10-27-2014, 02:43 AM
I was watching someone play outlast today and saw them hiding inside a locker. This instantly made me think of Alien Isolation doing the same thing, or Amnesia, using closets. The idea of hiding in a cramped space isn't something new but closets, lockers and the like have been all over horror games as of late, to the point of being a mechanic or even a staple of gaming. I might be one of the few, but I find this annoying. I think the idea itself is fine but the way it's used in games isn't. When you play a horror game where you can't fight back, you need a place to hide sure, but that hiding mechanic needs to vary in some way, and lockers are taking that variation out of the equation. The reason for this is probably because you are still standing and can see what's going on outside at least enough to get an idea of what's going on around you. Because of this, they feel safer than say, hiding under a bed or in a dark corner. I'd like to see a way to replace lockers because one thing that makes horror interesting is how game A is different from game B. If the locker becomes standard, it will take away some of that variation, or at least it seems to me like it will.
After watching an hour of the three games I mentioned at the start of the post, I realized that the only thing that felt different to me, was the monster(s). Everything else seemed so similar, that it almost made other games less scary because of all the time the let's plays I saw had people hiding in things like that. I guess what I'm trying to get at here is one, is anyone else sick of this most basic hiding mechanic? And two, does anyone have an interesting idea that might make hiding in horror games more interesting? I'd like to see some change before this becomes so common practice that it becomes boring and uninteresting, because it feels like it's already started to happen. Perhaps hiding in a place that isn't so closed off and safe feeling would add to a horror game, as opposed to giving you such a good shot at calming down as much as you need to. A horror game is supposed to be scary, so having less time to cool down, should in theory allow for a scarier, and hopefully better experience.
After watching an hour of the three games I mentioned at the start of the post, I realized that the only thing that felt different to me, was the monster(s). Everything else seemed so similar, that it almost made other games less scary because of all the time the let's plays I saw had people hiding in things like that. I guess what I'm trying to get at here is one, is anyone else sick of this most basic hiding mechanic? And two, does anyone have an interesting idea that might make hiding in horror games more interesting? I'd like to see some change before this becomes so common practice that it becomes boring and uninteresting, because it feels like it's already started to happen. Perhaps hiding in a place that isn't so closed off and safe feeling would add to a horror game, as opposed to giving you such a good shot at calming down as much as you need to. A horror game is supposed to be scary, so having less time to cool down, should in theory allow for a scarier, and hopefully better experience.