Fear-quitting

So i have hydrophobia. Not proud of it, but i do. Deep water scares the bejeebus out of me, probably the one thing out there that makes me downright irrational and  crazy uncomfortable, and does it ever.

Ironically, this creates a real fascination with underwater/water themed video games. Playing Silent Hunter 3 was borderline horror for me; i'd find myself keeping the camera above water because as soon as it dropped beneath the waves and the sound got muted and i couldn't see the bottom, just that black void, it was just too uncomfortable to do for long. The Bioshock intro was tough for me for this reason as well. No seeing the bottom = i freak out.

Picked up Silent Hunter 4 for cheap today, installed it, played a while, enjoyed it. Liked going to the bottom of the pacific to see the new seabed detail, something about the brighter, bluer waters of this game makes the experience less harrowing. Then i made the mistake of doing the same thing at (game) night-time. There's something about how they do water in SH4 that is really, really accurate. The way light distorts, the way particles float and drift, the way it seems so damn deep. The sensation i got was so intense i actually had to stop playing, just quit out of the game immediately.

It got me thinking of other games that have gotten that response out of me; games that are instinctively uncomfortable to play to such a high degree that it becomes physically trying to keep going.

Project Zero 1-3
These games are evil enough to make me never want to play any of them ever again. The first was a horrible experience, the second i actually finished (through a fog of alcohol, bright lights and the rule of never playing alone), and the third i have tried repeatedly to get back into but it keeps simply repulsing me. I like the sensation of fear, but i don't like to be completely mortified. It's a very difficult balance apparently, since so few get it right, and some, like Project Zero, get it TOO right. The quality of the games as games is also something that can be discussed, since mechanically they are damn near archaic, the voice acting and animation work is iffy at best, but it all comes together to create this David Lynchian dream sequence experience that is a perfect foundation for a bunch of freaky ghosts doing freaky ghost shit.

Aliens vs Predator (PC)
The marine campaign. I can barely get through the first mission, and it just gets worse from there. Some of the most sadistic "play" i've ever done. Pitch blackness and randomly spawning, screaming rapist enemies. Argh. The sequel was pretty tough to play as well, but it was more of a comic book experience and didn't feel as intimate.

STALKER
The underground bits in STALKER are insane events. Some of the shit they put you through in the dark is just twisted sadism.

So what about you lot. Any games freak you out so bad you had to stop playing?

So i have hydrophobia. Not proud of it, but i do. Deep water scares the bejeebus out of me, probably the one thing out there that makes me downright irrational and  crazy uncomfortable, and does it ever.

Ironically, this creates a real fascination with underwater/water themed video games. Playing Silent Hunter 3 was borderline horror for me; i'd find myself keeping the camera above water because as soon as it dropped beneath the waves and the sound got muted and i couldn't see the bottom, just that black void, it was just too uncomfortable to do for long. The Bioshock intro was tough for me for this reason as well. No seeing the bottom = i freak out.

Picked up Silent Hunter 4 for cheap today, installed it, played a while, enjoyed it. Liked going to the bottom of the pacific to see the new seabed detail, something about the brighter, bluer waters of this game makes the experience less harrowing. Then i made the mistake of doing the same thing at (game) night-time. There's something about how they do water in SH4 that is really, really accurate. The way light distorts, the way particles float and drift, the way it seems so damn deep. The sensation i got was so intense i actually had to stop playing, just quit out of the game immediately.

It got me thinking of other games that have gotten that response out of me; games that are instinctively uncomfortable to play to such a high degree that it becomes physically trying to keep going.

Project Zero 1-3
These games are evil enough to make me never want to play any of them ever again. The first was a horrible experience, the second i actually finished (through a fog of alcohol, bright lights and the rule of never playing alone), and the third i have tried repeatedly to get back into but it keeps simply repulsing me. I like the sensation of fear, but i don't like to be completely mortified. It's a very difficult balance apparently, since so few get it right, and some, like Project Zero, get it TOO right. The quality of the games as games is also something that can be discussed, since mechanically they are damn near archaic, the voice acting and animation work is iffy at best, but it all comes together to create this David Lynchian dream sequence experience that is a perfect foundation for a bunch of freaky ghosts doing freaky ghost shit.

Aliens vs Predator (PC)
The marine campaign. I can barely get through the first mission, and it just gets worse from there. Some of the most sadistic "play" i've ever done. Pitch blackness and randomly spawning, screaming rapist enemies. Argh. The sequel was pretty tough to play as well, but it was more of a comic book experience and didn't feel as intimate.

STALKER
The underground bits in STALKER are insane events. Some of the shit they put you through in the dark is just twisted sadism.

So what about you lot. Any games freak you out so bad you had to stop playing?

This is going to sound pathetic, but hear me out. When I was a little kid, I rented Banjo Kazooie from my not-yet-closed Blockbuster. I brought it home and entered Gobi's Desert. I was in the room with my brother, and I proceeded towards the pyramid maze. The mummy guy gave us some warnings about how we were to be cursed, but we ignored it. As soon as we hit the point of no return and he locked us in that pyramid, WE SHUT THE GAME OFF. I am not making this up.

The weird thing is that we also had Resident Evil: Code Veronica X for the PS2 from BlockBuster. I remember making it to the first area with zombies, frantically trying to decipher how to kill the damn things. Fear was not involved when it was decided not to play that game for the entire rental period.

Bioshock i didn't beat, Im having trouble playing Half-Life 2 for long periods of time, also Doom 3 i got about an hour in and said fuck it. 

In F.E.A.R, there's a point where you start climbing down a ladder and when the camera swings around to where you were just standing, Alma is there staring at you. I shit my pants right there and shut the game off. I have beat it since though

Bioshock is probably the most recent game I fear-quit.  My buddy gave me the demo on PC when it first came out, so I thought I'd give it a go.  It was awesome right up to the part in the intro where the splicer kills that dude and then comes and messes with the pod when you first show up in Rapture.  Right then was when I hit Escape and said screw this game.  The funny part is that not even a month later I watched my room mate play through the whole thing, and that was pretty much the only part that was fear-inducing through the whole game.

Games that rely on darkness to create tension and scares I generally avoid.  Just freaks me out usually.  F.E.A.R. got me.  I don't like jumpscares.  System Shock 2 makes me feel isolated just enough to where I can't handle very much of it at all.  The first time I tried it, I think I quit right out after the first enemy came running at me.  Some of the more unsettling (at least to me) parts in Indigo Prophecy I had to play through and then quit to give my brain a rest.

When I was a little kid, I mean real little, I was freaked the fuck out by those elephantiasis  looking gonad enemies.

[Joke]Early signs of homophobia?

First time playing Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina of Time when I was pretty little. Going down to the church in past, then into the graveyard. Those zombies that would startle you and stopped you from moving scared the living shit. (Probably the biggest wuss here but certain sound effects scared me. The only one I really recall that would make me turn the game off was Perfect Dark. My brother would use and turn crossbows on to scare/piss me off. It was the sound of the heavy breathing as you slowly died. I was scared of the breathing so much...)

I have a low tolerance for horror and I can remember REmake being scary enough for me to quit because of the Crimson Heads that I had created because I didn't know I had to burn the corpses. But otherwise, not really.

I have never fear-quit anything. Silent Hill 2 would have come the closest though.

Also I have never met anybody who was actually proud of their phobia. Does anyone really need to specify "I'm not proud of it but..." I'm not piss taking, but it just seems like a weird thing to say.

There are two games I fear quit. Only two, because both instances have actually left scars in my memory.

I watched a friend play Resident Evil and I was sort of freaked out by the random zombie attacks. I guess I just never even played more than 5 minutes of any of those type of games out of fear, or just avoidance because it is unpleasant. I would rather relax playing a game.

I've never been afraid of anything in a game, they just aren't realistic enough to me.

Games have put me into a frightful mood after playing though.  Looking around corners and over my shoulder kind of stuff.

\I really hate scary games lol like I keep trying them out but I just cant do it, I tried the demo to bioshock and FEAR and I still cant do it , I also really dont do horror movies either lol

dude, i'm the biggest pussy here, I fear quited MYST, but i was like 7 years old and yes at the age of 7 MYST is frigthening.
I also found that
is scary like HELL!!!!! god that game is messed up, it's like i F.E.A.R. and codemned had a baby.

I used to be scared of stuff like Silent Hill etc, but I could still finish the games it would just take me a while. I managed to make it through Project Zero 1 and 2 with a couple friends, but theres one random scene in Project Zero 3 that absolutely made me fucking shit myself (not literally, although I might as well have) where the game traps you in a cupboard and starts talking to you in different voices, and faces appear all over the screen. And if you think those are bad, I fear quitted Forbidden Siren 2 within about 15 minutes of playing it, I nearly vomited I was so scared.

I also found Myst scary as fuck, but I guess that was just the loneliness and the fact I played them after the LOST ARG, which also scared the shit outta me. That sorta thing just creeps me out. But I can play stuff like Dead Space without batting an eyelid.

Although Penumbra I am unable to play because it's very scary, for no reason I can discern either, it seems like I shouldnt be scared at all, but I am.

F.E.A.R didnt scare me, the only two scares that wouldve made me jump I already saw on the trailers and in the demo (Ladder and Elevator scenes)

REmake scared me actually, but I finished it. Only Resi game to actually scare me. Condemned did a good job, but I finished it eventually.

Clock Tower on the PS1 though was about as scary as Forbidden Siren, I literally screamed when scissorman started chasing me and was too afraid to even go to the console and turn it off. But I was, 8, or 10 or something at the time.

" In F.E.A.R, there's a point where you start climbing down a ladder and when the camera swings around to where you were just standing, Alma is there staring at you. I shit my pants right there and shut the game off. I have beat it since though "

I get jump scares, but I get over them pretty quickly. I'm not unflappable in that regard, but I have certainly never fear quit. I quite like the thrill of it. Especially in a game where you're not expecting it. You go into Dead Space, Left 4 Dead and Resident Evil 5 expecting scares, but when you get a jump scare from Fallout 3, that gets to me much more. But then I just carry on shooting dudes and hacking terminals.

Why arent people saying Eternal Darkness? That game scared the crap outta me. Basically, the television in my old house used to refract off our glass door and become much larger just outside the bathroom. When I got out of the bathroom, there was a giant skeleton face there. I was like OMFG! And ran into the bathroom, staying there for 2 hours. My brother joined me, seeing the skeleton coming out of a shower. The brother coming in part was the scariest part...

My buddy was on a marathon MGS2 playthrough and it was like 330am and he was sleep deprived and got to the part where you got all those weird messages .  He said FUCK this and shut off the game forever

One of the worst jump scares i've had was in Bioshock, during the garden level, i forget its real name. But you are chasing one of those teleporting masked splicers, when he suddenly appears behind you and his shadow is cast onto the wall in front. I literally yelled "FUCK!" and threw the controller behind me.

I think the only game I ever quit out of fear was Resident Evil... I mean I was seven, but that damn first zombie turning his head scared the shit out of me. Since then I've had that unnerving phobia of the undead... of course when I was 8 I picked it up again and forced my way through with my dog at my side xD

" I think the only game I ever quit out of fear was Resident Evil... I mean I was seven, but that damn first zombie turning his head scared the shit out of me. Since then I've had that unnerving phobia of the undead... of course when I was 8 I picked it up again and forced my way through with my dog at my side xD "

"@AzureSupernova said:

" I think the only game I ever quit out of fear was Resident Evil... I mean I was seven, but that damn first zombie turning his head scared the shit out of me. Since then I've had that unnerving phobia of the undead... of course when I was 8 I picked it up again and forced my way through with my dog at my side xD "

I to have a phobia of zombies :(  My first horror and fear-quit game was resident evil 3, the opening cut scene still hunts me to this day :..( "

Interesting blog. Anyway, I don't often get these experiences for some reason. Maybe it's because I don't usually get as immersed into the possibilities of what could happen because I know that I can control my surroundings in video games.

" One of the worst jump scares i've had was in Bioshock, during the garden level, i forget its real name. But you are chasing one of those teleporting masked splicers, when he suddenly appears behind you and his shadow is cast onto the wall in front. I literally yelled "FUCK!" and threw the controller behind me. "

Oh I almost forgot Bioshock, I explored every inch of that game both before and after the Sander Cohen level. But that level, the first time one of those statues moved and positioned itself in front of the door I shit myself and finished that part of the game as fast as I possibly could. Rest of the game wasn't scary at all though, just those dead people encased in plaster of paris.

-With Resident Evil 4, I got really scared. It was my first horror game to play, and when I got the the castle level, I went into the sewer. I was not expecting one of those bugs, it came at me from behind, and I literally screamed, and just ran out of the room. I came back a year later and beat it.
-Probably the best scary moment ever that I'm sure all of you will ridicule me for. I had a Playstation 1, and I hated the begining screen after you turn it on. It scared the shit out of me, and I always turned the T.V. on second afterwards to avoid it.

This usually doesn't happen to me, but one game that honestly scared the fuck out of me was Dead Space. They really pulled off a good atmosphere...or maybe it was because I played it late at night. Probably both.

In retrospect, I guess it's not really about a game that's merely scary, but a game that somehow made you simply unable to keep playing it. Silent Hunter 4 isn't a game that's meant to be scary as much as it's meant to be suspenseful, but for me with my stupid phobia, it becomes almost unbearable.

I think a game can be scary as hell but still be playable. Dead Space is a good example. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with that game even if i did come out of it feeling a bit skittish after every session.

" @Muttinus_Rump said:

" One of the worst jump scares i've had was in Bioshock, during the garden level, i forget its real name. But you are chasing one of those teleporting masked splicers, when he suddenly appears behind you and his shadow is cast onto the wall in front. I literally yelled "FUCK!" and threw the controller behind me. "

I had something like this happen to me, too. I had never seen those types of splicers before, and I went into a small room to get ammo and health, and my shadow had antlers. It took me a second to realize it was a splicer, and when I turned around I was like "HOLY SHIT!"In retrospect, it doesn't sound that bad, but my friend was over and he had the same reaction. "

I can't say that I've ever fear-quit anything.  Rage-quit?  Yeah.  Emotion-quit?  Sure.  Fear-quit?  Nope.

I fear-quitted out of Resident Evil Remake and Resident Evil 2. I was 12.

And the AvP 2 demo, I was then 15 I think.

" Bioshock i didn't beat, Im having trouble playing Half-Life 2 for long periods of time, also Doom 3 i got about an hour in and said fuck it. 

I guess i don't like to be games where you are alone, Half-Life 2 isn't so bad i just got to the Prison area so the actions starting to pick up. 

"

SHIT!  Come to think of it, I HAVE fear-quit a game once, when it was telling me that my memory card was being erased.

     The closest I've gotten to fear quitting was when me and my friend were playing Bioshock and we entered some dentist's office. We open a drawer looking for goodies, or some shit, we turn around sit there for a while staring at something, and then I'm like "I think that's a dude." The moment I say that, the dentist starts moving and starts attacking us and my friend drops the control and we freak the fuck out. However, instead of quitting he picked up the controller, blasted that fool and then we teabagged him vigorously :P

I know this sounds weird, but I have had to play in sections in games like Dead Space because I just couldn't take all that intenseness in one sitting.

" In F.E.A.R, there's a point where you start climbing down a ladder and when the camera swings around to where you were just standing, Alma is there staring at you. I shit my pants right there and shut the game off. I have beat it since though "

when i was younger, i had to take back Fatal Frame 2. I got like 3/4 through it but i just could not do it anymore. I was like 7 at the time. 

Dead Space. there just so many jump-scares i can handle before i just cant take anymore.
other than that? nothing.

" @NoDeath said:

" In F.E.A.R, there's a point where you start climbing down a ladder and when the camera swings around to where you were just standing, Alma is there staring at you. I shit my pants right there and shut the game off. I have beat it since though "

  

"

I pretty much quit Bioshock and never beat it due to some amount of fear.  The game scared me, but I was able to push through to final act.  However, something made me stop playing for a little while, and whever I thought about going back and playing it, the idea just kinda scared me.  Nowadays, if I watch somebody play a game, or see that the concept of a game will scare me, I'll just steer clear rather than attempting to play and then stopping.

" @FlamingHobo said:

" @NoDeath said:

" In F.E.A.R, there's a point where you start climbing down a ladder and when the camera swings around to where you were just standing, Alma is there staring at you. I shit my pants right there and shut the game off. I have beat it since though "

  

"

OH GOD! NOOO! ARHAHHHHHGGG! "