Scariest game you've seen/played?

[Solana]

I know I just missed Halloween, but was thinking about this. I had an instant answer.

Splatterhouse 3 for the Sega.

It's not the gore or gameplay that makes this game so freaky, it's the cutscenes. You play as Rick whose family is targeted by a villain called the Evil One. (I know, I know.) The setting is different levels in your own house. The first target is Rick's wife Jennifer, followed by their son David.

You're on a timer, and it is possible to save/lose your family if you defeat the level's boss in time. The cutscenes kick in at different intervals on the timer. While the game itself is in color, the cutscenes are done in a black and white film noir style. Even more, the music on the cutscenes gets faster and more highly pitched as you get closer and closer to running out of time.

This game scared the hell out of me as a kid, and I still find it incredibly unnerving.

[Rune Lai]

I generally don't like being scared or startled, so I try to avoid horror games, but I think the scariest I did finish was Koudelka. The titular character explores what appears to be an abandoned abbey, only it's not so abandoned and is host to unruly spirits and eldritch experiments. Though an RPG, it takes cues from survival horror games of the same era (PS1) with its fixed camera angles and close-ups to various objects as it asks you "Would you like to open the closet?" when the answer is obviously No, but if you don't pick Yes the game isn't going to go anywhere. Though the battles were turn based, the suggested gore and off screen corpses, journal entries of various people who died or went crazy there, made such an oppressive atmosphere that it was a supreme act of courage for me just to backtrack through the majority of the abbey when I realized I'd forgotten something.

I only played in daylight because I knew I wouldn't be able to stand it at night, and for weeks afterwards I would think about the monsters in it while entering my very dark garage in the early morning on my way to work.

[Solana]

Oooh, good choice. I hear the creators actually went to Wales and did some sound recording there to put in the game.

[skylark]

I'd have to say The Evil Within 1 and 2.

Of course, the scary was somewhat mitigated due to being Lat's Plays by heymrrabbit-

Reika: The LOUDEST voice on Twitch!

But yeah.