Spooky – Page 2

Top 25 of ’25: Silent Hill

This is the last game on this list that was made before the year 2000, I swear.

Release year: 1999
Developer: Konami
Platform: PlayStation

Silent Hill. It’s iconic. Maybe less so than its sequel, but I’ve always preferred the original, myself. Yes, I’ve played it before. Just like Donkey Kong ’94, I’ve played it many times. Maybe even dozens of times, as there was a point in my life where I was trying to speedrun it and get a perfect 10-star ending. And if you don’t really know what that means, don’t worry about it. It’s not relevant to normal people.

I think we all kinda know the broad strokes of the story here: Harry Mason and his daughter Cheryl are heading off on a vacation to the town of Silent Hill, when a ghostly figure suddenly appears from the fog, causing Harry to swerve and crash his car. When he comes to, Cheryl has disappeared, and he finds himself in a town that is mostly vacant, save for a handful of random oddball characters and a legion of monsters.

I picked this one up again to play on Halloween night, and, uh… mostly made it all the way through in one go. It seems that in the few years since I had last played it, my memory of what to do and where to go had eroded a bit more than I’d expected. Most notably, I completely forgot where the rifle is picked up, missed it, and then realized that you’re unable to ever go back for it. Fortunately, it’s not really required to finish the game, but watching those rifle bullets stack up in my inventory, forever unused, really broke my heart.

The thing I like most about Silent Hill is how absolutely weird and mysterious it is. I did a lot of unnecessary exploring during this run, and noticed a lot of hidden details that I don’t remember ever seeing before, which helped to clarify a few parts of the story a little, but so much still remains up to the player’s imagination. I’ve spent the last twenty years of my life, if not more, researching the Silent Hill lore, and the fact that I still can’t explain everything about the game makes me happy.

While it was a revisit of a well-worn classic, it was one that filled my heart. I only wish that Konami would port it to more machines, because the knockoff PS3 controller I used to play it is not great and caused great cramping in my thumb-parts. And even though a big-budget remake is right around the corner, even if Bloober Team completely nails it, I don’t think the janky ol’ PS1 version will ever be dethroned as my very favourite Silent Hill.

Top 25 of ’25: The Deadseat

It seems highly unlikely that any of the games that I’ve talked to would have made any other person in the world’s GOTY list. I guess I’m just a weirdo like that. And here’s another one that nobody is going to remember but me.

Release Year: 2025
Developer: Curious Fox Sox
Platform: PC

I kind of thought that we were past the era of FNAF clones, but it’s 2025 and The Deadseat exists. And I guess that last statement was maybe a little disingenuous; The Deadseat has gameplay similar to the classic Five Nights at Freddy’s games, but it’s distinct enough to stand on its own, and there isn’t a single haunted animatronic in sight.

This game has you play as a kid, riding in the backseat of your parents’ car, on the way home from grandma’s house or something. Mom and dad are bickering, and they tell you to just stay quiet and play your video game. But something sinister begins to happen, and the car is attacked by a curious two-headed monster that seems to have some connection to your character…

The main gameplay has you watching for the monster to pop up on either side of the car or in the back window, and you shoo it away with a camera flash to keep it from breaking the windows to get in and maul you to death. At the same time, you’re trying to drive the car in your video game to avoid obstacles and collect fuel cans. There are five stages, and a mini-game in between each stage that you play on your totally-not-Nintendo-DS gives you a chance to collect supplies like boards and bear traps to help keep the monster away. Each stage also introduces some sort of new gimmick to add to your stress.

And stressful it is! When I first started the game, hard mode was available from the title screen right away, and I immediately said “there’s no way I’m doing that.” But then I beat the game, and the ending was completely bonkers and left me with my jaw on the floor wondering what I had just witnessed. And then the game promised to tell me the whole story if I played through again on hard mode. So I did. And though it was indeed very difficult, I pushed through and actually it was incredibly fun. Frustrating, but in the best way.

Now, I don’t think there’s any contesting that this game exists largely as bait for indie game loretubers, but the gameplay behind it is surprisingly solid and fun. I recorded a let’s play of this one, and it’s one of the very few that I was really excited to watch back because I just enjoyed the game that much. I’d like to go back to it and give the challenge mode (which was added after I finished the main game) a shot, but I don’t know that I’ll ever make the time.

All that said, The Deadseat was great. It game me all the feelings, was terrifically fun and anxiety-inducing, and has a seriously messed up but interesting story to tie it all together. No question it’s one of my favourite games that I’ve played this year.

Top 25 of ’25: A Lakeside Walk in the Dolomites

If the last entry was the weirdest one, this is going to be the most unlikely. You wouldn’t expect a 20-minute-long game to make anyone’s Top X list in any year but here we are, and I’m about to pitch A Lakeside Walk in the Dolomites to you.

Release Year: 2025
Developer: Emad
Platform: PC

Yes, that’s right, A Lakeside Walk in the Dolomites is only about 20 minutes long. It’s a walking simulator with absolutely zero gameplay elements other than looking around to find documents. But I really liked it! I hate to say it, but I think maybe it’s mostly because I had very low expectations going in, but it surprised me in the best ways.

Oh, and obviously, this falls into the indie horror genre, which I think is more than enough to tell you how I even ended up playing it in the first place.

So the basic premise of the game is that you’re some random person going for a walk at night. You stroll down this nice, relatively well-lit path next to a lake, pass by a park, yadda yadda. But then things get a little weird. You start to find documents about missing persons and strange cult-like behavior in the area. Ducks randomly vanish into the lake. You hear whispering, seemingly from nowhere, and you start to see movements in your peripheral vision.

A Lakeside Walk does atmosphere perfectly. It starts at zero, then slowly builds the tension as you follow the path, and then (very stupidly) veer off into the forest. More than once, the unexpected little noises made me jump. And then you come out to a clearing by the lake and… the unexpected happens. I’m not going to spoil the ending, but I absolutely did not see it coming. It’s not a particularly wild twist, but it’s done really well, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

And so, that about wraps up everything I have to say about this game. It may be a little too heavy on the notes, but other than that I have no complaints. It’s a free game on itch.io too, so obviously I recommend going to check it out for yourself. I only wish I weren’t so desensitized to horror, because I know this would have scared the pants right off of seven-years-ago-Ryan. Big ol’ stamp of approval here.

Also, keep an eye on my YouTube channel for my let’s play of the game, coming… March 2nd, 2026? Oh jeez, that’s pretty far away, isn’t it? All the more reason for you to play it yourself!

Top 25 of ’25: Bloodbark

For 2025, rather than doing a Top 10 Video Games article, I’ve decided to do something different and do a countdown list of the games I liked most of all the games that I played throughout the year. That incudes all games I played, regardless of release year, if I’d played them before, etc, etc. No rules!

So, of the 99 games I’ve played from January until the time of me writing this, I’ve narrowed it down to a list of 25. The first of those being Bloodbark.

Release year: 2025
Developer: SirTartarus
Platform: PC

A short experience that will take maybe half an hour to beat if you goof around, Bloodbark is an indie horror game where you play as a lumberjack. Your goal is to look for special trees that bleed when chopped, which, if I’m remembering the lore correctly, are very rare and worth a ton of money. So your dude wants to collect a bunch of this lumber, sell it, and retire early.

Of course, it’s not that simple. As you stay in the forest longer, and as you cut down more bloodbark trees, you begin to have hallucinations. And they only get more vivid and disturbing as the game goes on. Eventually you start to question reality, and if the trees that you’re cutting down are really even trees at all…

That vagueness is part of what made this game really stick in my mind. I thought about it for weeks after I finished playing it, just muddling over the details and trying to figure out what exactly was going on and what the meaning of it all was. I think, in the end, it’s perhaps supposed to be about respecting nature, but I really can’t be sure. There are also two fairly different paths through the game, with one ending that is significantly more ambiguous than the other.

While Bloodbark is effectively a walking simulator, it does reward exploration by containing a metric buttload of little secrets and easter eggs. There are also a number of in-game achievements, and even a series of collectibles that you might not even notice if you aren’t looking for them. I had a great time playing it, and I look back on it quite fondly. Hence, I give it the coveted first spot in my Top 25 of ’25.

Month End Video Game Wrap-Up: November 2025

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Pokémon Legends: Z-A (Switch2) – While it doesn’t quite reach the heights of Legends: Arceus, it was clearly going in a very different direction from the start. Not outstanding, but I had a lot of fun playing it! And will keep playing through the postgame and DLC expansion.

Ramona (PC) – What I’ve been calling an “escape house” game, this is the most recent Doesn’t Matter Games release, and it doesn’t disappoint. A creepy house full of puzzles and jumpscares? Sign me up!

Kromaia (PC) – A neat 3D space-shooter game that’s as dizzying as it is impossible to see what’s going on. While I could see myself playing it through in leaner times, there are so many other games I’d rather spend my time on. So I beat the first level and then tossed it on the “not really feeling it” pile.

Month End Video Game Wrap-Up: October 2025

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The Trees Holding Heaven (PC) – A teeny-tiny “horror” game, which is mostly just a parable about not disposing of science water in the forest. It did legitimately cause me to scream, so that’s a thing.

Ramona – Play With Me demo (PC) – You ought to know how I feel about Doesn’t Matter Games by now. This is the demo for an upcoming title. It’s… exactly what you’d expect if you’re familiar with the developer. I liked it!

The Moth Inside Me (PC) – A horror game made for the “2024 LSD Game Jam”, which should tell you all you need to know. Great atmosphere, and some parts definitely resonated with me. While I think it was often a little too hard to figure out what to do next, I did enjoy it overall.

‘Ween Movies 2025 – Volume 2

A great surprise to everyone -mostly myself,- I’m back with another couple of vaguely seasonally-appropriate movies to talk about! And when I say “vaguely” I really mean it. I really ought to just throw on a Friday the 13th at some point just to get a little of the Halloween spirit going in my place.

The Endless

While Tubi lists The Endless as Sci-Fi/Horror/Mystery/Thriller, I would at least re-order those so that they go Mystery/Sci-Fi/Thriller/Horror, which is the most appropriate order. At most, I’d probably just pluck Horror out of there altogether. Yes, there is a certain cosmic horror element to the movie, but it’s really not the focus in any capacity.

This film follows two brothers, Justin and Aaron, who are living a bit of a rough life ten years after having escaped from a “UFO death cult.” Justin, the elder brother, feels like it’s his responsibility to take care of the both of them (despite them being at least in their mid-twenties), while Aaron longs to return to the cushy life that the cult had provided them. When he receives a random cassette tape from the cult announcing that they’re about to “ascend”, it spurs them to make a return visit to say their goodbyes, and maybe to show Aaron that it’s not as wonderful as he remembers it being.

Once they arrive, things do seem fairly peaceful, and the cult welcomes the brothers back with open arms, despite Justin having told many nasty tales to the media about what goes on there. The cult members all have their own eccentricities, but they’re happy, living simple lives where they’re free to pursue their passions and ignore the troubles of the modern world. Aaron is immediately enamored, but Justin remains skeptical, feeling that things are just a little too peaceful, and that there’s something rather important that the cult is keeping from them.

‘Ween Movies 2025 – Volume 1

It’s that time again. Halloween is coming and as a fan of horreur, I have to up my movie-watching game. Well, I suppose I don’t have to. But it’s basically all I do for the season any more so… I don’t really know where I was going with this thought. Let’s just do the thing.

V/H/S/94

This is an anthology film, for all the good and bad that entails. In addition to the four short films that are featured in it, the framing device also has its own story. It’s about a SWAT team that busts into a warehouse to… I don’t really know what they were up to, but they find a bunch of corpses and mannequins and screens that lead into the other segments. This was by far the weakest part of the film, and honestly I would have been happier if there had just been a Crypt Keeper-style host that introduced each segment. Points for having each of the short films tie into the framing device, but it was still lame and had the worst actors by a country mile.

This first short follows a news reporter and her cameraman as they investigate a local legend of a sewer-dwelling creature known as the Ratman. It starts off with your average interviews of random townsfolk, but then the big boss demands that they actually go into the sewer to get the real story. Our heroes reluctantly comply, entering a storm drain where they find a dirty old homeless man. He creeps them the heck out, and as they run away, they’re knocked unconscious and, well, things take a bit of a turn from there. I can’t say I saw what happened next coming, and it’s definitely a much better ending to the story than if they’d just found a monster and got mauled by it. While this was the most surprising story in the anthology, I wasn’t totally sold. The whole climax was shaky-cammed to Hell and while I know that often the scariest things are what you don’t see, the obfuscation was very clearly there because they didn’t have any money to actually put the action on screen.

It Begins Again

Friends, Romans, countrymen – Spooktober is here! Well, it got here yesterday but I can’t embed videos until they’re live, so I had to do this post today, and, yeah…

Anyway, with the month of October comes a full slate of horror (or at least horror-adjacent) let’s plays over on TE Video. I mean, nobody’s going to watch any of it, but I’m excited! And that’s all that counts.

It all kicks off today, with an older game from TurnVex called Within Skerry. I’ve played most of TurnVex’s games, and they’re generally decent. Unfortunately, this one includes a mechanic that requires you to take dozens of photos of split-second events to unlock the best(?) ending, so I didn’t get that one.

https://youtu.be/FuFew3OUh-4

I’m not going to type out everything that’s scheduled to go up during the month because I’m kind of over doing that, but rest assured that there are plenty of thrills, chills, and spills to come over the course of the month!

Month End Video Game Wrap-Up: September 2025

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The Lancaster Leak (PC) – This is actually a trilogy of 20-30 minute games. An anthology that tells three different stories, each in a different style, and with an overarching plot thread that connects them all. Looking forward to more!

Kirby and the Forgotten Land + Star-Crossed World (Switch2) – I’ve been wanting to replay this game ever since I finished it, and the new DLC was more than enough reason to do so. Still the best Kirby game, and now there’s even more of it.

Replay (PC) – A 7-minute-long indie horror where you play as a person playing a haunted video game. Gave off FNAF vibes despite not being anything like FNAF, and left me wanting more.