Puzzles are a staple in horror video games, stemming again to the basic PS1 horror titles that basically created the style.
These puzzles are essential to progressing in these video games, both by offering the important thing to the place gamers must go or revealing hidden secrets and techniques.
Horror followers anticipate what new puzzles they’ll be confronted with each time they decide up a brand new recreation, able to see how they will observe their problem-solving abilities and be scared suddenly.
A few of these puzzles are horrifying, heightening the fearful expertise whereas gamers must courageous the subsequent step ahead. Different puzzles are distinctive, requiring outside-the-box pondering and a eager eye for element.
Some puzzles are a beautiful mix of all of those traits, boiling down to simply being outright cool – to the place they’re as fondly remembered as the sport itself.
10
Pleased Birthday
Resident Evil 7
Resident Evil 7 is a superb return to horror for the Resident Evil sequence, particularly after making an attempt (and failing) to department into the motion style. By sticking to its roots, it re-cemented itself as one of many pinnacles of survival horror.
One key facet that the sport does that is by way of the Baker Household, a grotesque nuclear household that serves as the first antagonist to Ethan Winters. Earlier than Ethan, although, the household had imprisoned and tortured one other, Clancy Jarvis.
Clancy’s story with the Bakers unfolds all through the sport, together with in one of many puzzles, notably the Pleased Birthday Puzzle. This puzzle particulars Clancy’s last moments, beginning with the VHS tape that serves as the inspiration for the entire encounter.
This puzzle provides to the grotesque stress that Resident Evil 7 nails so properly, a ticking time bomb the place the gamers know that one thing horrible awaits them on the finish.
It is genuinely horrific, amplifying the specter of Lucas Baker as Ethan should retrace these steps and hope that his destiny shall be completely different.
9
Vodka Distillery
Half-Life Alyx
Half-Life: Alyx is a beloved VR horror recreation within the Half-Life sequence, and it would not even must be performed on a VR headset. It follows Alyx Vance, rescuing her father Eli after which retrieving1 the contents hidden away within the Vault.
This puzzle is in a while within the recreation, particularly in Chapter 7: Jeff. On her strategy to the Vault, Alyx cuts by way of the lengthy deserted Golden Lion Vodka Distillery, which is much better than her going through her probabilities with the Mix exterior.
The Chapter’s titular character, Jeff, is definitely an unkillable monster — a terrifying inconvenience. Plus, the would-have-been fast and straightforward route by way of the tunnels is sealed, leaving gamers to learn how to unlock it in a tense and cryptic distillery.
Your entire distillery is actually a puzzle, with elements scattered all all through the map and with timed moments that preserve you on edge. Plus, with horror video games continually having ranges in hospitals, mansions, and colleges, a vodka distillery is a enjoyable change of tempo.
8
Skeleton Statue
Tormented Souls
Tormented Souls is a PS1-style horror recreation draped in trendy graphics, a love letter to the classics that began all of it. Stuffed with cryptic puzzles, horrifying monsters, and a stylistic, moody environment, it is an absolute nostalgia journey for followers of survival horror.
There are numerous puzzles on this recreation, 17 to be precise, every uniquely tedious and entertaining. One such puzzle is the skeleton statue, discovered within the Experiment Room of the previous.
This statue is a skeleton with buttons on key physique components, and a poem mendacity proper beside it. It is a simplistic love poem, with every line containing a clue on which button must be pressed so as.
That is simply Golden Age of Survival Horror stuff, comparable in vibe to the piano puzzle has from Midwich Elementary Faculty within the first Silent Hill recreation.
7
Dollhouse
Track of Horror
Track of Horror is a refreshing horror expertise, stuffed with nice concepts and distinctive mechanics. The sport follows a literal cursed music, dooming anybody who listens to it to a grim destiny.
This recreation provides one other problem by incorporating permadeath, however not fully — with eleven whole characters to play, if gamers die, the character is completely lifeless. Afterwards, they are going to restart the chapter once more as one of many different surviving characters.
One puzzle that Track of Horror tackles is a horror staple: a dollhouse. The dolls must be put again of their correct rooms, and it is as much as the gamers to find out the place every of them will go.
Every doll has a number of hints hooked up to it: the character’s remarks when selecting up the doll, the beginning location of every doll, and Saul’s notes. It is a distinctive strategy to utilise context and creepy imagery, making the general expertise linger lengthy after it is solved.
6
Shadow Puppet
Chiyo
Chiyo is a terrifying Japanese horror recreation with an much more horrifying puzzle for these with a worry of mannequins.
The Shadow Puppet puzzle is cryptic, however easy sufficient to catch on. Taking part in because the paranormal investigator Chiyo Idate, for this puzzle they’re in a room of geisha puppets. And horrifyingly, not all of them are inanimate.
One of many geisha will observe Chiyo round, and you should definitely really look again, as a result of if the puppet will get too shut, they’re going to get you. The room can also be stuffed with dolls in varied poses — one in all which being the identical pose the puppet chasing you is in.
Utilizing her supernatural powers, Chiyo lights the candle in entrance of those dolls to solid a shadow, the puppet adjustments its pose, and the hunt for the subsequent doll is on.
This puzzle is horrifying, particularly in regard to sound design. Listening to the puppets creak nearer whereas frantically on the lookout for the matching doll is heart-racing.
It could simply be that I’d simply have a devastating worry of mannequins, however so would many different gamers, particularly after this stage.
5
Room of Sacrifice
The Evil Inside
The Evil Inside, created by Shinji Mikami, stays one of many scariest horror video games for the PS3. It is stuffed with basic survival horror staples, pulling inspiration from many different video games within the style whereas telling its personal distinctive story.
Chapter 6: Dropping Grip on Ourselves is filled with these staples, together with a imprecise puzzle that is not too laborious to be taught. Whereas progressing by way of the hospital and escaping along with your associate, gamers will discover themselves in a decrepit cave, locked from progressing.
This puzzle is simply outright macabre, requiring gamers to prepare our bodies with levers, shifting them to the proper altar primarily based on the numbers on the wall and the riddle the associate reads aloud.
If the our bodies are incorrect, the participant shall be impaled with spikes — a ugly finish, little question. It is a neat gimmick for a puzzle, taking normal horror however placing its personal spin on the work.
We’re additionally sending prayers for gamers making an attempt this puzzle whereas pursuing the infamously tough None Extra Darkish achievement; it’s going to improve the probabilities of a spiky shock.
4
Discover the Demon
The Mortuary Assistant
The Mortuary Assistant is totally horrifying — for lack of a greater time period, it is a uncooked, sadistic, demonic possession. Taking part in as Rebecca, gamers must struggle off the possession by discovering out the demon’s identify, making a mark, after which burning the internet hosting physique.
Discovering the correct physique is half the battle, as gamers even have to concentrate for hauntings, scribble on paper, preserve embalming with the intention to discover the correct corpse and be taught the demon’s identify, and take care of outright terrifying scares and visuals.
This recreation has a number of endings relying on how properly the gamers are in a position to expel the demon. It is a big puzzle that is included into the complete recreation, with much more dire penalties for failure.
It is one of many coolest puzzles in a horror recreation so far, making a complete mechanic out of it and inducing worry not like some other.
3
RPD Goddess Statue
Resident Evil 2
Resident Evil 2 is extensively considered the most effective video games within the Resident Evil sequence, introducing the fan favourites Leon S. Kennedy and Claire Redfield.
The Resident Evil 2 Remake is a splendidly devoted remake of the basic PS1 horror title, a close to 1-to-1 recreation of the unique story whereas increasing on the story and offering extra particulars. This consists of the long-lasting Raccoon Metropolis Police Division (RPD).
That station was once a museum, and it reveals within the varied puzzles which might be inside — essentially the most well-known being that of the goddess statue within the Important Corridor. This statue has three lacking medallions, and discovering all three will open a passageway into the Underground Facility.
This puzzle, actually, is simply plain enjoyable, in each the unique and within the remake. It is satisfying to seek out every medallion and rewarding to return them to the statue, particularly after surviving numerous undead — and Mr. X.
2
The Gallows
Silent Hill 2
The Silent Hill sequence is notorious for its puzzles, particularly for his or her issue. It is really really useful to play the video games with each the fight and puzzle difficulties being set to Arduous.
Silent Hill 2 is residence to one of the notorious puzzles within the franchise (and, in fact, this was recreated within the Silent Hill 2 Remake), which is The Gallows Puzzle in Toluca Jail.
This puzzle is obtainable after accumulating all the mandatory weights all through the jail, main as much as the gallows. Gamers are introduced with completely different incomplete confessions of people to be hanged, and so they must first pair the confessions to get the complete image.
After, they have to choose who’s the only real harmless of all of them, and should go pull the noose that corresponds with the confession.
Silent Hill 2 is stuffed with themes of guilt and punishment, particularly for protagonist James Sunderland — so a puzzle the place he has to actually be decide, jury and executioner is paradoxically becoming.
It is freaky, it is morbid, and completely unforgettable, making gamers excited for who the subsequent harmless could be of their subsequent playthrough.
1
Du Household Residence
Devotion
Devotion is a recreation that gamers can have a troublesome time getting their palms on, except they go to Purple Candle Video games instantly. Resulting from previous controversies, it would not be shocking if gamers hadn’t heard of it.
Your entire recreation takes place within the Du Household Residence, which is an residence in Taiwain in the course of the Eighties. This house is how the heartbreaking story shall be instructed, but it surely have to be solved first — sure, the complete residence is a multilayered puzzle.
This puzzle (and by extension, the sport) is masterfully carried out, giving gamers simply sufficient crumbs to proceed by way of the horrors but additionally permitting them perception into the household, their historical past, and their dynamics. By the top, when the complete image is revealed, it is simply harrowing.
Definitely, the Du Household Residence is without doubt one of the coolest puzzles in all horror video games, intertwining story and characters being woven collectively by way of hauntings and melancholy.
