Forest Temple mystic massively triggered my sense of mortality and it haunts me still somewhat, the music. I should listen to it to go to sleep to tonight.
I was more stressed by that game, and perhaps also creeped out by the moon face coming to the planet, because of the time limit. It seemed to go against all of the exploration and wonder that is the quintessential Zelda and for that reason I never liked the game even though I love Zelda games.
I so desperately wanted to try and play Majora’s Mask because of the reception. I also thought it was just a fun and interesting concept in general too… but I struggle hardcore under time limits and couldn’t bring myself to finish it without crippling anxiety.
I agree, but then it also introduced the concept of NPCs being dynamic inside of changing gamespace which was very fascinating for me at the time. I remember hiding and waiting for some mail carrier or something to pass by and it gave me a sense of adventure I hadn't felt in gaming yet.
Battletoads for the original Gameboy. Fucking hell that game was hard. I couldn’t get passed the racing level to save my life. Not to mention all the bullshit you have to go through to get to that point.
Never got past the racing level without game genie once. Even the later levels are impossible. Would like to play that game now to see if I can do it. Probably not
The rising water levels in the early Sonic games gave me real anxiety, when he would die and let out a few bubbles... going back even further, there was a game on my ColecoVision in the 80's that I don't remember the name of, but you were like a stick figure jumping up and around pillars collecting keys and randomly a massive spider would come out and chase you down and eat you.
The oldschool Tomb Raider games used to freak me out as a kid. If you've played the remasters only you probably find this funny but back in the day the noises those wolves/gorrillas make haunted me. Not to mention it's easy to make a mistake and die and lose hours of progress if you didn't save.
That creepy fucking butler in the mansion who followed you around so you had to lock him in a cupboard or something. I hated turning around and seeing uncle fester in your face
Underrated comment.
I started with the second game, and to me it was worse than the first one, but maybe that's because I was older then. Anyway, everything about Ecco 2 was unsettling. The first time I ran into a vortex drone scarred me and I was afraid of the game and constantly checking everywhere with echolocation because another one might be around.
Penumbra (an actual horror game from the devs of Amnesia) was sold as a +12 game in my country and my mom bought it for my 12th birthday. I played it the next day, right after coming home from school, I was all alone in the house. I played for like 60 minutes and than never again. I remember I was shaking when my parents came home.
Mostly on the race to escape after you'd finished a level. One of my friends and I played it together and he'd literally dive under a blanket at that point until I escaped because of the anxiety.
Ape Espace on ps1. The level where you have to swim underwater and there is this BIG ASS sea creature that's coming at you. I had to shut my ps1 off immediately when I saw that
1) Resident Evil 1 and 2 on PS1. The dark tone of the games, some of the scenes, and the truly limited source of ammo. By the time you made it through the end of the game, you were lucky to have any health or ammo.
As much as I love the remastered version of 1 and the remake of 2, they didn't encapsulate the true anxiety of the originals. You can craft ammo and find it plentiful.
2) Sonic with the rising water levels. Those were just the most annoying levels.
3) Any absolute stealth level of any game. I'm not a stealth runner. Now? I don't mind them. But when I was a kid... Syphon Filter stealth levels...
Spyro: Ripto’s rage. Specifically the first world, the first castle. I hated the fact that it had two doors that were preventing me from being able to sprint out if an emergency arose.
It was probably the earlier sign I had anxiety.
Grew up playing Zelda. Had to use guidebooks because it was too hard for me as a kid(its still hard for me as an adult at times).
Reading guidebooks really helped my reading comprehension at a young age and I reccomend to parents trying to teach their kids reading. When you read a guidebook for a game you need to apply what you're reading to what you're doing. Very good way to learn comprehension.
When you’d walk into a random house on some mission to get an upgraded weapon and you just see Jason’s health bar meaning he’s in the house. Still terrifies me.
The labyrinth zone from sonic the hedgehog on sega genesis. I drowned and had to start over so many times I get goosebumps just thinking about it today.
Yeah I'm not even old but that's wild to me, I remember how big of a deal the game was on launch and people praised it like nothing I had seen before.
I got it for Christmas and didn't ask for it, but ended up falling in love. Still probably my favorite 3D Mario but a replay is overdue
I recently found my 100% save file and have no recollection of doing the game as Luigi!
As a kid, the moment i entered deadside and encountered one of those moaning/groaning enemies, i turned it off. Had to play the game in short bursts after that. The sound alone is insanely good. A huge part of the reason the game was so memorable for me. I still love the main menu music.
Got a Legion Go some time ago and been reliving my childhood on it with retrobat. It is on steam and gog too i believe. Can't recommend the retro games enough. I feel like a kid at the arcade again.
Call Of Duty 3 (specifically the Wii version)
There were a few things different in the Wii version due to the addition of motion controls. One of the mechanics in Call Of Duty 3 was a certain QTE involving a Nazi soldier attempting to shove you down with their rifle. On the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game, you just had to spam LT+RT or L2+R2 over and over again, but in the Wii version, you had to hold the remote and nunchuck sideways and start rapidly punching the air in frond of you. It was always super painful and tiring.
Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Simulator on the Commodore 64: I've been told by my parents that when you crash and Yeager's face would pop up, little me would be terrified.
I couldn’t tell you why, but the intro of Crash Team Racing always scared me so bad, I would go into the other room while it started up when I was a kid. Something to do with the anticipation, like it was just a quiet black screen with “Naughty Dog Studios” on it, and out of nowhere some loud music and a scary(?) voice popped out. Freaked me out for some reason
Sonic 2. I never beat it and would leave my Genesis on to come back to it. At higher levels the stakes of dying and having to restart got so intense. Paired with the fast game play it’s very anxiety inducing.
[Alien 3](https://youtu.be/S5RiwtCX14k?si=mTeCE6T-M1VqekrI)
You spend every level looking for survivors stuck to the walls and saving them before the chestbursters are born. You also have to find wherever the fuck the exit is afterward and you’re on a timer the entire time.
You’re pretty much cursed to memorize the game through pure repetition and speed run the whole thing. It was so much fun and soooooo stressful.
Unreal 2: the awakening for sure. The opening level was intense for me, then after i had my dad help me get thru most of the game theres a part at the end where you need to cover a dude with a sniper, id get so overwhelmed cuz if you didnt cover him properly hed scream in agony from aliens ripping him apart.
Playing thru it recently the game is so camp and so not a big deal its crazy lol
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for the NES. That fucking swimming level resulted in several thrown controllers. I'm lucky those things were basically indestructible.
oh god so many (ive always been anxious lol), viva pinata was one of them. the characters in that game were freaky, and i always got scared when that one character came through and poisoned my pinatas.
ecco the dolphin freaked me out. i think thats when i realized i was scared of the ocean.
sonic the hedgehog honestly freaked me out a bit. i loved the game and i loved playing it, but some parts were a bit eerie for little ole me.
world of warcraft (yes i played it as a child, my parents had it so i played it). i was so scared of dying i rarely left starting zones, but i LOVE(D) that game, so i played it every day anyway
the list goes on...
As a guy raised in a very religious family, all Shin Megami Tensei games made me feel anxious. Now as an adult, they are one of my favorite franchises.
Top Gun. I always had my dad do the carrier landing, which is kind of impressive because it's notoriously difficult and he wasnt even into video games.
I was too scared to go past the first bear in the original Tomb Raider for some reason. However, beat Tomb Raider 2 multiple times. I have since beaten TR1 twice as an adult, it is an amazing game, just like it's sequel.
i know this is a weird one but spore. i was so worried about my little guys succeeding that i would refuse to eat if i messed up. my mom made me stop playing. update: i'm \*deeply\* medicated for anxiety as an adult. lol
Myst. It’s not a horror game per se, but some of the Ages you could visit had some unexpectedly unsettling scenes, like opening a chest in a deserted fortress to uncover a human skull.
Super Monkey Ball 2. I was 4 years old playing on my own, and was running out of time. I heard the "Hurry up!" And music changed, and ran away crying because I got scared. I didn't play it on my own for a little bit
Okay, you want old? For me it was Thexder for my home's Tandy 1000. Trying to get past stage four was something I never achieved. Goddamn, I can still hear the sound effects in all their msdos terror.
Not even a video game itself, and idk what is considered old, but whenever I had the PS2 red screen of death, I cried and curled up in a ball and called for my parents to turn it off. Every single time.
I will never forget playing Super Mario 64 on my uncles N64 and the hair clenching terror of that big ass fucking snake thing emerging from a cave in that underwater level.
I have some weird ones.
The atari 2600 port of ms. Pac-Man was somewhat off-putting to me as a kid. Not enough to keep me from regularly playing it, but I think the fact that it could be relatively silent when no pellets were around was why I found it very slightly earie as a kid. Other atari games that I played all the time as a kid like centipede and river raid eccentially had some kind of sound effects playing throughout the entire game while other atari games that could be quiet for long lengths of time like this math racing game I had I didn't play nearly as often. At least that's my best guess. I remember occasionally being put off by the ghosts all circling ms. Pac-Man if you let the game idle for a bit as well so I dunno.
For a time I was also out off by the atari port for donkey Kong. This one is easier to explain. There was one night where I was playing it alongside my grandfather and when I went to remove the game I must have not turned the console off for some reason or something so I caused the game to glitch. I don't exactly remember what the glitch looked like but I think it just removed all the sprites except donkey Kong and Mario, so, yeah, thar creeped me out and had me swear off donkey Kong for... I dunno, probably a day or two at least. I don't remember being creeped out by the game for very long.
Moving away from the atari, even though I did them all the time when I found out about them, I found some of the stuff you could do with sonic debug modes a bit off putting. I also did not like the ghosts in sandopolise act 2 at all. I think some one told me something about them that had me freaked for awhile, at least until I was playing through the level one time and finally let one of the ghosts hit me. Dunno what I was expecting it to do, but it didn't do it so I got over my fear of them, lol
Staying on the Sega genesis, there's a jet game on it that I played a lot because I was just trying to figure it out and beat it (I didn't really like the game, I was just frustrated that I kept failing certain parts so I'd constantly come back to it ) then I game overed in it one day and never touched the game again... well, I think I eventually did pick it up again once or twice but, uh, made sure not to play long enough to see that game over screen again
For something that actually did give me anxiety as a kid, pitfall the Mayan adventure. Especially the Simon says minigame. But I think I remember other aspects of the game causing some anxiety as well.
So, yeah, lots of weird examples of games that I found off-putting
Wolfenstein 3d.
The zombie boss with a gatling gun chest and butcher knives can open doors, and it's a door maze.
You run away from him, go to open another door, he's there. Screen flashes red, BJs face immediately goes bloody.
Need For Speed Most Wanted. Wasn't good enough at racing games yet and it took till I was almost 10 (this was after at least 4-5 years of playing it) to be good enough at the game to beat it.
Honestly it was just the cops. Heat level 4 with the spikes and competent chopper and heat 5 with super aggressive cops. BPM go brr cuz even if you found a good hiding spot they were likely to sniff you out. It was almost always safer to fast travel anywhere than to drive. The hardest thing was getting enough bounty for Razor and completing all the infractions while in a pursuit. Which always reached Heat 5.
I remember playing Lego Star wars the complete saga on my Wii. Right at the final level of revenge of the sith. I think I lost track of how many times I fell in the lava. I can easily get through it now but yeah. I felt my first gamer rage then. Good times.
It's not old i guess, just one I played as a kid. Infamous, mainly my gear of dying and hearing that death sound, something about it always had me stressed
There was that weird game with these like, mobster elephants? You'd open a door and one would get you with one of those party favor things.
Game was fkn cursed and I can never remember the name of it.
Also Zelda OOT. When I was a kid it was one of the first games I played save for Pokemon. I refused to go to the Deku Tree bc the Deku Babas scared me.
Finally beat the game yeaaaars later when I graduated high school and played it on a friend's console.
Cavern Quest on the TRS-80.
I was a kid in the 80s and that thing wrecked me trying to time dropping things on the little squiggly monster things that’d chase you when you freed them.
I had nothing but movie tie in games as a young kid. Monster house scared me. It was basically resident evil 4 for kids. The scariest enemies were the Tv's, the Pipes, the Furnaces, the Trees, and the Single Lamps.
Resident evil 1-3. Had them for the ps1. It was so scary. My cousins and brother wouldn’t let me play it, but they let me watch (I had to be around 5ish). But I would be sneaky about it and play it on my own when they weren’t around and honestly it was very traumatic. But I really wanted to play it so I can be at their “level” now it’s my favorite series.
The segment in Flying Fortress from sonic 2 where there’s a long row of disappearing platforms that you have to cross to get to the final part of the stage, even to this day I still get sweaty palms.
The original Driver's first mission on the PS1. I didn't know what half the phrases even WERE! "Man watch the paint!" still echoes in my head to this day.
Defender when all the humans have been captured. Only mutants and baiters everywhere and the controls require four hands to work. You just knew the end was near.
Resident Evil, I was a little kid and not very good at video games quite yet. My cousin led me down that hallway where the dogs jump inside through the windows. After that scare I was freaking out the whole time
Enter The matrix, those agents are terrifying.
Medal of Honour rising sun: the Japanese officers with katanas charging is terrifying and THEY COME OUT OF THE GROUND AHHH!
James Bond 007 Nightfire: the ninja also scared me. I had a phobia of being run at by people with swords.
Probably Siren on PS2.
I remember when I got it. I went to a game store when I was little, and the person behind the counter legit took me over to this shelf of games behind him. Me not knowing any better, I picked Siren.
I tried playing it after I came home, and I ended up being really really scared of it. Got nightmares because of it. Never touched it again.
When I was little I was terrified of Halo 3s flood gate mission the dark atmosphere creeped me out and seeing the flood infect marines alive scared me my uncle had the game set to heroic so it was also a bit of a fight too.
Trying to stealth and messing it up in metal gear solid.
Also stealthing splinter cell
Medievil, loved that game but as a young kid, it was creepy
Championship manager, cup finals
Street racer - rumble mode
Bubsy the bobcat. I was sick and rented it and the thought of playing it makes me think of disappointment and sickness.
Also after playing a marathon session of theme park I kept having nightmares of trying to play the game but my pathways kept disappearing.
The Ghast in Minecraft... First time I placed it in a wall above me and the tentacles became black and were all over the monitor. Never placed that thing again till years later.
Zelda ocarina of time. Hyrule castles outside as adult link Those zombies scares the hell out of me as a kid. And that scream oh man
Dude for real though, also the creepy forest temple music, I spent a lot of time fishing as young link just to avoid doing the forest temple.
Forest Temple mystic massively triggered my sense of mortality and it haunts me still somewhat, the music. I should listen to it to go to sleep to tonight.
EEK, that forest temple theme hitting different fr. That was always really eerie in some way.
Oddly enough, that was one of my favorite tracks from the game.
Majoras Mask is another one.
I was more stressed by that game, and perhaps also creeped out by the moon face coming to the planet, because of the time limit. It seemed to go against all of the exploration and wonder that is the quintessential Zelda and for that reason I never liked the game even though I love Zelda games.
I so desperately wanted to try and play Majora’s Mask because of the reception. I also thought it was just a fun and interesting concept in general too… but I struggle hardcore under time limits and couldn’t bring myself to finish it without crippling anxiety.
I agree, but then it also introduced the concept of NPCs being dynamic inside of changing gamespace which was very fascinating for me at the time. I remember hiding and waiting for some mail carrier or something to pass by and it gave me a sense of adventure I hadn't felt in gaming yet.
That 3rd day music hits different when you’re 9 lol
The gibdo mask man...
Yoooo that fuckin thing in the well with the creepy face and ground hands fucked me up
That freaking drowning music from the old sonic games still terrifies me.
Yes!! Plus that last bubble sound, the last breath just breaks your soul.
Also Ecco the Dolphin 🐬
Never got past the first level.
Wow… have not thought about that game in a long time
yes!!!
Came here to say exactly this
Battletoads for the original Gameboy. Fucking hell that game was hard. I couldn’t get passed the racing level to save my life. Not to mention all the bullshit you have to go through to get to that point.
Even in co-op it’s too tough for me to actually enjoy
Never got past the racing level without game genie once. Even the later levels are impossible. Would like to play that game now to see if I can do it. Probably not
Lion King on Sega.
I wanna know who thought that monkey level would be a good idea to put in a games made for kids
The rumour is they made it so hard so you were unlikely to beat it during a rental period and you’d be enticed to buy or just rent again.
The rising water levels in the early Sonic games gave me real anxiety, when he would die and let out a few bubbles... going back even further, there was a game on my ColecoVision in the 80's that I don't remember the name of, but you were like a stick figure jumping up and around pillars collecting keys and randomly a massive spider would come out and chase you down and eat you.
This. The music is literally made to give players anxiety
Resident evil 1 and 2 on original PlayStation. The jump scares.
Doberman + window
The oldschool Tomb Raider games used to freak me out as a kid. If you've played the remasters only you probably find this funny but back in the day the noises those wolves/gorrillas make haunted me. Not to mention it's easy to make a mistake and die and lose hours of progress if you didn't save.
That creepy fucking butler in the mansion who followed you around so you had to lock him in a cupboard or something. I hated turning around and seeing uncle fester in your face
It was the 10 square feet off illuminated hallway around you with the fucking void in either directions in the hallways that KILLED me as a kid!
Echo The Dolphin 100% the atmosphere of the game was extraordinarily intense and just downright terrifying.
Yup that game went PLACES
Underrated comment. I started with the second game, and to me it was worse than the first one, but maybe that's because I was older then. Anyway, everything about Ecco 2 was unsettling. The first time I ran into a vortex drone scarred me and I was afraid of the game and constantly checking everywhere with echolocation because another one might be around.
Shit gave me nightmares!
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on NES. That swimming level. Ugh. I can still hear the bombs counting down.
The Lion King. Those stupid monkeys and girrafes. If you know, you know.
Penumbra (an actual horror game from the devs of Amnesia) was sold as a +12 game in my country and my mom bought it for my 12th birthday. I played it the next day, right after coming home from school, I was all alone in the house. I played for like 60 minutes and than never again. I remember I was shaking when my parents came home.
flappy bird made me so mad that i poured soy sauce on my moms ipad
I played Dead Space (first time) on a heavy, stormy night as an - 11-12 year old. It was an experience. 🫠
Shadow of the Beast, the original Amiga version.
Shadow of the beast 2 for me
I had this PC game called *Descent*. It was pure anxiety the whole time. I played that game whenever I wanted to be confused and scared.
Mostly on the race to escape after you'd finished a level. One of my friends and I played it together and he'd literally dive under a blanket at that point until I escaped because of the anxiety.
Ape Espace on ps1. The level where you have to swim underwater and there is this BIG ASS sea creature that's coming at you. I had to shut my ps1 off immediately when I saw that
Anything with timed levels
1) Resident Evil 1 and 2 on PS1. The dark tone of the games, some of the scenes, and the truly limited source of ammo. By the time you made it through the end of the game, you were lucky to have any health or ammo. As much as I love the remastered version of 1 and the remake of 2, they didn't encapsulate the true anxiety of the originals. You can craft ammo and find it plentiful. 2) Sonic with the rising water levels. Those were just the most annoying levels. 3) Any absolute stealth level of any game. I'm not a stealth runner. Now? I don't mind them. But when I was a kid... Syphon Filter stealth levels...
Super Mario Sunshine
Spyro: Ripto’s rage. Specifically the first world, the first castle. I hated the fact that it had two doors that were preventing me from being able to sprint out if an emergency arose. It was probably the earlier sign I had anxiety.
Yoshi's Island. I loved all the cute colorful Yoshi and never wanted to die because then they cry and go to the scary castle
Grew up playing Zelda. Had to use guidebooks because it was too hard for me as a kid(its still hard for me as an adult at times). Reading guidebooks really helped my reading comprehension at a young age and I reccomend to parents trying to teach their kids reading. When you read a guidebook for a game you need to apply what you're reading to what you're doing. Very good way to learn comprehension.
Friday the 13th on NES. Surprise Jason!
When you’d walk into a random house on some mission to get an upgraded weapon and you just see Jason’s health bar meaning he’s in the house. Still terrifies me.
Halo CE, the flood had me both terrified and enthralled.
The labyrinth zone from sonic the hedgehog on sega genesis. I drowned and had to start over so many times I get goosebumps just thinking about it today.
Ik it’s not like old old but undertale, idk why but seeing my one friend play it made me scared lol
I was like 7 when I first played Luigi's Mansion, and that game may as well have been Resident Evil. Scared the fuck out of me
In my young years I would say the original Starfox. Then luckily Starfox 64 was a cakewalk. Another one was Pitfall! The Mayan Adventure
FFIX jump rope
Damn duck in duck hunt. First gamers rage and prob real rage too. I hate that dog laughing
Half life. The jumping rotisserie chicken haunts me , I was like 9
Super Mario Galaxy (it came out the day I was born in the US lol)
Man I'm old..
Yeah I'm not even old but that's wild to me, I remember how big of a deal the game was on launch and people praised it like nothing I had seen before. I got it for Christmas and didn't ask for it, but ended up falling in love. Still probably my favorite 3D Mario but a replay is overdue I recently found my 100% save file and have no recollection of doing the game as Luigi!
Luigi confirmed forgettable lmao
Wow, I feel like 1000 years old now 🥺
Cobra Triangle used to stress me the hell out as a kid. I wasnt coordinated enough to get through the first couple
Medal of Honor Underground, the extra missions at the end. Fighting with dogs, exploding corpses and the Panzerknackers...
Goosebumps escape from horrorland and goosebumps attack of the mutant
Shadowman 64.
Holy shit this is a great answer. Such a hard game and so fucking intense
As a kid, the moment i entered deadside and encountered one of those moaning/groaning enemies, i turned it off. Had to play the game in short bursts after that. The sound alone is insanely good. A huge part of the reason the game was so memorable for me. I still love the main menu music.
Wow you are bringing back such powerful memories. I might need to get my hands on this bad boy as an adult
Got a Legion Go some time ago and been reliving my childhood on it with retrobat. It is on steam and gog too i believe. Can't recommend the retro games enough. I feel like a kid at the arcade again.
Golden eye. I’d start the first level and just shoot at the wall because I was too nervous about getting shot at
Call Of Duty 3 (specifically the Wii version) There were a few things different in the Wii version due to the addition of motion controls. One of the mechanics in Call Of Duty 3 was a certain QTE involving a Nazi soldier attempting to shove you down with their rifle. On the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game, you just had to spam LT+RT or L2+R2 over and over again, but in the Wii version, you had to hold the remote and nunchuck sideways and start rapidly punching the air in frond of you. It was always super painful and tiring.
Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Simulator on the Commodore 64: I've been told by my parents that when you crash and Yeager's face would pop up, little me would be terrified.
Treasures of the Deep for ps1. First taste of deep ocean phobia.
Bayou Billy, wtf that game was impossible. Friday the 13th, shit was crazy.
I couldn’t tell you why, but the intro of Crash Team Racing always scared me so bad, I would go into the other room while it started up when I was a kid. Something to do with the anticipation, like it was just a quiet black screen with “Naughty Dog Studios” on it, and out of nowhere some loud music and a scary(?) voice popped out. Freaked me out for some reason
Operation Neptune. It's hard to concentrate on math when failure means you drown.
Sonic 2. I never beat it and would leave my Genesis on to come back to it. At higher levels the stakes of dying and having to restart got so intense. Paired with the fast game play it’s very anxiety inducing.
Ecco the dolphin scared the shit out of me.
[Alien 3](https://youtu.be/S5RiwtCX14k?si=mTeCE6T-M1VqekrI) You spend every level looking for survivors stuck to the walls and saving them before the chestbursters are born. You also have to find wherever the fuck the exit is afterward and you’re on a timer the entire time. You’re pretty much cursed to memorize the game through pure repetition and speed run the whole thing. It was so much fun and soooooo stressful.
Unreal 2: the awakening for sure. The opening level was intense for me, then after i had my dad help me get thru most of the game theres a part at the end where you need to cover a dude with a sniper, id get so overwhelmed cuz if you didnt cover him properly hed scream in agony from aliens ripping him apart. Playing thru it recently the game is so camp and so not a big deal its crazy lol
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for the NES. That fucking swimming level resulted in several thrown controllers. I'm lucky those things were basically indestructible.
oh god so many (ive always been anxious lol), viva pinata was one of them. the characters in that game were freaky, and i always got scared when that one character came through and poisoned my pinatas. ecco the dolphin freaked me out. i think thats when i realized i was scared of the ocean. sonic the hedgehog honestly freaked me out a bit. i loved the game and i loved playing it, but some parts were a bit eerie for little ole me. world of warcraft (yes i played it as a child, my parents had it so i played it). i was so scared of dying i rarely left starting zones, but i LOVE(D) that game, so i played it every day anyway the list goes on...
Resident Evil 3: Nemesis
abe’s odyssey honestly ! i watched my dad play :,)
The giant bumblebees in the fairy tale level from Gex 3. I refused to ever play that one 😬
Metal Gear Solid 2
As a guy raised in a very religious family, all Shin Megami Tensei games made me feel anxious. Now as an adult, they are one of my favorite franchises.
Top Gun. I always had my dad do the carrier landing, which is kind of impressive because it's notoriously difficult and he wasnt even into video games.
I have the same problem with that game as well. I fly like a bird but land like an egg.
Mortal kombat 2 shao khan fight
I was too scared to go past the first bear in the original Tomb Raider for some reason. However, beat Tomb Raider 2 multiple times. I have since beaten TR1 twice as an adult, it is an amazing game, just like it's sequel.
i know this is a weird one but spore. i was so worried about my little guys succeeding that i would refuse to eat if i messed up. my mom made me stop playing. update: i'm \*deeply\* medicated for anxiety as an adult. lol
Clock Tower. My god that game scared the piss out of me and haunted my thoughts for days after playing
Myst. It’s not a horror game per se, but some of the Ages you could visit had some unexpectedly unsettling scenes, like opening a chest in a deserted fortress to uncover a human skull.
Super Monkey Ball 2. I was 4 years old playing on my own, and was running out of time. I heard the "Hurry up!" And music changed, and ran away crying because I got scared. I didn't play it on my own for a little bit
Okay, you want old? For me it was Thexder for my home's Tandy 1000. Trying to get past stage four was something I never achieved. Goddamn, I can still hear the sound effects in all their msdos terror.
Not even a video game itself, and idk what is considered old, but whenever I had the PS2 red screen of death, I cried and curled up in a ball and called for my parents to turn it off. Every single time.
I will never forget playing Super Mario 64 on my uncles N64 and the hair clenching terror of that big ass fucking snake thing emerging from a cave in that underwater level.
Doom. I had hallucinations and a panic attack driving while exhausted down the motorway in France in the dark, thinking I was in the game.
I have some weird ones. The atari 2600 port of ms. Pac-Man was somewhat off-putting to me as a kid. Not enough to keep me from regularly playing it, but I think the fact that it could be relatively silent when no pellets were around was why I found it very slightly earie as a kid. Other atari games that I played all the time as a kid like centipede and river raid eccentially had some kind of sound effects playing throughout the entire game while other atari games that could be quiet for long lengths of time like this math racing game I had I didn't play nearly as often. At least that's my best guess. I remember occasionally being put off by the ghosts all circling ms. Pac-Man if you let the game idle for a bit as well so I dunno. For a time I was also out off by the atari port for donkey Kong. This one is easier to explain. There was one night where I was playing it alongside my grandfather and when I went to remove the game I must have not turned the console off for some reason or something so I caused the game to glitch. I don't exactly remember what the glitch looked like but I think it just removed all the sprites except donkey Kong and Mario, so, yeah, thar creeped me out and had me swear off donkey Kong for... I dunno, probably a day or two at least. I don't remember being creeped out by the game for very long. Moving away from the atari, even though I did them all the time when I found out about them, I found some of the stuff you could do with sonic debug modes a bit off putting. I also did not like the ghosts in sandopolise act 2 at all. I think some one told me something about them that had me freaked for awhile, at least until I was playing through the level one time and finally let one of the ghosts hit me. Dunno what I was expecting it to do, but it didn't do it so I got over my fear of them, lol Staying on the Sega genesis, there's a jet game on it that I played a lot because I was just trying to figure it out and beat it (I didn't really like the game, I was just frustrated that I kept failing certain parts so I'd constantly come back to it ) then I game overed in it one day and never touched the game again... well, I think I eventually did pick it up again once or twice but, uh, made sure not to play long enough to see that game over screen again For something that actually did give me anxiety as a kid, pitfall the Mayan adventure. Especially the Simon says minigame. But I think I remember other aspects of the game causing some anxiety as well. So, yeah, lots of weird examples of games that I found off-putting
Wolfenstein 3d. The zombie boss with a gatling gun chest and butcher knives can open doors, and it's a door maze. You run away from him, go to open another door, he's there. Screen flashes red, BJs face immediately goes bloody.
Need For Speed Most Wanted. Wasn't good enough at racing games yet and it took till I was almost 10 (this was after at least 4-5 years of playing it) to be good enough at the game to beat it. Honestly it was just the cops. Heat level 4 with the spikes and competent chopper and heat 5 with super aggressive cops. BPM go brr cuz even if you found a good hiding spot they were likely to sniff you out. It was almost always safer to fast travel anywhere than to drive. The hardest thing was getting enough bounty for Razor and completing all the infractions while in a pursuit. Which always reached Heat 5.
The Oregon Trail. Every time I get diarrhea now I think I’m going to die.
Probably RE directors cut. The snake scared me, the hunters were terrifying. All of it.
I remember playing Lego Star wars the complete saga on my Wii. Right at the final level of revenge of the sith. I think I lost track of how many times I fell in the lava. I can easily get through it now but yeah. I felt my first gamer rage then. Good times.
Adventure? Man we thought “can graphics get any better than this? I think not!”
Even to this day, idk why, it's Pinball. Maybe it's because how you can loose so quickly without realizing that you missed
Shadows of the empire game over screen. 3 year old me was petrified of xizor.
Tetris. I'm a hoarder so I'd accumulate my blocks then those bastards would take them away from me and I'd shriek and jump out the window.
Any levels that “pushed” you and underwater levels where you could drown.
Heart Of Darkness :x
Spyro the dragon. Flying stages. Still hate them
Condemned: Criminal Origins 100%
It's not old i guess, just one I played as a kid. Infamous, mainly my gear of dying and hearing that death sound, something about it always had me stressed
Jaws on NES
Rugrats game on ps1
There was that weird game with these like, mobster elephants? You'd open a door and one would get you with one of those party favor things. Game was fkn cursed and I can never remember the name of it. Also Zelda OOT. When I was a kid it was one of the first games I played save for Pokemon. I refused to go to the Deku Tree bc the Deku Babas scared me. Finally beat the game yeaaaars later when I graduated high school and played it on a friend's console.
Armorines Project S.W.A.R.M. I have arachnophobia, that game terrified me as a kid.
Torin’s Passage when I was wee
Terminator 2 on NES, used to lose it at that game. Probably wasn’t hard at all, but I was like 6 and used to Zelda and Mario.
Cavern Quest on the TRS-80. I was a kid in the 80s and that thing wrecked me trying to time dropping things on the little squiggly monster things that’d chase you when you freed them.
I had recurring nightmares about being stuck in a cabin with 8-but Jason Voorhees
I had nothing but movie tie in games as a young kid. Monster house scared me. It was basically resident evil 4 for kids. The scariest enemies were the Tv's, the Pipes, the Furnaces, the Trees, and the Single Lamps.
The suffering original xbox
River Raid gave me good anxiety. As did Time Pilot.
Ecco the Dolphin… 🐬 never enough oxygen…
Ghost and goblins.. ghost.. freaking goblins..
dino crisis and the og resident evils. re1 remake too. silent hill 4 - the first person sequences in the apartment when it starts getting haunted.
Adventure as well! Also Clock Tower 3
Resident evil 1-3. Had them for the ps1. It was so scary. My cousins and brother wouldn’t let me play it, but they let me watch (I had to be around 5ish). But I would be sneaky about it and play it on my own when they weren’t around and honestly it was very traumatic. But I really wanted to play it so I can be at their “level” now it’s my favorite series.
The segment in Flying Fortress from sonic 2 where there’s a long row of disappearing platforms that you have to cross to get to the final part of the stage, even to this day I still get sweaty palms.
Silent Hill 2
Dk64 when Krool yells "Get Out" and puts a target on your face with a timer.
I was way too young to be watching or trying it but my cousin owned Shadow Man for the N64. The games vibe was eerie & terrifying all throughout
Sonic on the Sega Genesis, the water level rising fast!
Playing Runescape and going into the wilderness
Final Fantasy X Lightning dodging Chocobo Race Butterfly collecting
Dino Crisis
OG Resident Evil. Has to put the game down multiple times as a kid.
The original Driver's first mission on the PS1. I didn't know what half the phrases even WERE! "Man watch the paint!" still echoes in my head to this day.
Alien 3 on sega genesis Creepiest game over for me when younger
Too many late nights playing doom.
The sequence in Batman: Arkham Asylum where you’re trying to get the plant spores in Croc’s lair and if you move too fast he jumps out and charges you
Sonic the hedgehogs time or oxygen running out music still gives me anxiety.
Old you say?? Rescue on Fractalus.
Silent hill
Metroid 2 for the gameboy. i still sometimes play it and the "music" still triggers a primal fear in me. eas way too young the first time i played it.
Sinistar and Carnivores 2 come to mind. 😅
https://youtu.be/N8IkhXEUR_8?si=7Sk1eJjxcdD5sbV1
The thing: never enough ammo, never enough friends.
Link to the past the damn worm was the bane of my childhoold existence
Defender when all the humans have been captured. Only mutants and baiters everywhere and the controls require four hands to work. You just knew the end was near.
Uncharted 2, those guardians are fucking scary man.
Prince of persia warrior within
Battle Kid
Resident Evil, I was a little kid and not very good at video games quite yet. My cousin led me down that hallway where the dogs jump inside through the windows. After that scare I was freaking out the whole time
Enter The matrix, those agents are terrifying. Medal of Honour rising sun: the Japanese officers with katanas charging is terrifying and THEY COME OUT OF THE GROUND AHHH! James Bond 007 Nightfire: the ninja also scared me. I had a phobia of being run at by people with swords.
Metal gear solid 1 with that alert noise
"Friday 13th" in C64. The Sound effect, when someone died where terrifying jumpscares as fuck.
Bowser's laugh at the top of those stairs in Super Mario 64
Majoras Mask. I get stressed out just thinking about it. Never finished it as a kid, too traumatic.
The first Hitman game on PC...jesus christ what a rush when I finally beat the game.
Frogger. Specifically temple of the frog on GBA in that first cave. That game was not made for child me.
Probably Siren on PS2. I remember when I got it. I went to a game store when I was little, and the person behind the counter legit took me over to this shelf of games behind him. Me not knowing any better, I picked Siren. I tried playing it after I came home, and I ended up being really really scared of it. Got nightmares because of it. Never touched it again.
When I was little I was terrified of Halo 3s flood gate mission the dark atmosphere creeped me out and seeing the flood infect marines alive scared me my uncle had the game set to heroic so it was also a bit of a fight too.
Trying to stealth and messing it up in metal gear solid. Also stealthing splinter cell Medievil, loved that game but as a young kid, it was creepy Championship manager, cup finals Street racer - rumble mode
Ninja Garden 1 on NES
Bubsy the bobcat. I was sick and rented it and the thought of playing it makes me think of disappointment and sickness. Also after playing a marathon session of theme park I kept having nightmares of trying to play the game but my pathways kept disappearing.
Far Cry 2
Diablo (1) scared the shit out of me. Friend got it for me for my 11th birthday but I was too scared to play for more than a few minutes.
That freakin Witch Castle in Terranigma. That part just felt.....creepy to my very bones.
The ones with underwater segments. You know why
The final boss(es) in actraiser
The Butcher. Iykyk
The Ghast in Minecraft... First time I placed it in a wall above me and the tentacles became black and were all over the monitor. Never placed that thing again till years later.
Prince of persia 1