I'll be the first to admit that I'm not an avid gamer. I probably haven't picked up a controller in four years before I launched back into the world of video games recently. The only games I knew of were Super Smash Bros. and Grand Theft Auto, and the last time I remember being excited about graphics where when Dance Dance Revolution came out and I got it under my tree for Christmas.

But I'll also be the first to admit that I'm an avid horror fan, consuming every slasher film that pops up on my Netflix homepage and backtracking to revisit all the old classics. However, the horror genre has quickly become a watered down mess of low-budget filmmaking, coupled with lackluster storylines.The films Hollywood is putting down these days lack imagination and settle on torture-porn kills to amp up their audience, when all we really want is some solid acting and a viciously scary plot that doesn't involve someone showing their breasts for shock value.

Enter the survival horror video game genre, something I recently became aware of even though it's been around for years.

Recently, I played the PS4 survival-horror Until Dawn, a choose-your-own-adventure sort-of game which revolves around the reunion of eight teens on a snowy mountain a year after their two friends go missing. The game was created by Supermassive Games and Sony using motion capture and recognizable actors like Hayden Panettiere, creating a creepy and atmospheric game in which you control the fate of each character.

The game opens with a simple and horrific tutorial, and from then on you have until dawn (heh) to survive a rampaging killer who is out to kill your entire crew. The game doesn't offer much in terms of diverse game play, but that doesn't matter very much when you take the game for exactly what it is: a horror movie you control.

sony.com

In order to play Until Dawn, you need to shut off all the lights and allow the creepy atmosphere to consume you. You help your characters survive by choosing simple things like "hide" or "run" when the killer begins to chase you. Choose too slow and you lose another player. By holding the controller, you're essentially deciding the fate of everyone in the game and every mistake has a serious, permanent consequence.

Instead of just watching a horror film unfold, you become an active participant; often when characters die you feel responsible. You've grown attached to them no matter how obnoxious they may be, and furthermore you can't help but feel awful when their death comes from a misplaced button push or ill-advised decision. The stakes are so much higher than any other video game because there are no re-do's: once a character dies, he or she is dead for the duration of the game.

And it is this exact connection that makes survival horror games so thrilling and terrifying. Back when Psycho first came out in 1960, the "gore" we now find hilariously camp caused people to become sick in the theaters. Today, audiences have become savvy to horror films. We're able to dissect predictable plotlines. The visceral reactions we used to have to slasher and horror films are now a thing of the past, with the market saturated with half-baked thrills that audiences no longer care for.

Sony

With survival horror video games, you have hours upon hours to grow attached to characters, and the advancements with graphics make the characters you play as life-like as they can be. Not only do you begin to root for characters as the speed of the game picks up, you begin to feel like you're part of the crew fighting for survival. Much like in real life, if you're being chased by a knife-wielding maniac, each choice you make can affect how the events unfold. By bringing the horror experience into the world of interactive gameplay, the creators of these games are allowing fans to immerse themselves in the experience and feel what it would be like to fight for your life.

With the push for virtual reality quickly becoming a reality, we can expect horror survival games to be the sole source of our nightmares in the future. According to the creators of Oculus Rift (a virtual reality headset that plans to immerse players into the world of the game), they're coming up close on figuring out the first VR death. The headset will allow users to play games on the horizon which involve solving crimes and finding their missing families.

However, this raises the question of how dangerous is it to immerse yourself in. Critics have noted that by playing games such as Until Dawn and even farther down the line, people who play VR horror games may be putting their hearts at risk. The added adrenaline could push people who are not completely healthy to give themselves heart complications if they become too engrossed in the game.

Although this is medically terrifying, for anyone who is an avid horror fan, it is a dream come true. With all this push towards immersing ourselves in the fear, it is no wonder that horror films have become passé and people are flocking towards becoming part of the story. The future of horror is at your fingertips, if only you choose to pick up the controller and be an active participant.



