Amnesia: The Bunker

I don’t know what the scariest game I’ve ever played is, but Amnesia: The Bunker is high on the list. It feels like a culmination of decades’ worth of survival horror innovation. From the stealth- and physics-based template of the first Amnesia, it simultaneously throws back to the punishing resource management of Resident Evil and looks forward to its own progeny in Alien: Isolation for its enemy behaviour. The resulting concoction is advertised as being akin to an immersive sim, and while those elements are a little undercooked, it’s still a refreshingly holistic and open-ended experience. The game also features mild procedural components, which frankly don’t matter very much.

What does matter is that the premise sees players trapped in a terrifically-realized WW1 bunker with a monster that’s repelled by light but has exceptional hearing. And you have very limited ability to generate light. And everything you need to do is very loud. And your methods of self-defence are so sparse and ineffective that they’re often better used as impromptu lockpicks. Frictional Games have been refining their design for so long that they’re able to pull out all the stops for generating horror – ensuring players can never effectively perceive their pursuer and can never be sure when they are and are not safe from it. Additionally, their trademark physics-based controls feel more tactile and intuitive than ever. Their storytelling ability has largely remained consistent over the years, however, so while The Bunker’s narrative is serviceable for the most part, it ends on an incredibly obvious and lazy note.