QCF: Until Dawn

t isn’t until the unfortunate passing of Wes Craven that it dawned on me the appreciation for the classic stylings and tropes of yesterday’s fright-fests and the terror-induced nightmares they dished out after spending a couple of hours of watching a bunch a hapless teenagers getting hacked to bits.

At some point, we’ve all exploded out of our seats in excitement back at the screen, so that we could root for the characters we wanted to live to live through the danger they were in, and in some of those instances, we lament over the poor choices that lead to their demise.

This sort of engagement often dissipated the empathy that was intended to connect with the viewer, and would instead lead to them boasting that the scenario would’ve played out much differently were they placed in that lethal predicament in lieu of the lovable idiot that bit the dust.

Well, while no one would ever really want to be wrapped up in that sort of hell, Supermassive Games gives us the next best thing with the exclusive title to hit the PlayStation 4.

Until Dawn proves that something as silly as keeping eight teenagers alive for a whole night can be one of the most intense commitments that you can ever hope to engage out of a video game yet.

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QCF: Five Nights at Freddy's

n the vein of Stephen King’s It or Chucky, Five Nights at Freddy’s takes on one of the creepiest characters from our collective childhood ­ the animatronic robots dressed as cuddly stuffed animals that perform at amusement parks and fun centers. Their dead eyes and jerky movements place them firmly in the Uncanny Valley ­ a bit too life­like for comfort. Why did these things exist?

Whoever thought they were appropriate for children? Even as a little girl I remember shrinking away whenever they “looked” at me (also, people who dress up as statues). These robots are creepy as hell, making them the perfect villains for this atmospheric nightmare game.

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PAX PRIME 2014: Surviving the creep show of Alien Isolation

hether it was on the show, editorial, video, social media, or whatever—I’ve gone on record ad nauseam about how the horror genre is dead in the water when it comes to modern game design. Over the last couple of weeks, titles like PT and Five Nights at Freddy’s have rightfully earned my foot an invite straight into my mouth, but one game in particular, managed to send chills down my spine.

Sega decided to dish out the scares several weeks before Halloween with Alien Isolation, an experience that was so effective at startling me, that it got the point across in an a show-floor environment, surrounded by a bunch of other people playing the very same game. People who were also relatively feeling some sort of anxiety of their own from the demo as well.

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QCF: Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs

hen Amnesia: The Dark Descent was released in 2010, it was a breath of fresh air into an industry that had seemed to have lost its way with horror titles for a while. Its unique tension and combat free gameplay gave the player a sense of helplessness that hadn't been experienced before. Paired up with undeniably scary set pieces this created a cult indie game that took YouTube by storm. The reaction videos to this terrifying game really hit a nerve and cemented The Dark Descent as a game every horror fan should experience.

Now it's three years later and the anticipation for this sequel has grown. Teamed up with Dear Esther creators The Chinese Room, Frictional Games is presenting us a follow up with a lot of pressure on it's back. A Machine for Pigs is this title and depending on your stance on what makes gameplay engaging, you'll either be loving it or hating it. However, one thing you unfortunately won't be is scared.

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PPR Presents Lime Light: The Dead Space Series

pace, the grand frontier of limitless possibility of the grandest variety; and yet we’re planning to visit a lot of dead stuff…IN SPACE! PPR is planning their most epic stream yet as George intends to marathon all three Dead Space games from start to finish for your entertainment and fright. Tune in around Saturday, February 23rd, at 2:00 PM pacific time and join us in the chat on our Justin.TV account or settle in for the stream right here where George and the gang get down on the get down and might have a couple of brews to ease the tension of surviving monstrous horrors -- IN SPACE.

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