With each Useless Area and Resident Evil 4 launching throughout the first quarter, it was clear that 2023 was going to be a powerful yr for horror remakes. However what we maybe wouldn’t have counted on because the yr started was that this was going to be a stellar 12 months for the horror style as an entire. It’s been such a superb yr for it, actually, that we needed to give it its personal award class.
There have been so many nice horror video games this yr, spanning quite a few totally different sub-genres and studio sizes. As beforehand talked about, it’s been a incredible yr for remakes, proving the classics will be as related in the present day of their revitalised kinds as they had been once they first arrived within the 2000s. However it’s additionally been a interval of splendidly experimental indies which have discovered model new methods to shake us up. World of Horror fueled our nightmares with photos drawn in Microsoft Paint (critically!), whereas Dredge had us desperately wishing for a much bigger boat as a Lovecraftian nightmare unspooled its tentacles beneath our hull. In the meantime, we lastly bought a worthy religious successor to Alien: Isolation in Frictional’s terrifying Amnesia: The Bunker.
However what did the IGN group assume was the perfect horror sport of 2023? Right here’s how the voting panned out.
IGN’s Twenty Questions – Guess the sport!
Runners-Up: Sons of the Forest and World of Horror
Tied with 2.4% of the vote every are Sons of the Forest and World of Horror. Each are from smaller studios (the latter is definitely largely the work of a single developer), however that didn’t cease them from taking Steam by storm.
The long-awaited sequel to 1 of essentially the most revered survival video games of all time, Sons of the Forest builds on its predecessors strengths to create a chilling journey right into a cannibal-infested woodland. The crafting core of the unique has been overhauled with rather more practical constructing animations that improve the immersion; as an example, you now should snap branches in two to create firewood, or bodily reduce home windows out of picket partitions utilizing an axe. However it’s the adaptive AI that actually makes Sons of the Forest what it’s; the freaky cannibals of the island react to your presence in plausible methods. Each enemy has their very own needs and wishes, and so their behaviour is exclusive to them. That makes each interplay unpredictable – will the mutant peering from the undergrowth run in worry, or be the very final thing you see because it tears you limb from limb?
The worlds of Junji Ito and H.P. Lovecraft mix in World of Horror, maybe essentially the most unsettling of all of the horror video games launched this yr. A roguelite RPG with turn-based fight, it’s immediately recognisable because of its distinctive black-and-white ‘1-bit’ artwork that depicts stomach-turning monstrosities. The apocalypse looms, so you should discover a fictitious model of Shiokawa, Japan within the Eighties and try and halt the previous gods’ plans. You’ll see that journey via the eyes of 14 totally different characters, with every of their tales having a number of endings based mostly in your choices. Regardless of its easy, manga-influenced 2D design, this can be a sprawling, multi-layered nightmare. It’s all of the work of only a handful of individuals – developer Paweł Koźmiński, author Cassandra Khaw, and musicians ArcOfDream and Qwesta. And with its artwork completely put collectively in MS Paint, it is an ideal instance of how greatness can bloom from even essentially the most humble instruments.
Runner-Up: Useless Area
Claiming 7.1% of the vote is EA Motive’s achieved remake of Useless Area, which took us again to the blood-drenched metal corridors of the USG Ishimura. One of essentially the most technically spectacular video games of the yr, it combines intricately detailed environments, astonishing lighting, and terrifying sound design to create a sci-fi haunted home that drips with oppressive ambiance.
Whereas the moment-to-moment of Useless Area is basically unchanged from the unique, Motive’s refined modifications assist not simply modernise the sport, however improve its best achievements. That’s true of many of the sport’s mechanical parts – the best way your weapons ‘peel’ enemies aside is a splatterhouse triumph – however we’d be remiss to overlook the changes to Isaac Clarke himself. Beforehand a silent protagonist, the remake offers Isaac a voice and character. This helps anchor the stranded engineer on the planet and make his story of survival towards all odds much more traumatic. I assume it’s solely within the horror style the place we will say that’s really a superb factor.
Runner-Up: Resident Evil 4
When 2019’s Resident Evil 2 remake proved an important horror masterpiece, followers unsurprisingly began asking for Leon Kennedy’s adventures in Spain to get the identical remedy. They didn’t have to attend lengthy, and this yr’s Resident Evil 4 remake is each bit the plush recreation that folks hoped for.
Whereas the distinction between unique and remake isn’t fairly as drastic for Resident Evil 4 as its predecessors, there’s nonetheless an enormous improve right here; this can be a grotesquely lovely, atmospheric journey with snappy fight and easy exploration. It embraces the winding stage design of the unique and offers all kinds of alleyways, corridors, and stairways to poke round for secrets and techniques, treasures, and scares in. And, of course, it gleefully performs round with the unique sport’s esoteric roster of villains, from the doll-like Salazar to the depth of cult chief Saddler.
It did abandon some of the 2005 unique’s goofy charms, although, and leaned extra on the gory chills of the sequence’ fashionable output. That makes for a scarier interpretation of the story, however one which’s not fairly as off-the-wall as its supply materials. Maybe that’s the explanation behind Resi 4 coming in second place, with 23.8% of the vote. Our winner, although, is filled with its personal model of comedy that makes it essentially the most out-there horror we’ve performed in years…
Winner: Alan Wake 2
IGN’s workers overwhelmingly selected Alan Wake 2 as their finest horror sport of the yr, with Treatment’s Lynchian survival horror taking 64.3% of the vote. It’s a wild trip, laced with laugh-aloud Finnish humour, astonishing musical numbers, and a proverb-quoting janitor. However, as you’d think about from its successful standing, it’s additionally an astonishingly scary journey into the clutches of murderous cults and the depths of a supernatural, New York-shaped jail. Actually, it’s in all probability the closest any studio has come to capturing the fear of Silent Hill in fairly a while.
On the floor, Alan Wake 2 seems like Resident Evil, however past that acquainted over-the-shoulder perspective is a sport with unmatched imaginative and prescient. Its assured course, utilizing all method of visible and audio tips, drags you right into a creepy world that gives sudden surprises in each chapter. Its parallel tales, chronicling the lives of FBI agent Saga Anderson and haunted novelist Alan Wake, is each pulpy and literary, relishing in style tropes because it tells a genuinely emotional, thought-provoking story. We waited 13 years for Treatment to get a second likelihood and proceed Alan’s story, and it was value each second of endurance. It’s the studio’s most artistic, clever work so far, and the very best horror sport of 2023.
Honourable Mentions
- Dredge, Amnesia
- The Bunker
- Killer Frequency