-24
hours a week playing video games. He has played Resident Evil 5
and Bioshock. He has some experience with the horror genre and
he is not easy to scare but also it not fearless. He rated Silent Hill 3
as the scariest game. His reasons for this are It was the creepiest
of the games played and was fairly hard to understand what was
going on. The game he rated the least scary was Spec Ops: The
Line because it was more action based than horror.
In the questionnaire he was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games he played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Getting overrun More action based
than other games
Silent Hill 3 The theme Enemy movements
Dead Space 2 The mutants Just had to follow a
path and you would
be fine
Bioshock The setting More fun than scary
Slender Not knowing where it
is
Graphics
Spec Ops: The Line Trying to make you
feel for your actions
More of a action
game
While playing these games his heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 When grabbed by an
enemy from behind
and when hit by the
axe boss
jumped when
grabbed
Silent Hill 3 At the end of the first
cut scene and first
encounter with the
enemy
-
Dead Space 2 Ally being mutated,
when being chased
and the throat cut
scene
-
Bioshock First look at the Big
Daddy and Little
Sister
-
Slender Increase over time
after finding the first
page and when
caught by Slender
-
Spec Ops: The Line - -

It should also be noted that the participant talked his way through
each game.
Participant 2
Participant 2 is a 23 year old male who works in the engineering
sector. He plays games for 5 to 12 hours a week, has played
Resident Evil 5. He says he has some experience with horror and is
not easily scared but is not fearless. He rated Slender as the
scariest game; his reason for this was Fear of the unknown and
Things sneaking up behind you. The game rated as the least scary
was Spec Ops: The Line, saying that there was nothing sudden.
In the questionnaire he was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games he played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Turning around to
find someone behind
you.
Stand and shoot.
Sheva*
Silent Hill 3 Odd creatures Falling in holes**
Dead Space 2 Dark and things
jumping at you
The beginning credits
Bioshock Dark and things
jumping at you
The Irish man***
Slender Sudden noise and
dark
-
Spec Ops: The Line Burnt People Non-burnt people


While playing these games his heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 - -
Silent Hill 3 At the end of the first
cut scene, first
encounter with
enemy and death on
the rollercoaster
-
Dead Space 2 First death* -
Bioshock None -
Slender First encounter,
sudden sounds** and
death
-
Spec Ops: The Line None -

*Participant died multiple times on the Dead Space 2 playthrough
**After finding the second page random bursts of static occur

Participant 3
A 20 year old student male, who has moderate experience with
horror and is not easily scared. He has played Bioshock and
Resident Evil 5. The game that was rated the highest was Slender.
His reasons for this are the concept of the game, the simple
mechanics made it hard to survive, the fact that you couldnt kill the
threat and the suspense of wandering around the map. The game
he rated the lowest was Spec Ops: The Line. He chose this as the
lowest because it lacked driven suspense, it lacked an overall
creepy style and dark settings, there were no threatening or scary
enemies, and difficult/mediocre game-play controls.
In the questionnaire he was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games he played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Relentless threat Game maps
Silent Hill 3 Creepy setting Realism of enemies
and weapons
Dead Space 2 Gore and brutality
aspect
Simple game-play,
introduction
Bioshock Creepy enemies Soundtrack
Slender Suspense Building Graphics
Spec Ops: The Line Graphic cut-scene The games light
setting and art*

*Participant means how the game is set in the day
While playing these games his heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 When hit by the axe
enemy, on the run
with low health and
grabbed by an
enemy to then be hit
by the axe enemy
-
Silent Hill 3 At the end of the first
cut scene and first
encounter with
enemy and death
-
Dead Space 2 -* -*
Bioshock -* -*
Slender When a page was
collected, the first
encounter and death
-
Spec Ops: The Line When seeing the
burnt bodies of the
innocents
-

*Video and audio data was corrupt
Participant 4
20 year old male works in computing. He has little experience with
horror and is easily scared and he has not played any of the games
before. This participant rated Bioshock as the scariest game
because it built up tension and you never know when the next
enemy would show up. Spec Ops: The Line was the least scary
game because it was not scary.
In the questionnaire he was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games he played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Big zombie The zombies did not
look like zombie
Silent Hill 3 Very haunted, Creatures did not
troubling place look scary
Dead Space 2 Very dark. Second
part was scary
because it went dark
Was not expecting
much to happen
since Im in a straight
jacket
Bioshock Dark didnt know
what was going to
appear
Was scared the
whole time
Slender When Slender
appeared
Running around the
woods
Spec Ops: The Line Was not scary Was not scary

While playing these games his heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 When surrounded by
enemies and seeing
axe enemy
approaching, first
fight and death
-
Silent Hill 3 At the end of the first
cut scene and death
-
Dead Space 2 Hallucination* and
death at the door
quick time event
-
Bioshock First fight, the
flooding tunnel,
-
watching the Big
Daddy fight a Splicer,
death and when
trapped at the end of
the level
Slender First encounter, when
collecting the first
page and death
Jumped
Spec Ops: The Line Erratic beat when
finding the innocents
-

*During the introduction cut-scene the character is being
interrogated. During this he starts to hallucinate about the previous
game.

Participant 5
22 year old female, is a student studying the performing arts. Plays
video games for less than 30 minutes a week, has not played any of
the games and has little experience of horror and is very easily
scared. She rated Slender and Spec Ops: The Line as the scariest
games, her reasons for these are: in Slender The atmosphere,
and the unknown aspect it played on. In Spec Ops: The Line the
scary part was seeing what your actions have caused. She rated
Resident Evil 5 as the least scary game because The atmosphere
didnt create any horror.
In the questionnaire she was asked to identify the scariest and least
scary aspect in each of the games she played. They were:
Game Most Scary Aspect Least Scary Aspect
Resident Evil 5 Nothing The game as a whole
Silent Hill 3 The music and
darkness
The monsters
Dead Space 2 Nothing The game as a whole
Bioshock The darkness Everything else
Slender Everything, the
atmosphere; the
music, the darkness,
the sense of the
unknown
There wasnt,
everything scared me
Spec Ops: The Line Seeing what your
actions had done
The actual game play
While playing these games her heart rate and physical reactions
were recorded.
Game Heart Rate
Increases
Physical Reactions
Resident Evil 5 Death of the
butcher*, first
encounter, grabbed
by zombie and death
Jumped at every
time the character
was grabbed
Silent Hill 3 -** -
Dead Space 2 Hallucination and first
encounter
Looked uneasy at the
mutation
Bioshock Seeing Rapture for
the first time and
Splicer attacking the
biosphere
-
Slender -** Jumped
Spec Ops: The Line When seeing the
burnt mother holding
her child
Covered face with
hands and looked
physically disgusted

*In the actual game the characters meet with a butcher beforehand
who gives them weapons.
**She said that she had difficulties in other situations when her pulse
could not be found.

Online Questionnaire
A questionnaire (Appendix 5) was posted online on a number of
horror related or gaming websites asking for people to watch a
number of videos and rate each one for how scary it. The videos the
participants watched were playthroughs of the games and levels that
have been discussed in previous sections.
The hypothesis for this questionnaire is that Silent Hill 3 will be rated
as the scariest game. This is due to its dark, unsettling atmosphere,
the vulnerability of the female character and the reputation that the
game has. Because this questionnaire was conducted on online, a
number of people might have already completed some of the games
and might consequently be influenced by remembering sections of
the game that are not in the videos and therefore rate it higher or
lower according to their experience.
Each participant was asked their age, gender, if they were
employed, and if so which sector they are employed in, how much
time they spent playing video games and which horror games they
have played. They were then asked to watch a playthrough of the
games discussed in previous sections of this report (page 12 -13)
and rate them on a scale of 1 10, 1 being not scary and 10 being
terrifying. After watching and rating all the videos they were also
asked what did they found scary about the game/s that they had
rated the highest and what was lacking in the games they rated the
lowest.
Summary of Responses
A number of comments were received about the games that were
rated highest by the participants. Here is a select few:
Bioshock succeeds in being scary because the player has no idea
what's attacking the pod/elevator, has obscured vision and because
the sight of Rapture has already set up an element of mystery and
danger. By putting the player in the pod and giving them no weapon,
they also provoke a feeling of helplessness. Dead Space has a
moderately successful jump scare and makes the player helpless
due to the bound wrists/lack of weaponry, which is great to induce a
short term panic. The subsequent section exploring abandoned,
dark rooms is good for inducing paranoia
Being alone and the general sense of paranoia emitted from the
games. You never really knew what was going to happen next most
of the time, and it made you worry. Even when you completed the
game, you never knew what to expect. You could take a breath after
the last page in Slender, but that didn't mean it was over.
The intent about both horryfying and scarying to death the
player.Immersion -Great atmosphere. - Player encouraged to use
their imagination. - In the Silent Hill the use of darkness removes the
player's ability to keep tabs on what's going on. Anything can be out
there in the darkness. For example at 5:50 in the SH3 video a sound
effect denotes something is out there. We don't know what is could
be or how dangerous it is, creating a tense atmosphere. "I hope Mr
Satan isn't waiting out there for me.", "Oh shit, what was that. *I
don't know*" - I liked the survival element in the ResE5 video in
which the player had to barricade the room. Gives a great sense of
being trapped.
Slender is a scarier game in my opinion. Darker atmosphere and a
sense of being alone. The others feel that way, to some extent, but
they add a lot of color, making it feel unrealistic. Slender seems like
it actually could be me really lost in the woods, sounds of natural
things(crickets) add to the immersion.
Slender and Silent Hill are masters of atmosphere. Spec Ops is not
like most horror games, but it's a chilling experience and one of my
favorite games. Bioshock is nice, but doesn't quite measure up to
the others.Being pitted against the unknown, with your mind creating
various horrifying scenarios that *could* happen at any second. The
feeling of helplessness, in which you have little to no way of
protecting yourself against whatever is lurking in the dark.
A scene like that in a war game carries a lot of impact when you
think about the popularity of other war games of a similar nature.
Although we use it as escapism, Spec Ops manages to make an
impact on the player through his actions, which highlights the reality
behind the game. Although, I'll also mention that I rated this the
highest partially due to the fact that I've played most the other
options multiple times already.
Silent Hill games are known for being truly horrifying. The demonic
creatures, tense atmospheres, disconcerting sound effects, and
pounding music all combine into a nightmare of a game. I had only
ever played Silent Hill 1 and 2 and those started off more slowly
than this one. The abruptness of the enemies appearing threw me
off and made the video terrifying.
Confined Spaces. I Have a slight claustrophobia, so i'm generally
not a fan of those. Secondly, There's this feel of danger, generated
mostly by good mixture of music, ambient noise and use of
shadows, (but not overuse)
A number of comments were received about the games that were
rated lowest and deemed not scary by the participants. Here is a
select few:
Spec Ops isn't scary because during this segment of the game, the
player has the power. Nothing in the section is threatening. This ties
in with the intention of the game as a commentary on modern
military shooters, which give the player all the power but ignore the
consequences of their actions. Spec Ops is a great game, and could
definitely be described as depressing or emotionally draining, but
scary it is not. On the other hand, RE5 IS trying to be scary, but fails,
because everything is predictable in terms of how the enemy attacks
and appears, and because nothing is left up to psychology -
everything is in plain sight, so there is no 'fear of the unknown'
element.
They gave you a lot of power. For example, its hard to be scared of
jack in Dead Space 2 when you have a pistol that can set people on
fire when you shoot them. I mean seriously? A game is only as
terrifying as the player is powerful. If my ammo is limited, and my
gun is only good for headshots, then my first option is going to be to
run if I am offered it, and save the ammo for an enemy more
ferocious. RE5 and DS2 did not do that, and really killed themselves
by doing that.
Slender kinda sucks. Mostly because of it's over hype. Penumbra
series (which for me are the most scary games ever made,
especially the second one) used symialar mechanics( huge, easy to
get lost enviroment hubs, monster the will chase you and you don;t
really have any way of opposing them other then hiding and fleeing)
but there it works, because monster are SOMEWHERE in the world
looking for you rather then teleporting right in front of your face.
Walking about with a small armoury on your back isn't scary.
Bioshock - Scary enemies that aren't much of a threat. Clunky
movement - I've not played any of the Resident Evil games, but from
an onlooker's perspective it looks horribly clunky to control. The
super slow moving zombies seem like a result of this. - I'd much
rather my character have limited abilities (such as ammo, running),
than a limited and clunky interface. It breaks immersion. Jump
scares, whilst effective, are super boring and often very predictable.
- Doom 3 is especially bad at those, whenever entering a room I
always cleared it out, walked past the conveniently place vent,
turned around, shot the thing.
Personally, I find it hard to get in to a horror mind set when you're
running around in the middle of the day, in an open environment.
Furthermore, being thrown in to an area in which you just have to
survive for a certain amount of time isn't at all scary when you're a
walking steroid with a gun.
To me, scares only land if they're jump scares, because I'm a jumpy
person. Horror doesn't really affect me because jump scares are
cheap and psychological scares only have weight when you've
become attached to the character they afflict.
The games with the lowest scores usually just rely on jump scares
to scare you. That's not scaring me; that's startling me.Atmosphere
and vulnerability. Seriously, just look at 2:48 of the Resident Evil
clip. That's something that should be in a comedy. Chris Redfield is
an ass kicker-extraordinaire and I feel sorry for anything that thinks it
can take his tree sized arms on in a fight and come out of it with all
of their body parts attached. Spec Ops is a great game but it isn't
aiming for the kind of horror that these others try (and mostly fail) to
achieve. Walker is the real monster here, so the only fear that the
players feel is what they are helping him to unwittingly achieve.
Something that both these clips have in common is that the
protagonist is the one with all the power. The enemies should be
scared of them, and thus the player, and not the other way around.
Of the games mentioned in this survey, only Slenderman, Amnesia,
and Silent Hill are what I would call legitimate horror games. Out of
all the monsters in the other games, it's the playable characters who
would be the most frightening to get into a fight with.
Slender is all about building tension but in that video the bloody
slenderman took too long to turn up. I was too bored to be frightened
when he bothered to make an appearance. Spec Ops the line looks
fantastic and I will play it. But I didn't find it scary. If I was playing it I
would feel really guilty about causing that suffering, but not
frightened.
Spec Ops: The Line and Resident Evil 5 are both pretty tame. While
both games have truly visceral scenes, they are not very scary. The
scenes may shock people, but the impact is not horror, it is the
violent deaths of the soldiers/villagers that might scare people. Also,
I do not find the Slender games to be too scary. The model of
slender to me looks dumb and I see no reason to be afraid if you're
only adversity is a motionless model. Also, I believe that the Slender
games have bastardized one of the coolest entities to come out of
SomethingAwful/Creepypasta and that may be the source of my
contempt for Slender games.
(All comments and statistics can be seen here:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1JsglxtvaS-
9LBq7_64P4LNQBcCIUWIt8g7wVmN-
NiJk/viewanalytics#start=publishanalytics)
Analysis
Experiment Results The results bore out of the hypothesis in that
Slender: The Eight Pages produced the greatest physical response
out of the participants but it was also rated as the scariest game.
The game that was rated as the least scary was Spec Ops: The
Line.
Participant Scariest Game Least Scary Game
Control Slender Spec Ops
1 Silent Hill 3 Spec Ops
2 Slender Spec Ops
3 Slender Spec Ops
4 Bioshock Spec Ops
5 Slender/Spec Ops Resident Evil 5/Dead
Space 2

Spec Ops: The Line received the lowest rating; it gained this rating
because it is an action game. Some parts of Spec Ops could be
classed as horror or disturbing but the game as a whole is classed
as action. Other reasons for the rating are that it lacked dark setting
and there was nothing sudden. However, one participant did rate it
has the scariest game her reason for this are The realisation of
what you had done, playing games you just get use to killing things.
This game gave you consequences to your actions.
Slender: The Eight Pages was rated as the scariest game and gave
the greatest physical reactions. The reason for the physical
reactions is because Slender is a jump scare game, the game relies
on making the player jump to get its scares. This is achieved by the
combination of the atmosphere and simple mechanics. The game
takes places in dark woods shrouded in fog which will make the
player uneasy. The audio in the game is just a repeating slow drum
beat, the players footsteps and breathing, and the static which
appears when Slender is near or randomly after finding the second
page. The reasons for it having the highest rating were The
suspense of wondering around the map, shot quick burst of static
creates a random element which will make people jump and the
fear of the unknown.
Online Results - When the results were all gathered and examined,
the results were that Silent Hill 3 was deemed the scariest game
with 26% rating it 8 out of ten. The least scary game was Spec Ops:
The Line with 53% of the vote with a rating of 1 out of 10.
Silent Hill 3 was deemed the scarcest game this was mainly
because of its unsettling atmosphere and the player having no
sense of what to do or what was happening. As one participant says
The enemies and the environment are deeply foreboding you get
the real feeling that the protagonist is at what little mercy they have
to offer.
Again as in the experiment Spec Ops was rated as the least scary
game. The majority of participants in both questionnaires noted that
it is an action game not a horror. As one participant commented, It
was action, what was supposed to be scary. Spec Ops seems like
an action game here. The victims at the end, that was graphic not
scary.

Conclusion
At the beginning of the project, the stated intention was investigate
how players are affected by horror games, and to examine which
factors within these games create the greatest scare from the
player.
During the research it was found that a number of factors are used
to create scares but to create the greatest scare these factors
should be used in conjunction with each other. For example in Silent
Hill 2, the town itself is grounded in reality so gives the fear a
purpose; it creates a strong sense of place and has excellent
ambiguity, just what is out there in the fog?
The other characters within the game bring in human interaction; the
protagonist must defend a woman during one section of the game
and talks to a number of characters throughout. The relationship
with the protagonist starts with James entering Silent Hill, at this
point we know nothing about him and he is used as a blank slate for
the player to project themselves onto, but as you start exploring the
town you meet other characters who are seeing their own version of
the town and in turn you start to question what James sees.
The enemies within the game all take after a characters mental
aspects, for example the mannequins represent his sexual urges
and one of the boss fights is another characters representation of
her abusive father. These enemies both reflect the environment and
the mental aspects of the characters and so make them the more
terrifying. During one section of the game in a block of apartments
you see what appears to be a man behind some bars as you get
closer, you cannot see exactly because it is dark and the figure is
just out of sight. You cannot reach it nor can it reach you, and this
builds up the sense of anticipation and ambiguity. After going into
the adjacent room and leaving again the monster is gone, the sense
of fear deepens due to the change to the environment. By using all
of these factors together, a terrifying game has been created that
has been rated by countless people as the scariest horror game of
all time.
The experiment and online questionnaire were both successful. The
hypotheses on both were only partially correct. The hypothesis for
the experiment was that Slender would produce the greatest
physical reactions, which it did but Silent Hill 3 was to receive the
highest rating from the participants. Instead Slender was rated as
the scariest. This was because Silent Hill 3s introduction is scary
but it becomes scarier only as the player progresses through the
game. Slender puts the player on edge instantly located in a dark
forest while being stalked by a monster and not knowing why they
are there or what is happening. In the online questionnaire Silent Hill
3 was rated as the scariest game. This occurred with 26% rating 8
out of 10 for being scary compared to other games which scored
lower.
Some problems occurred during the project namely the corruption of
recording data, location issues, sickness and game selection. During
one of the experiments the video and audio data did not save
correctly and so was corrupted, rendering the data unusable. Two of
the participants could not travel as one had a broken leg so the
experiment had to take place in their flat which would have affected
the results, personal illness lasted for several days but time was
allocated for this event.
The selection of Spec Ops: The Line was seen as an odd choice by
a number of people due to it being an action game and not a horror.
However, some of the events in the game are horrifying.
Additionally, the way the game forces the players choices and how
you see the characters mental condition deteriorates throughout the
game does make it into an action game that could be classed as a
horror.


Bibiograohy

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http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/scare?q=scare
(Accessed:21/04/2013)

[ii] Polygon, Dont Be A Hero The Full Story Behind Spec Ops: The
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_affect_.php (Accessed:12/05/2013)


[iv] Oxford Dictionary. www.oxforddictionaries.com. [Online]
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[vi]Carr, L., Iacoboni, M., & Debeau, M. et al. (2003). Neural
mechanisms of empathy in humans: A relay from neural systems for
imitation to limbic areas.Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences USA, 100, 5497-5502.



[vii] Oxford Dictionary. www.oxforddictionaries.com. [Online]
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/empathy (Accessed:
28/04/2013)

[viii] Psychology Today, Guadagno, R What makes videos go viral?.
[Online] http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/why-people-
click/201304/what-makes-videos-go-viral
(Accessed:28/04/2013)

[ix] Walter Bradford Cannon (1929). Bodily changes in pain, hunger,
fear, and rage. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

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Fear Of The Unknown, Part 1
By Luis Guimaraes on 12/03/13 12:02:00 am
The oldest and strongest emotion of
mankind is fear, and the oldest and
strongest kind of fear is fear of the
unknown.
H.P. Lovecraft

The famous horror master is frequently cited in discussions
surrounding the subject of horror and fear in video-games. "The
biggest fear is fear of the unknown". That's correct, we do fear the
unknown... But what, exactly, is the unknown? Also, how does this
Fear of the Unknown work?
In this article we'll be exploring some of the different usages of the
unknown in horror games, trying to have a glimpse of it's inner
workings and, if successful, open a path to further analysis and
discussion of the subject so we can step every time closer to having
this figured out.
There will be things that are commonly known and normally called
by different names, for example, imminence is dubbed "suspense",
and hints of the unknown is dubbed "mystery" or "negative space".
That's all true and also correct, but the usage of those terms won't
help our studies of the mechanics of how fear is originated and
nurtured from the point-of-view of everything being about
information, which's what we're doing here. Also important to note is
that all the considerations taken are based on observation rather
than research, so feel free to come out and say that my assumptions
are wrong about both the subject and the perceived misconceptions
around it. It's an art and not a science after all.
Now, let's have some fun!
Unknown
The word itself conveys the existence of a lack or limitation of
information, and this information can be about any of many aspects
or details about the subject of which we are dealing information
from. It can be about different parallel pieces of information, and it
can also be in different levels of information. You can not know (lack
information of) the name of a person, or not know what field they
work on, or where they come from, or you can know they are sick
and not know what illness they have (limitation of information).
The entire field of analysis in this article will revolve around the
many ways information can be withheld from the receiver and how
each piece of existing or missing information can affect the way our
brains deal with information. When you have excess of information
your brain will filter the bits deemed unnecessary or unimportant and
work at conscious level only with the relevant bits to whatever you're
having to deal with at the moment. Similarly, when the amount of
information you're getting is limited and deemed insufficient to give
the sense of security to work with, your brain will enter a state that
amplifies it's extrapolation capacities, hence "fear of the unknown" is
interpreted as "your imagination is scarier than anything".
Three bits of information most commonly withheld from the receiver
to create the unknown in horror games - and commonly asked by
players when ranting or discussing about what makes a great horror
game - are informations about:
a) Image: the shape, figure, or graphic depiction of something "it's
scary until you see it", "you fear what you cannot see", "when I saw
the monsters I stopped fearing them", "the sanity system is intended
so you don't get a good look at the monsters otherwise you stop
fearing them", "the first hours of the game is the best", etc;
b) Presence: the location or whereabouts of something, and/or the
confirmation of it's existence in the game's world and/or in the
player's vicinity "that feeling that you're being watched", "when the
door opened and there was nobody there", "the part when the wind
blows the candles", "the foot noises in the upper floor"; and
c) Imminence: the threat and/or likelihood of an event happening
"you don't know when something will jump out at you", "the sense
that the bridge was going to fall".
But is our imagination alone what we should fear most? If that's the
case, I must tell you, the amount of things you don't know about the
world outnumber the amount of thing you know by an nearly infinite
number of times! How many unharmed units of edible fruit of any
kind exist in the world right now? What was the distance between
the place you are now and the south pole of Mars in 2:45 PM of April
9th, 1743? Where will the clothes you're wearing now be 2048
months in the future? What are the chemical elements made of dark
matter? You don't know! MuaHaHaHaha!

This is dread man! Truly dread!
Are you scared now? You should be! It's the unknown what we fear
most, right?
But why is it we're not completely losing our sanities over this infinite
number of matters we have no knowledge (information) of? "They
aren't of any importance!", you must be saying right now, but the
truth is, we don't even know if the things we don't know are
important or not. But what if they are? What if our lives depend on it
and we don't know? What if we knew all that at some point and for
some reason it was all forcefully forgotten? If think about those
questions seriously, things start sounding scary. That's because a
full binary isKnown information doesn't sound relevant enough to
warrant any consideration and from there, our brains won't get to the
step where it'll calculate if the information received is plenty to
supply our needs under the existing constraints of time pressure
(perceived urgency), considered risks (perceived potential losses)
and personal safety (perceived danger).
Only once hinted in the correct direction we consider the importance
of not-knowing something. And you might have already guessed by
my used of the word hint that it's not only about holding information,
but also about about exposing information that renders the lacking
information relevant. For easier referencing of this characteristic,
we'll be calling the acknowledgment that there is a lack of further
important information, by sense of unknown. Without the sense of
unknown, it's virtually as if there's nothing unknown to begin with.
The catch is that the unknown is only present if we know about it.
That's what the sense of unknown is. So the player must be teased
into the fact that he doesn't know everything that should be known to
increase his/her chances of making it out of the nightmare alive.
Without teasing the player on the fact there is information of utmost
importance being held away, one will not have a reason to fear it.





But here comes a problem: seasoned players will be used to games
being "fair" by default, therefore if something isn't known it's not
important information. If a horror game doesn't feature guns, what
it's trying to tell you is that you can do it without one, therefore why
would you be scared of being unarmed if the game will be balanced
with that in mind? If a game has guns and plenty of ammo and
suddenly locks you in a room with five monsters, what the game is
telling you is that five against one is a fair fight, therefore why should
you be afraid of them instead of them when it's instead them that
should be afraid of you?
So how to keep the player from approaching the game with a happy-
go-lucky attitude of simply not caring about what's not known? The
solution this article is here to propose is the observation that
knowledge is not only binary. It's by riding the line between known
and unknown that we can give the player a sense of unknown, give
it the meaning the want it to have and raise it's importance to the
necessary levels that will focus the player into the helm of his own
imagination.
Similarly as to how the information being withheld can mean many
things, the ways the information can be withheld or exposed also
differ and have different effects. And if they differ, we can categorize
and label them for more clear usage.
The constitutions of information we'll be exploring in this article will
be the:
a) Unknown: the binary lack of information - you either know it or
you don't;
b) Vague: the ambiguous or incomplete piece of information - you
have information but it's not key information; and
c) Uncanny: the presence of conflicting bits of information - you're
not sure anymore about something you are supposed to know.
Note that information can also exist in different scales, we won't be
exploring much about them as we'll leave this up to artistic
interpretation and usage, specially because it's variable about what's
the relevant information scale being dealt with at the moment. For
understanding of what it means, you can for example see a person
in the distance and not know which color this person's eyes are.
That can either be a lack of information (unknown color of the eyes)
or incomplete information (unknown details about the person as a
whole) depending on what scale of importance is being considered.
This aspect is very complex and varies a lot depending on context
so it'll be a dimension we'll take for granted and leave apart while
working on the other two already described. If any reader wants to
complete this base-article with that, please feel free, and thank you!
In future articles we'll study examples of each combination which
are not necessarily the only elements of the two dimensions this
article is out to explore.

Can you fill each combination with events from Video-Games,
Movies and Books?


Antagonistic Horror Design, By Josh Bycer
Over the weekend I had something that I havent experience in a
long time: a nightmare- Specifically a wake up with your heart
racing nightmare. Its been a while since a nightmare has actually
made me wake up tense as Ive reached a point where nothing
really scares me in real life.
But enough psychological talk, the element of the nightmare that
relates to game design is an unexplored area of horror in game
design: antagonistic.

A Game of Cat and Mouse:
In my last post on the subject of horror design, I focused specifically
on the protagonist, looking at alpha heroes. This time, were going to
flip it around and talk about the thing (or things) that are trying to kill
you.
Going back to horror movies while there are two types of
protagonists, there are also two types of antagonist: horde and
mastermind. Horde is where the hero is dealing with mindless
creatures on the hunt, or some kind of rampaging monster as the
focus. We can include everything from zombies, to aliens and just
about every Sci-Fi channel original movie.
If there is some kind of main villain who is either controlling them or
is a monster itself, it is still considered a horde type as the main
threat comes from it unleashing its minions at the hero. The
necromorphs in Dead Space, while supposedly under control by the
marker, were still left to run around and cause destruction.
A mastermind antagonist is someone with an actual agenda and not
just about running around causing trouble. These characters will do
their best to stalk their prey, get the group separated and are usually
the stand out character in the story. Characters like Pinhead or
Freddy Kruger as an example.
We could probably debate if the thing from The Thing would be
either a horde or mastermind type monster. On one hand the
creature did everything it could to blend into the group the best it
could. But then again, it wasnt that smart once someone found out
and attacked it.
Incidentally, stories that feature horde type antagonist are ones
where the hero is usually an alpha character, while the reverse is
true for mastermind antagonist. The reason is that when the
antagonist is the stand out character, the viewer becomes invested
to see how they are going to get rid the survivors and how said
survivors will hopefully get away.
This kind of cat and mouse game is one of the main sources of
terror with mastermind antagonists: as you know someone is going
to die, the only question is when. But for such an interesting take on
the genre, its one we dont see in video games often.
Evil AI:
Antagonist villain design is an interesting concept for a horror game
as the player is not the one in control, but the villain. More
importantly it would get around one of the biggest barriers of
creating scary games: linearity. If you had a game where the AI
would actively track the player and do whatever it can to get the
player into a trap to kill them, there would be no set attacks in that
case.
Imagine playing a horror game where you could never really be safe
as whatever you came up with, you knew the monster would be
coming up with a workaround. I bet for a lot of people reading this
that last statement made them excited about the possibilities but
there are a few catches.

Haunting Ground was all about hide and seek from the chasing
antagonist, while trying to solve the games many puzzles.
First is that there are very few games that go with the mastermind
approach. With the only three that I can think of would be Resident
Evil: Nemesis, Haunting Ground and the Clock Tower series.
But while each game did have a reactive villain, the titles were still
largely linear.
You as the player had to complete tasks in a reasonable order and
there were cases where the enemy would just show up at set points.
Trying to make a game with a mastermind villain in todays setting is
especially tough, as we have seen from most major developers that
they believe that horror is out. Both Resident Evil and Dead Space
have become more action-horror then survival which go against the
mastermind format.
The player should not be the one in charge just plowing through
everything; they need to be weak and forced to react to the
situations around them. But of course that goes against the concept
of having an action based hero.
Now the tougher issue is on the technical side, as you would need a
highly complex AI to effectively play the game against the player.
Something like the AI director from Left 4 Dead taken to the
extreme, but that is not an easy task. Strategy game designers, who
make some of the most complex titles around still havent figured out
a way to make a completely reactive AI.
And that is the key ingredient in making a horror game where the
player is truly being hunted by a superior force: Where attacks are
never predetermined and the path through the game is always
different.
As mentioned, many major developers feel like the horror genre has
been played out, but maybe theyre just looking at the wrong kind of
horror. Left 4 Deads experiment with the AI director showed the
basic concept of having an AI affecting the experience. Taking that
and expanding on it could open the doors for reviving the horror
genre in the eyes of mainstream designers.
Escalating Horror Games The Pitfall of Survival Horror, by
Josh Bycer
Over the weekend I replayed Alan Wake which is one of my favorite
horror games this generation. The game was billed as a horror title
with action elements, much in the same vein that we see in games
like Dead Space 3 and Resident Evil 6.
But there is one big problem that ruins the horror for Alan Wake and
is seen in almost every horror game released: the designers fail to
properly escalate the situation.

Terror-Rising:
In the past Ive examined design of the horror genre from the heros
perspective and the villain. Today, were going to focus on the
situation itself and how it can raise or lower the horror.
Pacing is an important part of any horror experience, movie or game
related. If you have nothing but terror for a long period of time, the
audience will become use to it and get bored. However, if there is
too long of a lull, then the audience will also become bored.
This is where escalating the situation or raising the stakes comes
into play: The more threatening the problem at hand, the scarier the
situation becomes.
Its common in most horror movies where there is a mastermind
villain, that they will go on a rampage that shows what would happen
if they win. Or have them winning and the hero is pushed into a
corner and forced to do something crazy to survive.
In horror movies about mindless monsters or surviving, the situation
can be escalated on the survivors side of things. For example:
Running out of food, someone needs medicine to survive; they have
to get out before its too late and so on. In these cases, you dont
need to add new monsters or change their dynamic; instead the
focus is on the problems of the survivors.
With video games however, we run into problems with escalating in
two major areas.
The first problem is with the enemies themselves. Horror games
normally only feature a small handful of enemy types to challenge
the player. As always: The first time you fight a monster is scary, the
50th time, not such much.
But it doesnt just have to be fighting monsters; it can also be just
interacting. Both Alan Wake and Amnesia: The Dark Descent
suffered the same problem in that regard. In Alan Wake, the player
will be fighting the same 6 enemy types for the entire game. While
Amnesia only had one basic enemy that they will interact with and
another that only appears at select areas.
The more you see the same situation, the more acclimated youll get
to it until eventually it wont bother you anymore. To compensate,
designers usually fall back on two ideas: boss fights and stronger
enemy variants.

The use of light and shadow helped set the tone for Alan Wake but
the developers did not do enough with it.
Boss battles in horror games break up the norm and do a good job
of escalating. However the escalation only lasts for the length of the
boss fight and then things return to the status quo.
Introducing stronger variations doesnt mean anything if you are
fighting the same enemies. Raising enemy stats is not the same as
introducing something brand new to fight.
The other problem with escalation in horror games is that the
designers only escalate one side of the equation: The player.
Giving the player more weapons or abilities is a standard form of
progression seen in any video game. However this form of
escalation is a killer to tension in a horror game. Its hard to be
scared when you just picked up a new shotgun.
Even if the designers do introduce new enemy types if they arent
suitable threats then we run into the same problem as before: An
enemy who is 20 feet tall seems scary, but not so much if the player
has a quad-rocket launcher.
Playing Dead Space 2, I spent more time trying to come up with
witty one-liners for my kills than actually being scared.
One area of horror that video games dont normally tend to explore
is the players situation gradually becoming worse. In zombie movies
the main threat after the initial zombie attack is normally trying to
find enough resources to live.
The problem is that with most horror games featuring action
mechanics, reducing the players ammo supply will make the game
unbeatable. As the players only recourse for survival hinges on
them blasting away at any enemies that get in their way.
When trying to design horrific situations, the issue comes down to
balance: How do you make the player feel stronger without reducing
the terror of the situation?
Randomized Stakes:
I came up with an idea that became a part of my horror game doc
that you can find in the portfolio section. In the game, after a specific
event or time has passed, a panic event will happen to mix up the
game. These events will introduce a powerful enemy or alter the
game forcing the player to adapt.
Each event cannot be defeated by brute force alone, rendering any
weapons or upgrades by themselves useless against them.

Boss battles are a temporary way of escalating the situation, but
good horror design demands more.
Randomized elements are popular among rogue-like design and it is
surprising that we dont see any horror games that make use of
them.
One of the major problems with horror design is that the linearity
turns horror games into a one-play experience as once you know
where all the scares are, there is no more horror.
The challenge of good horror design is maintaining a balance
between the player and the threats at hand. If one side becomes
stronger, then the other side must also grow to match. And keeping
everything at the same level also doesnt work as once the situation
becomes routine, there wont be any horror or tension.
The Three Senses of Horror: Sight, by Josh Bycer
In time for Halloween, I wanted to write some horror design posts to
go along with the upcoming podcast dedicated to horror games. For
this post series, were going to examine how three of our senses can
be compared to the elements of horror design. And spoiler alert:
Taste and smell are not going to be talked about for obvious
reasons.

Sight Unseen:
The biggest distinction between a horror movie and a video game
comes down to the pacing set by the medium. A movie unfolds the
same way every time and was written and directed to run for a
specific running time. Video games are a different story, theyre
meant to be played for a varied time which is usually far longer than
a horror movie.
This creates a major clash between horror and game design by the
fact that the more you know about a situation or the rules, the less
scary it becomes. When people talk about their favorite horror
movies, they usually talk about the first one in a series or a
standalone movie. And the reason is simple: Its unknown.
You cant detail a character or monsters entire life in a two hour
running time and instead have to focus on the situation at hand.
Meaning, that the audience is just as confused as to whats going on
as the main characters are who probably being killed.
But once the audience knows how things work, the movie becomes
less about horror and more of a dark comedy as youre now
following things from the antagonists point of view.
Whats worse is that the longer you watch a specific monster or
series for, the more routine it becomes and you become acclimated
to the situation. John Carpenters remake of The Thing is one of my
favorite horror movies, but even I would become bored by it if it went
on for six more hours. Simply put, there is only so much horror you
can squeeze out of one situation.
And as AAA games continue to grow, this is why weve seen the
Indie market pick up where major developers dropped the ball on
terror.
Short and Scary:
When it comes to horror pacing, you cant stretch out the experience
without upsetting the horror of the game. During our upcoming cast,
we each talked about our favorite horror moments in video games
and podcast guest Chris Gardiner brought up an interesting point:
Many of our favorite moments either took place in games when we
werent expecting them or were just single sections lasting from 30
minutes to an hour and a half.
The reason goes back to horror movie pacing and within that short
time frame, youre not given enough time to figure out whats going
on. All you can do is go with it and experience it much like the main
character who is scared out of their mind.
But AAA development is running into the same problem when horror
movies went mainstream: People wanted more of the same series
and the quality dropped. You simply cant sustain the same kind of
horror over multiple iterations or hours.

Dead Space started out as mostly a horror title, but became more
action oriented as the series went on.

Both Resident Evil and Dead Space as franchises are perfect
examples of the problem with sustaining horror across multiple
games. With both, the designers tried to escalate things such as the
numerous alphabetical viruses in Resident Evil and turning Isaac
Clark into a bad ass necromorph hunter.
But as time went on, both series moved more towards action based
instead of horror, both from a design point of view and simply
because you were always fighting the same enemies.
This is why Indie games or quick sections are usually the best
places to find horror as you can make an experience last however
long you want. And you are free to only make one game and not
have to turn it into a complete series. And just like a horror movie,
you can assault someone with a variety of insane creatures and
situations and have it end before the player gets acclimated to the
surroundings.
As when the game gets long enough that you have to start
explaining things to the player, the magic is lost. Coming up
tomorrow, well talk about touch or the feel of the gameplay and how
it can be used to generate terror.
The Three Senses of Horror: Touch, by Josh Bycer
Continuing my look at how our senses can help add horror to a
game. Todays post is about touch or specifically how gameplay can
be used to create terror. However there is a fine line between adding
tension and creating frustration.

Strong vs. Weak
Yesterdays post about sight talked about how some of the best
horror moments came when you least expect it and are gone before
you can really make sense of it.
What that means in terms of gameplay is hitting the player with a
situation removed from the rest of the game or effectively changing
the rules of the game for a short period of time. For instance
in Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, the haunted hotel level
mixed things up by removing all combat in lieu of exploration and
introduced a threat that was stronger than a vampire.
Normally the player would be the strongest force in the room as an
immortal vampire, but the developers switched it up and made the
player feel vulnerable. By making a strong character feel weak, it
was able to make what was normally an ARPG feel tense.
However, changing the rules too far can have the opposite affect if it
is too much of a change from the normal game. An infamous
example of mixing things up in an action game is removing all the
players weapons and forcing them to sneak around to get them
back.
In these situations, the designer is forcing the player who is use to
an action game where they could fight their way out of everything
and instead must now sneak around.
On our cast we discussed the change in tone that introducing
zombies to the Thief universe had in the first game. Many people
complained about both the tonal shift and the fact that the designers
introduced an enemy who broke so many of the established rules of
the game.


Resident Evils transition from horror to action may have improved
sales, but removed much of the horror.
Moving from strong characters, there is a popular opinion that in
order to have horror that you need to create weak characters.
This was the rationale for the PS2 generation featuring numerous
horror games with teenage girls as the protagonist as they were not
designed around being bad-ass heroes.
To translate that into gameplay, the designers shackled the player
with things like poor controls, fixed cameras and a character who
can barely fight if not at all.
The problem that I find in games like this is that by removing the
players ability to manage their character, that the game becomes
more frustrating and less scary.
Case in point Amnesia the Dark Descent, which Ive gone on record
saying that it was more boring to me than scary. As there was no
choice to the encounters with the monsters: Either run or die. When
the player isnt in control and unable to make their own decisions
about what to do then the game loses a lot in terms of tension.
On the cast we brought up as a great example of player defined
tension with Demon and Dark Souls. While the series is not really
about horror, the games do an excellent job of providing tense
gameplay.
You never know whats around the next corner or what the next
boss is like and this can make a player question their resolve to go
down that path or cross that bridge.
Remember, its not about making the player a bad-ass who can fight
their way out of any situation, but giving the player enough control
so that they feel like they can have some impact on whats going on.
Hiding, making distractions, an attempt to knock an enemy off
balance, these are just some of the ways that a player can do
something without being viewed as powerful.
Now there is so much more that I could go into detail about with
horror design but a lot of it would be me repeating myself. If you
havent looked at these yet, here are the posts I wrote about
antagonist design and the general problem with co-op and horror
design.
Before we end this part I do have one thing that I want to say about
multiplayer and horror. If done right, I can see a multiplayer game
working as a horror title which we talked about on the upcoming
cast. The key point is that the players cant be tied at the hip to each
other and should be forced to split up.

Dead Space 3 featured co-op that was more about having a second
gun than really increasing the horror.
Imagine playing an online game where you and your eight friends
are being stalked by a Jason homage and are forced to explore an
open world to find the means to fight or escape.
No one is the hero or safe and it forces the group to make that
always difficult choice to split up. Picture someone having to decide
to be bait at the risk of their own life to give the group a chance to
escape and the idea opens up so many possibilities.
There is also the concept of having one player be the monster and
stalk the other players and there is currently a game available on
early access called Damned that is going that model. I havent
played it but the idea sounds intriguing.
As with visual and pacing, getting the gameplay to go with creating a
horror game is a challenge. And to wrap up this series, tomorrow Ill
be talking about sound design and setting the mood.
The Three Senses of Horror: Sound, by Josh Bycer
To wrap up this quick series on horror before our horror cast, I want
touch on the importance of sound design with setting the mood and
ratcheting up the tension.

Killing Them Softly:
Sound is as important a detail in horror movies as it is in horror
games as audio can serve several purposes: Early warning, raising
tension and going all out when the crap has hit the fan. But like with
everything else when it comes to horror, it needs to be properly
paced and composed for it to have its full affect.
People more versed (no pun intended) in composing and audio
design will have a more technical explanation than what Im going to
talk about. Understanding the right music for the right moment is an
art form in of itself and something that both horror movies and
games these days can learn a thing or two from.
For me, Im believer in the less is more saying when it comes to
audio in horror. Im not a fan of horror movies that have to have the
soundtrack blaring whenever something is about to attack or worse,
plays random metal songs as the monster attacks.
I find things personally scarier when there is no music and only the
ambient sounds around the person or character can be heard. On
the cast we talked about how much your own imagination can have
an impact on horror and when youre left completely alone with your
thoughts; your imagination can run wild.
Another important part of sound design is randomized effects: Doors
slamming, windows creaking and so on. Just like with visual and
gameplay design, the more routine something becomes, the less
impact it has. Thats why in my dream horror game idea, there will
be no such thing as a soundtrack, and everything will be based on
ambient noises which should be randomized. I want a pin drop to be
like a nuclear bomb to your ears.
There is a lot more to sound design, however I dont have the audio
background to write about it. With that said, that wraps up this series
and come back tomorrow for the horror edition of the Perceptive
Podcast.

Postmortem: Resident Evil 4
By Yoshiaki Hirabayashi
In this reprint from the
October 2005 issue of Game
Developer magazine,
Resident Evil 4 cinematics
lead Yoshiaki Hirabayashi
writes about the overhauls and challenges which faced one of
the franchise's most notable entries.
The Resident Evil series has a broad fan base, and in order to meet
players' expectations, we decided to create a totally new entry with
Resident Evil 4. Because the series has been around for so long, we
really wanted to address the feedback from both our fans and our
development team in order to revamp the game. This meant looking
at everything from presenting a new way to experience fear, creating
more frightening enemies, implementing new ways of using items,
and much more.
For this postmortem, we'll use one element, which was also one of
our biggest challenges, as the archetype for the game's
development: the successful creation of the title's graphical style. I'll
provide an overview of what this entailed and how we were able to
achieve it with some specific examples from the game.
What Went Right
1. Cutscene Integration
When we began the project, one area we focused on was how
playable portions of games usually shift into atmospheric pre-
rendered movies. This seemed like an area that, if done well, would
improve critical reception. As gameplay shifts to a cutscene, the
change is usually quite noticeable. It's possible that in that moment,
players regard what is on screen as just imagery rather than a true
part of the game. The change might be appealing to those people
who simply enjoy cinematics for the higher quality of the cutscene
graphics, but in terms of keeping players focused on the game, it's
possible that these moments interrupt the flow of the experience.
We thought that if we could facilitate a seamless transition between
gameplay and the in-game movies, people would be able to stay
involved throughout the entire experience without interruption. Our
solution was to keep the cutscenes in real time.
The action button system we implemented for Resident Evil 4 was
very complementary to our use of real-time movies. By incorporating
an action button into the cutscenes, we made it possible for players
to interact with the in-game movies. In a traditional game scenario,
players change from being active participants to bystanders as the
cinematics begin and play out. The player might not pay close
attention or might even put the controller down, and either way,
that's not what we want.
2. Improved Technology
In the current generation of consoles, the technical capacity of
hardware has improved vastly over the last, and our technology
itself has also increased to the extent that we can maximize the full
potential of that hardware. Technologically speaking, this
advancement has made it possible to express scenes in real time
that would have previously only been possible in pre-rendered
cutscenes, for example those that incorporate complex facial
animation. Up until now, we didn't have the processing ability or
capacity to realize complex animation of the sort we have achieved
in Resident Evil 4 -- it was simply outside the hardware's
capabilities. We solved this issue through programming and by
packaging data intelligently. The same solution was applied to areas
that required a lot of special effects, such as projection lights and
explosions.
Using real-time movies also made it easier for us to change
elements of the story according to the game specs and design. For
example, in a pre-rendered situation, if a character or enemy in a
movie had to be somehow altered, all the time and energy used to
create it would have gone to waste. However, by using real-time
movies, we could just rewrite a new model onto the existing model
data.

3. Improved Workflow
Since we had to basically reinvent the series, we needed to improve
our workflow -- converting data, managing data, and troubleshooting
-- in order to stay on target. We needed to find a way to complete
these tasks more efficiently, which was how we came to use the
XML data management system. This workflow management method
saved us valuable time that we were then able to apply to the
creative elements of the game design.
Figure 1 shows the system we
used for converting movie scenes, posting scene data, modeling,
and making slight adjustments for texture data, among other things.
The XML system allowed us to evaluate the total amount of data in
order to assess whether there was an excess or deficiency to
support it. The system also eased the process of making multiple
alterations to the customized models in each of the game's many
scenes.


Looking at our previous system (Figure 2), you can see exactly why
our new system has helped us. The traditional development pipeline
in Japan is still quite hierarchical: With the previous system, you
needed a programmer to transfer data to the development tool,
which put limitations on the programmer's work capacity. This
situation caused a tremendous loss of time.
As opposed to the old flow, which put the heft of the workload on the
programmers, the new system (Figure 3) actually resulted in the
designers being able to contribute more frequently and more
directly, thus minimizing the amount of time lost.

4. Believable Images, Appealing Characters
Creating believable images doesn't necessarily mean that the
images need to be factual and realistic. Rather, they should engross
players and be believable within the game's universe. For example,
in Resident Evil 4, a long skirt or long hair moves naturally according
to the motion of the characters, but in a slightly enhanced way. This
effect helps to immerse players and create a suspension of disbelief.
If something swings in the real world, it also swings in the game;
however, in real life, it might not move in such an exaggeratedly
beautiful way.
We adapted the swings a little and brought the motion close to what
players might expect, even though it isn't completely accurate.


In regard to creating more appealing characters, there's a wide
range of opinions on the topic. In our meetings with Shinji Mikami,
the game's director, he stressed that the most important factor in
making a character appealing is to create believable facial
expressions and gestures. Characters should exhibit appropriate
feelings and expressions for a given situation, while also expressing
their individual personalities.
With Mikami's goal in mind, we put a great deal of effort into making
characters' expressions believable (see Figures 4 and 5), and to that
end, each characters' fingers have joints that move and articulate,
for example. Still, we wanted to focus on even more refined details.
In order to achieve this, we used a very large number of face targets
(or facial expressions) for each character.
At key moments, we conveyed the tension that characters might be
feeling by using extra lighting elements to highlight a character's
facial expression. We actually created quite a lot of facial expression
patterns for the characters. We also used special higher-quality
textures to make the expressions look as good as possible.
For Ashley, the main heroine, 36 facial targets were used in total,
which is one and a half times the normal number. Regardless of the
effectiveness of the increased targets, we couldn't have that much
data for just one character, so we used a method called face target
packaging. Even though 36 targets were prepared, they were not all
necessary for each scene. We included targets required by each
scene into models that implemented them on a scene-by-scene
basis.
At first, I talked with a programmer regarding the amount of data
which could be used for a character and decided to use 30 targets
for each. We divided these into two categories (see Figure 6). One
is the Standard Slot, which is frequently used and is the general
default slot. The other is the Select Slot, which dictates less
frequently used targets for each scene. We made one package with
these two slots. Because the number of Select Slot expressions
varied from scene to scene, we were able to efficiently manage the
data allocation so there were only 30 targets in the package at any
given time. By changing the package according to the scene, we
were able to produce facial animations with higher quality.

5. Reinvented Gameplay
Even though the series is linked to horror, it also has become known
for having strong gameplay and a high entertainment value. We
wanted to make Resident Evil 4 appealing to an even wider variety
of players by raising the game's level of entertainment. Early in
development, through trial and error, we found that the game was
scary, but had a low fun factor -- we needed to rethink both the
gameplay system and the fear component. We restarted the project
four times in order to ensure that this title would be interesting and
fun for the consumer; there had to be more to the game than just
fear.
In order to change the gameplay, we challenged ourselves to
implement features and elements that had been impossible to
realize previously, in terms of environmental interaction, graphical
quality, and more frenetic action. We took the existing archetype of
Resident Evil and added extra play value that would make sense
within that world. The main character's melee attacks were made to
be more robust because he's a police officer and should be better at
close-quarters combat than we had demonstrated in previous
games. Enemies were made to be more intelligent and much faster;
they can pick up weapons and open doors. Enemies also talk to
each other, communicating plans of attack. This was used as a new
way to inspire fear for the series, giving the player a feeling that he
or she was up against a sentient and unrelenting force, rather than
shuffling zombies, or simple monsters.
We had intended from the start to make the project something that
we ourselves found intriguing and challenging. In demanding this of
ourselves, and largely meeting those goals, I think we were able to
provide an exciting game for the fans.

What Went Wrong
1. Freshen Up
The goal of any game's storyline is to expand the depth and
perception of that game's universe, as well as to inform players of
what they are to do. In Resident Evil 4, the storyline was primarily
conveyed through our real-time movies. We had a hard time
achieving our concept of combining gameplay with the necessary
story elements that could evoke a feeling of believability within the
in-game movies.
Games are a visual medium, and throughout the series, it wasn't
always easy to create fresh concepts. It was even more difficult to
develop visuals that would continue to advance the series. This is
why we thought of a new direction for Resident Evil 4's
development, which we call "complete concept changes." That is to
say, we examined all the previous gameplay features and notions of
fear and broke them down to change the entire concept for the
game.


2. Data Constraints
Because this version of Resident Evil was far more action-based, we
often needed to display a very large number of characters at once
(see Cutscene Images AD). As a result, we needed to carefully
apply model textures for these types of scenes. Normally, an enemy
character in the game has about 3,000 polygons and is about 400K
of data space. There are some scenes in the game, though, that had
up to 25 characters on screen simultaneously. We weren't able to
adjust all the memory and image storage to the level that would be
required for us to keep those 3,000 polygon models intact.
In order to address this issue, we decided to adjust the amount of
data per model in each scene, and even in cuts within the scene.
First, we would implement the model that required the most data
(usually the closest to the camera). Then we adapted it by deciding
how it would be drawn and processed, based on memory levels.
Limiting the amount of data on all the models would result in poor
quality, so we prioritized the portions of the models that would
require the best modeling. We came up with three different
scenarios for how to distribute the data for texturing the models,
which could then be used in various situations by combining them.
A normal high resolution model for a Ganado, a generic enemy in
the game, consisted of approximately 3,500 polygons. Normally, it
would be difficult for us to render several high resolution Ganados
on screen simultaneously. Therefore, we created two additional
variations of the model: mid-resolution Ganado, which are
approximately 2,000 polygons, and a lowresolution model with about
1,000 polygons. These three models would switch depending on the
situation. Textures were treated in the same way. High-resolution
textures were 512x512 pixels, mid-resolution textures were 256x256
pixels, and low-resolution textures were 128x128 pixels.
As mentioned, these models could be switched depending on the
situation, according to two conditions: how many models the scene
required, and how much data was available for the given scene. We
always attempted to be efficient with our data sizes, so we would
reduce the model and texture data by taking into account the
camera and lighting used for certain scenes.
3. Texture vs. Light
In addition to the models, we also adjusted textures for each scene.
We sometimes faced problems with how to adjust the way that
characters looked when different lights hit them. This happened
especially when we used a lot of penetrating or spot lights. We
solved this problem by creating textures for each scene or each cut.


Not only was this used for something as detailed as eyes (Figure 7),
but was used widely, anywhere from the characters' bodies, to
background objects. This texture adjustment was also useful in
addressing problems with dynamic lighting situations, such as when
dented objects were being lit too brightly. In cases when a model
would only be seen from a distance and required little to no shading
information, we reduced the data amount because the dimensions
visually do not stand out very well, and the difference would not be
noticeable. In another case, when a character's shadow would stand
out due to the camera's position, we wouldn't use the low-resolution
model, as it would not be capable of properly rendering the delicate
lighting details. Instead we would use a high-resolution model with
low-resolution textures, still keeping data use down.

4. Depth of Field
Another problem we had to address was related to depth of field
within a given scene. One method we used is a blurring effect: We
displaced several pieces of a given image at various depths of field
when no camera movement was happening. In this case, processing
power was light, and the hardware was not overly taxed.
The more difficult scenarios came up when manipulating depth of
field in a scene that required camera movement. In these cases, we
specified a distance from the camera past which we would blur the
image. We dynamically blurred the image itself, just as you would in
Photoshop. The method was artificial, but it enabled us to convey a
depth of field that appears in the actual in-game camera. The
processing power was very heavy in comparison with the first case,
and therefore, we used the blur only when we needed to move the
camera and adjust the depth of field from a creative standpoint.
5. Multi-Camera Strain
Some situations required real-time rendered textures, which in turn
required the use of multiple cameras. By using multiple cameras, the
processing strain is increased by about one and a half times the
amount used with just one camera. Despite this, we decided to use
this method because the workflow system we utilized made it very
efficient to adjust the images.
This technology was used in a scene in which Leon looks at a
monitor on the screen. For the "video" displayed on the monitor, we
didn't use pre-rendered movies, but animated scenes which were
rendered to a texture in real time. With this method, we did not have
to render character motion on the monitor in order to change
elements of the scene, and so we were able to make changes quite
easily.

Normally only one camera's data is used for one cutscene, but data
from three cameras had to be used here (see Figures 8 AD). One
was the main camera, which projected the entire scene. The second
was camera A, which created the image shown on monitor A. The
third was camera B, which created the image displayed on monitor
B. The screen images which were created by camera A and camera
B were cached by memory, scaled down to a lower resolution, and
used as the texture for the monitor. After that was done, we
compiled the image for the main camera view. This technology was
also used for reflections in things like sunglasses and car windows,
with translucent adjustments to cached image data.
That's a Wrap
As you might have gathered, the development of Resident Evil 4
was not necessarily based on innovative new technology, but rather
on efficiency. Our improved workflow and our intense focus on
details in the game allowed us to achieve the level of quality we had
challenged ourselves to produce. Restarting the game multiple times
allowed us to take several fresh perspectives on the game, and the
survival horror genre as a whole. I think that ultimately we came up
with something that was not only enjoyable, but which also helped to
advance the series in a positive direction. The next Resident Evil is
planned for next generation consoles, and will present a whole new
host of challenges and opportunities. Hopefully we will once again
be able to meet our own high expectations.