Like Sketch, I was also raped by a Kemco game as a kid. Except it was Shadowgate. I feel the need to use italics and everything. It was also the FIRST NES game I ever played, as mine came bundled with Shadowgate, Dr. Mario and Zelda. "THIS ONE WITH THE CRAPPY DEMON ON THE COVER WILL BE GOOD!"

It started off well enough, trying to figure out why anyone would store the key to their front door in a skull. And I'd stumble around, not knowing what to do. Then my torches would start burning out, and this AWFUL horrifying music would play. Oh God it scared me half to death, I had to go fumble for the volume knob. But it wasn't just that, it was the (at the time) shocking death sequences. Even though it was pretty much just text telling you what happened. Then Mr. Grim Reaper would burst onto the scene and inform you that the game was over, with more terrible music playing.

Now a zillion years later, I've beaten the game, and it was okay. I'd like to track down Shadowgate 64 one day. I'm in no rush though, as I hear the game is basically made out of dog poo.

Kemco also published 'UNINVITED' which had the same gameplay has 'DÉJÀ VU' and 'SHADOWGATE'. It was still has terrifying but Déjà Vu was played first.

God, that female silhouette in the corridor......don't approach it!! O_O

I remember getting really freaked out in Maniac Mansion whenever I saw one of the aliens. I don't think I have played it since.

I remember trying to play Uninvited when I was little, and that particular scene gave me the biggest scare I've yet to receive.

You walk down a hall and see the woman, and if you approach her, she turns into:



Not so bad now, but when you're 6 years old playing the alone completely alone and that horrifying music plays, it's enough to leave an impression. It doesn't help that when you die, this blood-stained skull shows on screen.



I never got to find out the ending because I couldn't bring myself to finish the game. God, I'm such a wuss. :(

When that T-rex came around the corner on the original Tomb Raider, I almost wet myself I swear! Then I got eaten -_-

Not really traumatizing...but when I played Metal Gear Solid, I had a dream (twice) where Snake was trying to shoot me and I had no place to hide except under the stupid cardboard box.

TALES OF A SCREWED UP CHILDHOOD:

One of my first and only memories with my father was playing the original Super Mario Bros. Being a retard little child, I couldn't push two buttons at the same time. This, being compounded with the repeated sight of the poor 8-bit man dying over and over, and my father screaming, "MAKE MARIO JUMP OVER THE DAMN HOLE WHY DON'T YA!!!" scarred me for life.

I didn't touch a console until the... SNES.

None that I can recall. I started playing survival horror games when I was about eleven or twelve, but I didn't have nightmares or phobias because of them. I tend to become startled while actually playing a scary game, but never afterwards.

When i played the first Myst with my mom and brother I was really young. When we get to that torture chamber room it totally freaked me out. I still have images of the rooms of that area in my mind today but it scared the crap outta me back then...ah good times

When young I used to get scary at the ghost scenarios Super Mario Bros, belive it or not. I only stopped from being scared by it when I was older and was playing Mario 64.

Nowadays, a game that always scare me is Fatal Frame 2. Not only the game is scary by itself, but whenever I start to play there are these huge coincidences:
1. I'm playing at night
2. Nobody else is at home [or worse, when they are travelling and I'm alone with my cat, which keep staring at nothing (probably a ghost)]
3. While playing it and after I keep hearing strange things.
I love this game but untill today I wasn't able to finish it just by how scaried I got playing it, but eventually I'll finish it.

I remember these faintly now:

Sonic the Hedgehog for the Game Gear - The first boss was a pair of pincers at the bottom of a 45 degree angled slope I believe? I was scared to get sucked in and I didn't know how to beat a pair of pincers submerged in the ground. Somehow I beat it but I certainly didn't want to do that again.

Sonic Chaos - I was absolutely terrified to reach the third act of the second level because the boss what a snake made out of marbles or something. I kept hitting the body which made me lose my coins, but then one day I beat it and figured that I had to bounce on the head. It was really scary to face the snake thing that kept flinging it's marble body segments at you.
After that I made it to Metal Sonic somehow, and I was scared that it was a clone of me.


I don't know if this was a glitch or something, but I was a bit scared when this happened:

World Heroes 2 for SNES - I beat the game and then I went to the 2 player mode to fool around on the survival stages with my friend just taunting with Mudman and Rasputin. I beat him and then this screen comes up saying "glass, grass" and a speech or something like that. Then it said Game Over. I was freaked out...but I figured that it was Rasputin's ending somehow.

Resident Evil 2 was probably the scariest game for me as a child.

In the first 30 minutes or so, a zombie attacks you through one of the windows. I was so scared by it that I paused the game and called my friend. He laughed when I told him a zombie was eating my face. Needless to say, I walked through the rest of the game verryyy slowly.

More recently, FEAR and Doom 3 had me pretty much on edge the whole game.

I don't ever recall me ever being traumatized by video games, but I remember my little sister did once, I believe when she was 8.

My half-sister and her boyfriend of the time were playing Castlevania 64 one the N64 in her bedroom, and me and her were watching also. I don't remember exactly what happened, but whatever it was, my little sister ended up getting so scared of the game that she slept with my parents for almost a year, and afterwards she moved to a different room of the house and slept there, because she said something about that room still bugs her.

I remember when I played Resident Evil 2 how the Lickers scared the crap out of me. Because they moved so fast in the game and crawled on the walls and ceilings, I was scared to fall asleep in my room the first night I played it. I think I actually had a dream with one of them in it and I ended up on the floor in the middle of the night... :(

Also, the Slime boss in Secret of Mana gave me nightmares for a day or so because it reminded me of a horror movie that I'd seen once. In the movie was this oil slick thing that looked just like the Slime boss! *shivers*

I remember some more traumatizing games...

There's those headcrab zombies in Half-Life 2...but I was more scared of the sounds they made than the actual zombies.

Then there's those Seahats in LoZ: Wind Waker. From far away it's fine, but when they are RIGHT IN YOUR FACE, I get the big case of the heebie jeebies. I mean seriously, look at their HIDEOUS GRINS leering at you!!

Ever played Aliens Vs. Predator 2? There's a moment in the Marine campaign where I nearly pissed my pants. It was when I was heading over to a plain ol' door when I looked behind me for absolutely no reason to see a FRICKIN' HUGE PRAETORIAN with flailing arms come speeding towards me. I ran for the door to another room, and ran to the another door that was made of steel, and the Prae's on the other side pounding it viciously while I was desperately looking for an escape route. I thought it was going to tear the door down and get me! That was a terrifying but also one of the most awesome scripted moments I've seen in a game.

And let's save the best for last. The most traumatizing moment is when I played Fading Footsteps. One of the worst.games.ever.

Diablo I. The Butcher. I used to play it at night, i was like 9-11, cant remember the age exactly. But after everyone was asleep...
"Ah.... Fresh Meat".

Playing Zelda 1 through in one run, nonstop, no saving, no dying. I got to Ganon and BEHOLD!

I HAD NO SILVER ARROWS!
/SUICIDE

Fuck, reading this thread IMMEDIATELY made me change my music on my media player. Something nice like the ARIA the ANIMATION OST please...;_;

This I think is why I WILL never play a Silent Hill or RE game. No matter how many "100% or near perfect score" reviews RE4 got, I don't think I'll play it ever alone. Seeing the trailer where you shoot this fat guy then tenticles come out is nerve-racking. And I keep hearing about these "pyramid heads" or whatever from SH or RE.

The music for the world stage in Super Mario Bros 3 was creepy to me when I was a kid..maybe 7-8 at the time.

Just today, "fighting" The Sorrow on MGS3 wasn't a pleasent experience, but it's necessary to see it once all the way through to feel remorse for those fallen, even if they're your enemies (lol whatever). It wasn't frightening, just disturbing, especially when he hits you with the blue spiral shit.

I think ICO had a few scary moments as well when you can't really tell when the shadow monsters are coming up. I was at the East Reflector (READING THE WALKTHROUGH mind you) and knew a monster was coming. When it appeared, I screamed "OH FUCK~!!!!!" and my parents were upstairs, going what the hells going on?

Also, could someone please post this "Secret of Mana" track I read earlier? MP3 please?

Silent Hill 1 was pretty traumatizing the first time I played it.

I remember when I was very little (like 3-4) I got scared shitless by Tresure Mountain, when the guy comes out of a secret opening in the wall of his castle and tries to grab you...

Sadly, I never had the pleasure of playing Uninvited or Shadowgate. I got to play a little Deja Vu back in the day, but it didn't really creep me out. I've forgotten most of the game by now, anyway.

One crazy game that really got to me was Elvira 2 from Horrorsoft. It was a sub-par adventure/RPG thing gameplay-wise, but it was full of gross close-up pictures of zombies and corpses and scary vampires and short clips of dead bodies falling out of closets and right into your face and similar freaky stuff. A lot of the art looked like manipulated photographs, and the realism was sickening for an unassuming young lad who thought he was playing a modern-day version of Dungeon Hack.

Maybe it's campy, but back then I was scared enough to put off sleep for the longest time every evening.

The Secret of Mana thing you people are talking about disturbed me in the same way Symphony of the Night's confessional did (THAT MUSIC), but I'd hardly call my experience with them traumatizing. Unusually creepy, yes.

Yeah, I had a traumatizing experience.

When I was 8 and first heard the music from Mario 64 where you try to go into a door but don't have enough stars, it scared me shitless. And Bowser's laugh at the end didn't help much either. In fact, that music STILL creeps me out and I'm almost 18 :lolsign:I had to have my friend over when I played the game when I was younger >_>

God, I forgot about the black headcrabs in Half-Life 2. They still give me the god damn creeps, especially in Ravenholm. I hated the long legged headcrabs (the ones that move really fricking fast and create those berserk zombies) like the plague, but the black ones are even more disturbing ;_;

EDIT:
Yeah, that's the song alright. However Spatula, it naturally won't have the same effect unless you see the temple and know the storyline at the point and the circumstances that made you investigate the place in the first place. All those poor people ;_;