Is it just me, or have Steam sales gotten less… exciting? There was a time I used to leap from my bed like a kid on Christmas when a new sale started. I never knew what was in store for us, whether it be a new ARGs, special achievements, even entire new mini-games created just for the events. Not to mention the astronomically low prices. To give you a sense of just how into this shit I used to be, I have a Golden Potato. Bow down, lesser nerds.
However, recent sales just don’t seem as compelling. Maybe the promise of extra discount coupons aren’t as tantalizing as older prices like the Valve Complete Collection. Or maybe I don’t see as many 90% blowout sales on major titles. Maybe I already have all the games I want. Or maybe I’m just getting old. Who knows.
The point is, Steam sales are a great opportunity to pick up a ton of games at a price console gamers would consider to be borderline theft. Chances are, you already know if you want the newest Resident Evil or Devil May Cry. However, there are so many indie games out there, it can be hard to find the gems. So with that, I wanted to use my extensive knowledge of all things horror to put together a quick list of 16 Indie Horror Games To Pick Up During The Steam Halloween Sale. It was originally 13, because spooky number, but I remembered 3 more so now it’s 16. Oh well.
Also as a quick note, I’ve listed both the game and the price. If you’re interested in picking it up, just click the header and it’ll take you to the Steam store page. I’ll wrap the list up with a total price.
Honorable Mentions:
Before we kick things off proper, I do have two honorable mentions. First up is Cryostasis: Sleep of Reason. It’s a relic of a time where horror was split between going more action (Dead Space style) or more sneaky (Amnesia style). Cryostasis attempted to do both, and as a result has firmly planted itself as a cult hit in very dedicated horror circles. It was actually the first game that came to my mind for this list. Unfortunately, it’s not on steam.
My second honorable mention is a game called Uncanny Valley. I reviewed it a lifetime ago for Dread Central, and it’s stuck with me. It’s a fascinating little experimental horror title, where the different decisions you make can drastically alter where the story goes. Seriously, it ranges from a conversational psychological horror “your past is haunting you” trip, to a stealth shooter taking down a mad AI. It’s wild. Unfortunately, it’s not on sale, so can’t be part of my gift guide.
16) Depth – $4.99
Who among us doesn’t at least suffer from a mild case of thalassophobia? Be real, deep water is some scary shit. Say what you will about Jaws being dated, but the idea of a monster from the deep lunging at you with impossible speed from the gold dark abyss is nightmare inducing. Depth gives you the opportunity to both live this terror and inflict it on others. Depth is an asymmetric shooter where a team of divers works to gather treasure from a number of sunken ruins. Trying to stop them is a team of sharks. Why are the sharks trying to stop them? I’m not sure, it probably has something to do with the sonar waves coming out of the treasure-bot enraging them? Or maybe they’re just dicks. Who knows. At this point, Depth doesn’t have a very large player base. But at just $5, it’s worth picking up and checking out the excellent map design and interesting premise.
15) ECHO – $9.99
I don’t typically get emotional about the games I like not getting the love I think they deserve. I know plenty of people that can ramble on for hours about how this or that JRPG never got any love in the west, or how a critique on art disguised as a pixel-punk puzzle game should have more mass appeal. I get that the games I like might not be the most marketable, and that’s fine. However, I at least expect niche audiences to know about these hidden gems. Echo is a game that no one I have ever met has played. I cannot for the life of me figure out why. Echo is fucking beautiful, unique, and hauntingly poignant. The premise is simple: you play as a young girl trapped in a facility. It quickly becomes clear that this facility is some kind of brute force AI experiment, and is creating clones of you to hunt you down. These clones learn to move by your example. Shoot a gun, and they learn to shoot. Run, and they learn to run. Nothing you do to protect yourself will work forever. I understand how general audiences might not like a game designed to actively punish every choice you make. But for anyone that considers themselves a “games as art” or horror game fan, not playing ECHO is a serious ding to your credibility. Play it now.
14) GET EVEN – $7.49
GET EVEN is a game that defies logic and reason. You seriously can’t do it justice by trying to describe it. It’s a horror/shooter/detective simulator with memory manipulation, branching choices, and an unreliable narrator. Until, it’s not. The game fundamentally shifts what it is about four times throughout. Then it shifts that shifting structure into an entirely new framework. Then it all ends on another major perspective shift that makes it all make sense. This is a game that will thoroughly confuse and confound you until it suddenly all becomes clear. It’s a type of narrative many games have tried, and almost none have succeeded at. It’s certainly not for everyone, but is wonderfully bold and bizarre.
13) Neverending Nightmares – $3.74
It’s not super uncommon to see horror games that are a, “reflection of the creator’s struggles.” It’s generally trite, and how we get most of the games on itch.io. I don’t really mind if video games are your preferred medium for self-expression (mine just happens to be dick jokes). The main problem is that it’s difficult what titles are genuine and what are just trying to pander to the social justice crowd. Neverending Nightmares manages to transcend these issues by simultaneously being genuine, creatively presented, and a good game. It’s consistently disturbing with minimal jump-scares. It also deserves a medal for not featuring a small child with a large head. Just a grown man with a medium-sized head.
12) Darkwood – $5.99
Darkwood feels like a game from another era. It’s a huge compliment. It feels like the natural conclusion of that golden age of Flash games where people were just making weird shit. You’d see all kinds of top-down shooters, adventure games, and horror point-and-clicks coming out on sites like Newgrounds. While that trend died a long time ago, Darkwood feels like one of those games taken to the natural conclusion; if those creators just kept going and improving, Darkwood would have been the result. An indie title made by a passionate group, Darkwood is an open-world scavenging game mixed with base defense. Explore by day, hunker down and survive by night. All set in a world that gives Silent Hill a run for its money. If you’re willing to take a plunge into the world of “different,” you can’t go wrong with Darkwood.
11) Stifled – Echolocation Horror Mystery – $15.99
Stifled is one of those indie games that feels like it was made to win awards at IndieCade. It’s a psychological horror game about someone with a twisted past. It has microphone support, so that you can use your own voice as the echolocation device. It’s VR optional. And to top it all off, it looks like it was made for the oscilloscope. And yet, it still just works. The concept is so simple and effective, presentation so unique, that Stifled sticks with you. In a horror market constantly trying to find new ways to scare you, Stifled does so intelligently and effectively.
10) Stories Untold – $2.49
Linking screenshots from Stories Untold is a bit of a conundrum, since they all are framed like promotional photos. I can assure you, that is not a real picture. That is just how the game looks. A series of static environments with minimal traversal, Stories Untold is basically a puzzle game. Each puzzle has its own story and basic gameplay mechanics. Broken down into a series of “episodes,” each level is its own thing. Until it’s not. It’s one of those games where everything seems to be one thing at first, before bleeding into itself and revealing a whole new picture. Was that too confusing? Good, play the game and figure it out. It’s far more satisfying to experience than just talk about.
9) The Void – $2.49
In The Void, you are dead. No use whining about it. Luckily, you’ve been given a brief respite from total oblivion thanks to a spark of Color. You now exist to serve the whims of the Brothers, nightmarish ghouls who horde color and feed it to the beautiful eternal Sisters. It seems like your lot is to briefly assist in this eternal balancing act before your color drains and you are forever consigned to oblivion. However, you do have one trick up your sleeve. You have access to a garden, where color grows. It’s up to you to decide if you wish to use this color to challenge the Brothers, free the Sisters, and unlock the secrets of The Void. Featuring permadeath, gigantic bosses, and multiple unbeatable game-states, The Void redefines your definition of a “hard” game. if you can wrap your head around the obtuse premise and bizarre gameplay, The Void is an adventure unlike any other.
8) Pathologic – $1.29
This one kind of feels like cheating. Both The Void and Pathologic are created by the same studio, Ice-Pick Lodge. They are both incredibly strange Russian art games that push the boundary of what we even consider to be a game. Both present the player with a hopeless grey world, and a limited timeframe to try to make things slightly better. The two games are admittedly very similar. In the end, I’m including them both because Pathologic is just $1.29 right now. At that price, you have no excuse not to try it out. It’s weird and frustrating and even after playing it a dozen times I still can’t put my finger on why I like it. Maybe I’ll just have to play through another dozen times to figure it out.
7) Cold Fear – $2.49
After a couple of weird Russian art games, I figure you all deserve a break. Cold Fear is a zombie shooter from an age where shameless ripoffs were the norm. In this case, Cold Fear is a shameless ripoff of Resident Evil 4. It’s fine, everyone was doing it back then. You just had to have a good enough gimmick. For Cold Fear, that gimmick was to just shove in as many gimmicks as possible. Since Cold Fear takes place on a boat, why not have a mechanic where you need to hold onto things to steady your aim? And also since it’s on a rocking boat, why not have swinging boxes serve as environmental hazards? Also, boats are in the ocean, so why not have the waves battering the ship as another hazard? But wait, boats also have engines! Why not also have a part where you can knock zombies into the engine and turn them into red mist? There are like a zillion stupid gimmicks in Cold Fear, and they are all pointless and wonderful. At $2.49, it’s a great blast from the past.
6) Narcosis – $7.49
Narcosis has one of the most terrifying premises of any horror game I’ve ever played. After an underwater earthquake destroys your research base, you find yourself trapped in a pressurized dive suit on the bottom of the ocean. You’re safe from drowning and most of the wildlife. However, you are always running out of oxygen. Your suit has become your walking coffin. It’s a race against time to make it to the last evacuation point before you suffocate. But don’t panic! Panicking makes you breath harder, and waste oxygen. So you must remain calm. If only you didn’t move so damn slow… and you weren’t hallucinating.
5) Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today – $1.99
In Dead Synchronicity, the world is infected with a plague. No, not the people. They have their own problems/plague. The world itself is infected. Time, reality, existence itself is dying. It’s hard to explain the exact plot, but the sense of hopelessness is palpable to anyone. It’s all wrapped up in a classic point-and-click adventure package with an expressionist art style that should make it a perfect fit for anyone looking for a more thoughtful indie nightmare.
4) Lobotomy Corporation: Monster Management Simulation – $16.74
Lobotomy Corporation is the final act of The Cabin in the Woods in videogame form. Or if you prefer, it’s an SCP simulator. Either way, Lobotomy Corporation is a management simulator for horror fans. It mixes the ghastly task of containing horrific monsters with the mundanity of an office job. Your task is to contain these horrible creatures. You’ll have to research and experiment with different methods of containment to find the right fit. But be wary, as any kind of fuck-up can quickly cascade into a tidal wave of violence. It’s wonderfully tense and chaotic, and wildly different from other horror games.
3) The Town of Light – $2.84
I’m pretty well on the record about not liking artsy games about mental disorders just because they are artsy games about mental disorders. I’m okay with minimal gameplay, but if that’s the case the game has to really impress me. The Town of Light is a game I thought I would hate. When you play as a lost girl walking through the ruins of an abandoned mental asylum, you know what you’re going to get. However, The Town of Light has no monsters or spirits stalking the halls. The horror is left to real recreations of practices and conditions in a 1930’s mental institution. For that alone, it’s something special. By the end of The Town of Light, I was in tears. It’s a game that reminds us that you don’t need to invent monsters to scare you. You don’t even need to look very far.
2) Fran Bow – $7.49
I actually wasn’t going to include Fran Bow on the list, as it made the rounds a while back as being one of those “indie game must-haves.” In my brain, everyone has already heard about, bought, played through, loved, and written a 3-5 page article on Fran Bow. But I guess I live in a bubble, as I found that none of the people in the coffee shop I forced to be part of my focus group had heard of it. Fran Bow is one of those adventure games that’s not only good, it manages to shift conversation about the genre. People thought it would be the start of a great new era of adventure games. And it kind of did. Except great isn’t the word I’d use for it. Fran Bow still serves as a shining example of what you can make with sheer imagination and a fantastic artist.
1) Penumbra: Collectors Pack – $1.49
At this point, everyone in the world has heard of Amnesia: The Dark Descent. But little did you know, they actually had a whole series of games before that. Penumbra was a series way ahead of its time. It pioneered the click-and-drag interactivity that has now become a hallmark of the horror genre. Sure, it’s rough around the edges. Swinging your pickax to fight spiders feels pretty lame. But the actual story and world more than make up for it. The collectors pack comes with three games (it looks like two, but the Requiem expansion is basically episode 3), and you can also download fan-made Penumbra: Necrologue for even more content. It’s pretty dated now, but a wonderful example of how a great idea can shine through a low budget and technical limitations. For $1.49, it’s hard to find a better deal.
And with that, my list has come to a close. That’s 16 great games for just $94.99. That’s less than the cost of a $100 bill. I think, I didn’t verify that claim with the bank. I wish I could go forever, but I am just one man and you have but two eyes to read my content with. So what did you think? any of your favorites make the list? Did I miss your favorite game? Let me know in the comments!