Horror games are such a wide and varied genre that many fall through the cracks on a yearly basis. Earlier this year, we covered 10 Underrated Horror Games Released In the Last Decade, but we have since decided that we missed a bunch of titles on that list! So let’s take a look at five more underrated horror games that might have passed you by over the last few years and why you should play them now!
5 Scorn
Scorn is disgusting and I love it for that. I love how the game doesn’t let you play as some all-American action hero, dripping with machismo, instead forcing you to play as a pathetic reject from the depths of hell. There is no glory to playing through Scorn and it is a game tinged with a certain feeling of sadness which can weigh down heavily on some.
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However, the grotesque environmental and creature design is worth the price of admission alone. Everything feels so fleshy and sticky, yet every mechanism still manages to have a sense of weight to it and feel tactile. The puzzle-solving and FPS mechanics may be unremarkable, but Scorn is still an underrated game from recent years worth checking out.
4 Bloodied Fear
If you are looking for a bloody, ripper of a retro brawler in the style of classic titles like Double Dragon, then Bloodied Fear has got you covered. It is a fantastic throwback to beat ‘em-up arcade cabinets from the 80s and is a blast from the get-go.
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The game also has a good sense of humour, often poking fun at both the cheesiness of the 1980s and the beat-‘em-up genre as a whole. With all of that being said, I’m not sure that it is worth the $2,000,000 that it is listed on Steam for some inexplicable reason.
3 Town of Light
Town of Light is an interesting first-person psychological horror game that deals with themes surrounding mental illness and sexual abuse across mental health institutions in the early 20th century. The game carries a genuinely unnerving atmosphere with the setting of a derelict mental hospital in Tuscany, Italy maxing the creepiness out to 11 with each creaking door and flickering light.
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Town of Light is said to be inspired by true events which makes the psychological horror aspects even more engrossing and uncomfortable at the same time. Taking on the role of a former patient at the hospital named Renée, you explore the abandoned building all while having the plot drip fed to you through unnerving narrated journal entries and PTSD-ridden flashbacks.
Overall, the only thing that brings down Town of Light’s engaging and carefully told story is that it brings nothing new to the table regarding gameplay or visuals. This unfortunately leads to Town of Light being a little slower paced than I tend to like my horror, but it is still worth a playthrough with its roughly 3—5-hour playtime.
2 Close To the Sun
Looking for a taste of that haunting retrofuturism without having to play Bioshock for the tenth time? Well, Close to the Sun will give you that fix. Taking place aboard the city-sized ship known as Helios, you play as a journalist called Rose who has been invited aboard by her sister Ada via a cryptic letter.
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Close To The Sun draws heavily on previous games in the first-person horror genre. From the classic art-deco Bioshock-esque setting to the combat-less gameplay elements taken from games like Outlast and Amnesia, Close To The Sun makes its influences very clear.
From the moment you step foot on Nikola Tesla’s scientific monstrosity, (yes that Tesla), things proceed to immediately go wrong. Although the story can be a little slow at times, the visuals, weird alternate-history setting, and mysterious plot lead Close To The Sun to be well worth its six-hour playtime.
1 Homebody
Homebody is a retro-inspired puzzle horror title that harks back to the days of classic survival-horror games such as Clock Tower and Resident Evil. Developed by Game Grumps, Homebody is a fantastic first attempt at a horror game with an interesting time-bending story that deals with sensitive themes such as anxiety, depression, and agoraphobia.
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The last one, in particular, is key to the plot, with protagonist Emily’s phobia tying in deeply to the mystery happening behind the scenes. The only aspect of Homebody that I feel could be more finely tuned is the at times awkward puzzle mechanics.
Although the puzzles themselves are interesting and creative giving some of that classic Resident Evil-style weirdness, the execution doesn’t quite pay off sometimes. The stiff fixed camera and tank controls meant that I often ended up stuck between a doorframe before being frustratingly sliced to pieces.
Ultimately these are small issues that don’t impact the game massively but are aspects that Game Grumps could work on for future titles. I don’t want to spoil Homebody too much as it was released fairly recently, but it is already one of this years best underrated horror games and is definitely one to check out!
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So, that completes our list of five more underrated horror games. What do you make of the games that we included? Are there any other underrated horror titles worth checking out that you feel should have made the list? If so, then feel free to tell us on social media!
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