Games with Unintentional Creepiness

Dead Guy · Mar 16, 2019

This fucking game:

Note the cover art on the box. Also note that it says ages 6 to 12. I'm getting some real mixed messages here.

The game itself is a point and click with the occasional puzzle you have to solve and the objective is to get the hell out of the manor. The whole game is creepy as fuck on purpose and it even includes several sequences where you have to scramble to find a place to hide to avoid getting caught by the two hench guys. Let me tell you as an 8 year old child these sequences were nightmare inducing. 6 to 12 my ass.

Here are some screen shots to show just how scary the whole game was:

Why was this ok'd for children!?!

Deleted member 8861 · Mar 16, 2019

Silvergun-Blue said:
This from the Medal Of Honor reboot. There's something really unsettling about it.

It's that half second stare. It's like she's saying "Hi there. Do not interfere."

GamerJM · Mar 16, 2019

Oheao said:
For me it was the GCN Bios menu

This definitely scared me as a kid. The sound effects are just plain eerie and since they're the only thing you hear it just feels mysterious. Them, combined with the fact that it wouldn't be too difficult to accidentally delete something when navigating around the memory card menu, definitely scared me.

But then of course, there's also the fact that it would boot automatically whenever the Gamecube couldn't read your disc. As my laser was dying, the fact that the console would boot straight to the bios more and more frequently caused a direct association in my mind between the dread that came from the fear of losing my console and that spooky bios menu.

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

ClickyCal' · Mar 16, 2019

A ton of gen 5 3d games...including sm64, especially more hindsight. Maybe because most characters had static facial expressions and just weird faces, a lot of creepy empty places, etc. It's hard to explain, but yea.

KDR_11k · Mar 16, 2019

I always get this feeling of underlying wrongness when seeing Sonic 06. Like something eldritch is hiding by putting up a facade of normalcy that doesn't quite hold up.

Deleted member 17643 · Mar 16, 2019

I found Bound to be incredibly creepy in VR, simply by moving the life sized character model toward the camera rapidly. I could literally make myself flinch.

Silver-Streak · Mar 16, 2019

I can never tell if the creepiness in Dropsy is intentional or not. I never got around to finishing the game, but the game itself is focused on making the people you meet happy.

http://dropsytheclown.com/

1upsuper · Mar 16, 2019

yuoke said:
A ton of gen 5 3d games...including sm64, especially more hindsight. Maybe because most characters had static facial expressions and just weird faces, a lot of creepy empty places, etc. It's hard to explain, but yea.

The boo that stares at you from across the hallway leading to the courtyard as you head towards the basement still kinda creeps me out. Looking down long hallways kinda bothers me in general.

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

yuoke said:
A ton of gen 5 3d games...including sm64, especially more hindsight. Maybe because most characters had static facial expressions and just weird faces, a lot of creepy empty places, etc. It's hard to explain, but yea.

60fps · Mar 16, 2019

I don't know why but Super Mario Bros 2 always creeped me out. I was pretty young though.

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

60fps said:
I don't know why but Super Mario Bros 2 always creeped me out. I was pretty young though.

That game gave me nightmares...

harry the spy · Mar 16, 2019

Silver-Streak said:
I can never tell if the creepiness in Dropsy is intentional or not. I never got around to finishing the game, but the game itself is focused on making the people you meet happy.

http://dropsytheclown.com/

Published by devolver : whatever looks creepy in the game is probably intentional.

Deleted member 29237 · Mar 16, 2019

This scared the hell out of me as a child. I think it was the idea that the sun itself was trying to kill you, and he looks like he *hates* you. I can't think of anything else in the Mario series that looks and behaves as scarily as this enemy.

blitzblake · Mar 16, 2019

Might have been intentionally, but running out of the Temple of Time as Adult link for the first time...

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

The storyline in Super Mario Sunshine.

MrBadger · Mar 16, 2019

Honestly I'm finding the new Yoshi game to be pretty creepy. The artstyle and the incredibly minimal (or sometimes complete absence of) music is giving me creepy vibes

Also,

there's a level with screeching axe wielding clowns that attack you in the dark

gameplay link

Link the Hero · Mar 16, 2019

I think most games named in this thread are intentionally creepy. It's a hard task anyway since you never know what the developer's intentions were.

Nonetheless, my vote goes to the mission in Majora's Mask where you had to save the cows from getting kidnapped by the aliens. I was afraid of playing that part back then.

Stormkyleis · Mar 16, 2019

GamerJM said:
This definitely scared me as a kid. The sound effects are just plain eerie and since they're the only thing you hear it just feels mysterious. Them, combined with the fact that it wouldn't be too difficult to accidentally delete something when navigating around the memory card menu, definitely scared me.

But then of course, there's also the fact that it would boot automatically whenever the Gamecube couldn't read your disc. As my laser was dying, the fact that the console would boot straight to the bios more and more frequently caused a direct association in my mind between the dread that came from the fear of losing my console and that spooky bios menu.

Exactly this lol. I used to look away from the screen whenever I turned on my GameCube.

Katarn343 · Mar 16, 2019

Deleted member 16876 · Mar 16, 2019

Green Mario said:
I can't believe this hasn't been posted yet.

No matter what, I will always go out of my way to make sure this bastard gets locked in the freezer.
Hearing the stuff rattle around on his tray while he slowly clambers towards you is so creepy.

I can't believe I forgot about him. Man was creepy as hell.

Lukemia SL · Mar 16, 2019

Abandoned systems in No Man's Sky where the abandoned space station are the ones with the design Pre-NEXT DLC. The atmosphere here is just creepy and there's nothing to find here.

lvl 99 Pixel · Mar 16, 2019

Katarn343 said:

A cemetery with creepy music, ghosts and grieving NPCs is not unintentional

LDAF · Mar 16, 2019

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire is scarier than most horror games. Everyone I've talked to about it feels the same way. The wampas, the sewers, IG-88, the fog, frequent darkness, and level design that made it hard to see an enemy until it was right on top of you...

Katarn343 · Mar 16, 2019

lvl 99 Pixel said:
A cemetery with creepy music, ghosts and grieving NPCs is not unintentional

Wait, really? Sorry, I didn't even remember the background info.

Dice · Mar 16, 2019

Creation_Scapes said:

They're aware of this one because it remains one of the scariest fucks in the latest major installment

I hate the Ocarina of Time "?" (Windmill). I love this game and always hate playing the creepy parts

No one should be making this face. Why does anyone live here, why do you look like you've seen death and you try to hide it?

w.t.f. Why would anyone be DEMONICALLY MAD at you for music. He never attacks you...but then why THIS face?

Samstrike · Mar 16, 2019

finley83 said:
This scared the hell out of me as a child. I think it was the idea that the sun itself was trying to kill you, and he looks like he *hates* you. I can't think of anything else in the Mario series that looks and behaves as scarily as this enemy.

What about those :

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

Dice said:
They're aware of this one because it remains one of the scariest fucks in the latest major installment

I hate the Ocarina of Time "?" (Windmill). I love this game and always hate playing the creepy parts

No one should be making this face. Why does anyone live here, why do you look like you've seen death and you try to hide it?

w.t.f. Why would anyone be DEMONICALLY MAD at you for music. He never attacks you...but then why THIS face?

I know but in Mario64 it wasn't meant to be as creepy as in the new games obviously.

Deleted member 51539 · Mar 16, 2019

Ecco and Lavender Town were definitely intentional.

Son of Liberty · Mar 16, 2019

I remember playing Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer on the GameCube and it always creeped me out when you would crash into the water on some of the levels and all you could see below you was pure black.

Creation_Scapes · Mar 16, 2019

Zehzin said:
Ecco and Lavender Town were definitely intentional.

Definitely.

Pendas · Mar 16, 2019

antitrop said:
No one has ever heard of Kether, because it was on the CD-i, but it is fucking creepy weird.

I had this game as a kid and had no idea what they were going for with the presentation, the gameplay was rather unremarkable space shooter/dodge asteroids kind of stuff. But all the cutscenes and voice acting is the stuff of nightmares.

One of those games you can't explain how it was created other than drugs. Drugs would also be the only reason to choose to develop for the Philips CD-i.

HOLY SHIT I HAD THIS GAME!!!

I can barely remember because it was such a long time ago, but I remember playing this having no fucking clue what was going on or how to do anything. but trying to get through it anyway because this was the only CD-I game we had.

RecLib · Mar 16, 2019

A lot of early 3d games are kind of creepy for me. I think just how empty the environments are, and how short the draw distance is. Sometimes its like you are just walking in this void and anything could jump out at you.
I say that, even talking about very cutesy kid friendly games.

TigerGD · Mar 16, 2019

In Street Fighter III, when you square off against Urien and Gill, and they explode out of their clothing to reveal their banana hammocks underneath. Bros, I did not come here to tussle *like that*

But seriously, I was driving off-road at night in Forza Horizon 4, and dropped off an embankment straight into a river. I was instantly overcome with a very real sense of panic, because I've had nightmares of all sorts of drowning scenarios ever since I was narrowly rescued from one as a kid.

RedDevil · Mar 16, 2019

Dice said:
I hate the Ocarina of Time "?" (Windmill). I love this game and always hate playing the creepy parts

No one should be making this face. Why does anyone live here, why do you look like you've seen death and you try to hide it?

w.t.f. Why would anyone be DEMONICALLY MAD at you for music. He never attacks you...but then why THIS face?

Well it's explained by himself when you talk to him.

Deleted member 21411 · Mar 17, 2019

Silver-Streak said:
I can never tell if the creepiness in Dropsy is intentional or not. I never got around to finishing the game, but the game itself is focused on making the people you meet happy.

http://dropsytheclown.com/

Point of the game is that "scary on the outside, kind on the inside"

The guy just made hypnospace outlaw, he knows what he's doin

Joseph · Mar 17, 2019

Walking around the house in Gone Home felt creepy to me.

Baccus · Mar 17, 2019

Tonky said:
Idk if it counts but:

the entire epilogue of RDR2, knowing what happened to Arthur and what will eventually happen to John...was really off-putting.

Nailed it. It hits really hard. Like in a mental area no Videogame had before. So unpleasant.

flyover · Mar 17, 2019

I liked Myst when I played it, way back when. But it never filled me with wonder. Just loneliness and dread. It instilled a feeling in me that I wouldn't have again until Shadow of the Colossus, where making progress in the game

felt like I was the villain, working toward unleashing some unspeakable evil.

Of course, in SotC, that was the point.

BouncyFrag · Mar 17, 2019

SofNascimento said:

Moar:

Liam giving zero fucks:

Mediking · Mar 17, 2019

Tonky said:
Idk if it counts but:

the entire epilogue of RDR2, knowing what happened to Arthur and what will eventually happen to John...was really off-putting.

Yup pretty disturbing but not in a totally bad way

Mediking · Mar 17, 2019

Silvergun-Blue said:
This from the Medal Of Honor reboot. There's something really unsettling about it.

Menome said:
If the snippet of subtitles weren't there, I could easily scroll past this now-infamous gif and not notice it was CG. I think the zoomed-in cropping just helps make it look like it's a normal person filmed on an average phone camera.

This is CG?!

Serenitynow · Mar 17, 2019

This is going to be a deep cut but the Sims 2 on DS.

Procheno · Mar 17, 2019

Not a game but a screen that always really creeped me out when I was a kid and still kinda feel offputting to this day. When you turn on the SNES, you always had a small chance of not turning on the game with the intro cutscene and good happy music and all that but rather booting up this screen at pure random in dead silence.

You would turn on the system, the screen would hard cut from black to this picture with heavy shadows, faces of the kongs, and no music or audio at all. If I was playing in a dark room alone I was always off put

Menome · Mar 17, 2019

Mediking said:
This is CG?!

Yep. It's a lot more obvious from the actual cutscene thanks to not being zoomed in just on her face.

The first time I saw that gif, I had no context for it other than someone saying it was "creepy" and I had no idea why. I genuinely thought it was real because I wasn't laser-focusing my attention on it.

flyingorion · Mar 17, 2019

Early 3D games in general can have some creepy elements. It's with the low draw distance, abstract level designs, low polygonal graphics, empty levels

wollywinka · Mar 17, 2019

shaneo632 said:

She looks like she needs potty training, not N7 training.

justiceiro · Mar 17, 2019

Dkc2. That park world seems straight out of my nightmare.

AMAGON · Mar 17, 2019

shaneo632 said:

I had that same feeling taking a dump earlier.

Magicgamer · Mar 17, 2019

It took me awhile to start playing both The Witcher 3 and Skyrim because I was always kinda creeped out by monsters randomly attacking me, especially at night. Same with Fallout 3 as well, I was barely able to make progress in the game. I got over it though because I realised I'm good at games and don't really die and even if I did it's not Dark Souls where I drop all my souls/cash.

Games with Unintentional Creepiness

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