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Darkness and horror go hand-in-hand like cheese and wine, and it has for centuries — people have always gathered around for scary stories in the dark. So when playing a horror game, it's just common sense to turn out the lights and close the curtains.
For some games, it's practically a necessity; it's outright impossible to imagine playing them in anything but pitch blackness, allowing the fear you feel to be amplified tenfold.
Navigating darkness is when the atmosphere is at its most important, with players unable to shake off the anxiety and terror that's creeping through their bodies. So when these games actually throw in a proper scare after what feels like hours of tense darkness, it's all the more terrifying to experience.
For these horror games, it's not a rule set in stone, but in order to get the best experience, it's as rigid as law: turn the lights off before you start playing.
The Mortuary Assistant
Surely, Night Shift at the Morgue Isn't Bad
There's working night shift, and then there's working night shift at a literal morgue; just saying, morticians truly have a special kind of bravery. However, in The Mortuary Assistant, things take a turn for the absolute worst when demons decide to get involved ... and they want to possess you.
From there, the game turns into trying to ward away the demon that's targeting you, dealing with the hauntings as they come, but you're still doing your job at the same time. It's a bizarre blend of mundane busywork and bone-rattling jumpscares hiding out of the corner of your eye, and it will leave you terrified during every second of it.
Naturally, this is a game that should be played in the dark, even more preferably in the middle of the night — that way, you're working the night shift alongside Rebecca (until everything goes wrong). It's quite literally a dark and stormy night in the game, so immerse yourself in the mood.
Just remind yourself that the demons you see outside your screen aren't real; worry about the cadaver.
Alien: Isolation
Space Isn't Bright, After All
"In space, no one can hear you scream," is the tagline and very foundation of the 1979 film Alien, showing a new side to sci-fi in one of the most horrifying possible ways. A few decades later, Alien: Isolation will end up following that same principle in a far more terrifying manner ... by putting you directly in Ripley's shoes.
For continuity's sake, you're actually playing as Ellen Ripley's daughter, Amanda, but she's found herself in the same situation as her mother: a Xenomorph has made its way onto her ship (called Torrens), and she has to survive the carnage it will create. However, the Xenomorph is as intelligent as you are, so you have to constantly be on your toes.
The only light that you have in this game is what's still powered on your ship, and that's how it should be experienced — playing with lights on while trying to navigate a dark spaceship just doesn't hit the same. It's even more jarring if the light in your room is natural sunlight.
This is a game that relies on that vast and isolating (pun intended) emptiness of space, so let the darkness work its magic on Torrens.
Dead Space 2
See What Isaac Sees
Sure, we've already established that space is pitch black and therefore should be enjoyed in darkness, but considering just how much more terrifying Dead Space 2 is when compared to the first game (due to Isaac's rapidly deteriorating mental state), that darkness becomes crucial for experiencing the game's good atmosphere.
Basically, you really want to put yourself in Isaac's shoes and see what he sees, and the best way to do that is to be surrounded by the dark — that extra immersion will make his PTSD episodes all the more unsettling.
Seriously, the atmosphere just would not be the same if you weren't playing in the dark, and it will really help you get into the (emphasis on rapidly deteriorating) mindset that Isaac is stuck in. You just wouldn't get the same experience if the sun was peeking into the room.
Besides, there are a new kind of enemy, called Stalker Necromorphs, that actively sneak up on you in silence in order to ambush you, so it's best to let them work on their terms for the best adrenaline spike.
Alan Wake
Utilize Your Own Light
Alan Wake as a horror game developed a unique take on darkness: by having your light literally be your weapon against it. The enemies in this game are completely enveloped in a malicious darkness, one that can only be dispelled with your flashlight (from there, you can use whatever you have on hand to actually kill the enemy, but you can't do this without shining light on it first).
Your flashlight is going to be the sole thing keeping you alive, so you need to make sure that you actually have plenty of batteries on hand. It's not like other horror games where it's no big deal if your flashlight dies — in this game, if your flashlight dies, you die.
Because of this, it's genuinely best to play this game at night and in the dark, so that way the light that you use is all the more prominent and striking. It's almost blinding, but it's the perfect reprieve after struggling against the lack of that light. After a while, you're just happy when light is there.
With that in mind, it's a better time to play it in the dark — after all, that's what the game is all about.
SOMA
Emphasize the Void
As you go deeper underwater, the less sunlight there will be — that is, until you eventually hit the Midnight Zone, where all light is lost, and that's exactly where you find yourself in SOMA (which takes place in a vessel at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean). Right off the bat, you are submerged in darkness, and you're encouraged to follow suit.
And as you play, that darkness becomes all the more suffocating and crushing; this only gets worse once the game's existential themes start to come into fruition. The next thing you know, that darkness is going to feel like a void, and you're going to want to throw yourself into it by the time you're done.
Seriously, this game is a chilling work of art, and it's best experienced while absolutely terrified by everything it offers. The bleakness that pitch blackness instills is something this game takes advantage of, and manages to really hone in on how much more isolating everything can truly feel.
Developers are working on a spiritual successor of the game titled Ontos, and if it's anything like SOMA, I'm going to need a week to mentally prepare myself for what I'm about to get into. Even then, I'm turning my lights off to play it.
The Closing Shift
Quite Literally Nighttime Horror
Working the night shift is bound to give even the most steel-nerved a sweat, and that's the exact kind of paranoia that The Closing Shift preys on, since you're working the night shift at a café. Even worse, you're actually actively being stalked by one of your customers, adding a sense of realism that hits too close to home for some players.
Of course, since it's the closing/night shift, it's only best to play the game at nighttime, right when third shift is getting ready for their (dark) day ahead.
There's a fear in the mundane, and Chilla's Art games as a whole are fantastic about using that to their advantage (The Convenience Store is a personal favourite of mine as it also includes paranormal/supernatural elements with the ordinary), so it's best to get yourself in the mood for any of their games.
And if all their games take place at nighttime, it's best if you play in the dark.
Visage
Bring in the P.T. Vibes
If you loved the suffocating darkness that you experienced with P.T., you're going to love Visage and then some. And if you love puzzles that will genuinely get you to stop and think, you're just going to love the game even more.
Visage is a game that takes place entirely indoors, within the confines of your old home, as it twists and turns on itself in every way it can to properly haunt you. These long, dark hallways will do more for your anxiety and the overall tension of the game than any of the actual scares that are written-in, so it's not too far of a logical leap that you should keep these hallways dark.
Turn off the lights in your own home when you're playing this game, and suddenly, you're going to be enveloped in walls that aren't your own, with a creeping paranoia that won't let up no matter how far along you progress. It's one of those games where it's genuinely better to be submerged in darkness, and it will do more for you if you are.
And if that darkness starts to feel like it's closing in on you, it's probably because it is.
Resident Evil 7
Nothing Like Swamp Darkness
Resident Evil 7 is, without a doubt, easily the scariest Resident Evil game, and it's one of the few where it makes a genuine difference if you play it in the dark or not. Normally, Resident Evil is one of those games that isn't horrifyingly scary, but it knows how to make you jump out of your seat — the kind of horror that doesn't care if the lights are on.
However, Resident Evil 7 is an entirely different beast, one that requires absolute darkness for it to punch with its full effect; and let me tell you, this game is just outright terrifying. It's going to scare you in ways that you would never expect from a Resident Evil game of all places, but that's the horror power that resides here.
After a while, you're going to end up saying the same things as Ethan while you're running for your life, and not even the Save Rooms will make you feel fully comfortable in the dim light.
Not to mention, this game takes place in the swamps of Louisiana, and if there's anything you need to know about those wetlands, when nighttime comes, the darkness is unlike anything else, even when the moon is out. At this point, it's just better to play in the dark for accuracy's sake.
Darkwood
It's Literally in the Title
With a title like Darkwood, you'd probably expect this horror game to take place in deep, dark woods: and you'd be absolutely correct in that assumption. However, these woods are about as hostile as they come, and you're going to question every single noise that you hear while you're traversing it.
With this in mind, Darkwood is definitely a game that you need to play with the lights turned off; not only will it properly immerse you into the world and ramp up the atmosphere, but it'll really make the artwork of this game shine.
The art direction/art style in this game is grotesque and disturbing, playing with light and shadow in a fantastic balance you don't often see anywhere else. It's hard to be genuinely unsettling with a limited perspective (as this game is top-down), but Darkwood makes it look easy (and just outright messed up).
About the only other way you could immerse yourself in Darkwood more than just playing in the dark would be playing in the woods themselves, but it's better to see what's going bump in the night in this terrifying world.
Silent Hill 2
Absolutely Horrifying ... Everything
Silent Hill 2 is genuinely one of the scariest games you could ever play, with Silent Hill 2 Remake somehow succeeding in making it ten times scarier. It's psychological horror at its finest, combining killer ambience with stellar sound, symbolic monsters, and a story that will still shake you to your core 20 years later — and there's no shortage of secrets that will just make your blood run cold every single time.
Of course, it's even scarier when you play in the dark, especially as you get towards the latter half of the game. Playing through Toluca Prison and the Labyrinth for the first time in pitch black darkness had my heart racing as if I was running a marathon.
At times, the game itself can be so dark you can't really see, practically running around blind and hoping with everything in you that you're heading in the right direction. The first time I played through Toluca Prison, it was so dark, in fact, I didn't even find the map of the place until I had already completed the Serpent Section, if that gives you any indication of difficulty.
Even then, the experience was just so outright terrifying, it genuinely didn't matter in the long run — and if you find yourself playing this game in the dark, you'd be just as scared in the exact same way.
