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Labryx

Atmospheric Games

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7 hours ago, rzh said:

Hexen: Beyond Heretic .... is less about the combat and more about exploration.... Great atmosphere, great soundtrack.

I'm 100% with you. It was not as well-regarded as its combat-heavy cousin Heretic, but I enjoyed it immensely more.

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resident evil village, dat atmosphere is thicc

 

what do you mean atmospheric, every game has its own particular atmosphere it doesnt have to be dark, edgy and depressing to be considered atmospheric

 

other candidates

 

control

cyberpunk 2077

red dead redemption 2

hellblade senua's sacrifice

 

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1 minute ago, sluggard said:

read dead redemption 2

Amen. An all-round well-produced game.

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13 hours ago, m8f said:

Sunless Sea/Sunless Skies. About Sunless Sea, one may even say that there is more atmosphere than gameplay, knowing how close this game is to interactive fiction genre.

 

Seconding Sunless Sea/Sunless skies. If you love reading and lore, and do not mind the slowness, this is the game for you. Fantastic world.

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Cry of Fear. Horror mod for Half-Life 1, incredibly well made by just 4 people.

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2 hours ago, Doom_Dude said:

Wait a sec. Am I blind and there's no Stalker on this list? wtf.

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, it's there, first column, third from bottom

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I would add Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere and Counter-Strike:Source, i swear seeing the 2004 Source aesthetic makes me want to cry.

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- Subnautica [Lone survivor on an ocean planet]

- Devil Daggers [not much atmosphere, but damn does it nail what it's going for]

- Earthbound [I'm not sure it's necessarily "atmospheric," but Itoi did a beautiful job giving the universe its own feeling]

 

If I could force someone to play my favorite games, they'd be System Shock 1, Super Metroid, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R..

I'd recommend playing Arkane's Prey first to get a feel for -Shock style ImSims. After that, play the original version on SS1. Enhanced Edition lacks a few minor details I appreciated the second time through, though more importantly, mouse look and pressing a button on the keyboard to reload totally obliterates the balance Looking Glass put into the game. If you can beat the first level, you can probably beat the game. Medical was / is probably the hardest level in the game since the restoration bay [respawn point] is one of, if not the furthest in / latest in any level WHILE you have to learn a strange [but at the time forward thinking] set of controls from an era before a standard had been set.

 

Play the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. trilogy unmodded. Shadow of Chernobyl is the weakest link gameplay wise because of the pretty linear weapon progression, and that for the first third of the game you can't shoot a beached whale from 10 feet away. After you've beaten the main games, try Anomaly. Much more modern gameplay and many new features. Additionally, the trilogy is currently on sale for 70% off on GOG and Steam atm.

 

Other games I'd strongly recommend mentioned either in the OP or the rest of the thread:

- ImSim: Dishonored, Fallout: New Vegas, E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy

- Horror Shooter: F.E.A.R., Cry of Fear, Dead Space

- Horror Exploration: Yume Nikki [Fan translation > Offical translation], LSD: Dream Emulator [English translation patch]

- Lisa: The Painful [Not sure it's that atmospheric, but I love it. Brutal story, sequel to Lisa: The First. Play The First 'til you get bored or just read about the synopsis. The Painful is much more polished, well-rounded, and enjoyable; The First is short, abstruse, and gruesome.]

- Metroid Prime Trilogy [M+K via PrimeHack]

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On 5/29/2021 at 12:53 AM, rzh said:

Hexen: Beyond Heretic - you probably heard of it since it also runs on the Doom engine, it's a first person dark fantasy game that is less about the combat and more about exploration. People knock it for being obscure and confusing, but those people never played CRPGs, Hexen is a breeze if you take your time to remember where you are and what you're supposed to do. Great atmosphere, great soundtrack.

 

Hell yes. Heretic had a great soundtrack as well, but it was much more suited to the fast-paced Doom-clone killing that often dominated its levels. Hexen's soundtrack was slower and more foreboding. Not only that, but both games made excellent use of ambient sounds(rattling chains, evil laughter, gusts of wind, bell towers ringing), which were a pretty new concept back then. To top it off, Hexen made a ton of use out of transforming level geometry---shifting blocks, continuously moving stone lifts, metal crushers, endlessly cycling projectile traps, etc. It made the levels feel even more alive. 

 

All in all, Hexen was a *profoundly* atmospheric game for 1995.

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I miss various games. Realms of the haunting, Max Payne, Return to Castle Wolfenstein. And there are certainly more, i don't think of atm.

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Here are some of the games I consider to be atmospheric:

  • Max Payne 1 - The snow storm setting and more limited graphics make it feel bleaker than the sequel
  • Thief 1 & Thief 2 - great use of sound design but I lean more into the first game due to better overall variety in levels
  • The Dark Mod - just Thief but on the Doom 3 engine
  • Silent Hill 1 - only one in the serious I have finished
  • Arx Fatalis - great interactivity with an unique setting
  • S.T.A.L.K.E.R - all of them
  • Deus Ex
  • Kingdom Come Deliverance (hardcore mode to disable the quest markers)
  • Ultima 4-7 part 2

Basically games with unintrusive interfaces that don't hold your hand.

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I'd recommend Hylics 2. I haven't finished the game yet, but it's got a surreal, dreamlike atmosphere to it that I haven't seen in any other game.

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I'd like to add Heretic II to the list. The music was very haunting and, together with the graphics, really set the mood of a medieval land.

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How is Link to the Past on there but not Super Metroid, Demon's Crest or Super Ghouls n' Ghosts?

 

EDIT: I've had too much to drink... carry on...

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Doom 3 should be there. Most of the others I would've mentioned already got brought up in the thread. And a bunch were already on the list.

 

On 5/29/2021 at 9:20 AM, ZeMystic said:

Lost in Vivo definitely belongs on this list. The game has more atmosphere then most horror games, and is 100% my favorite. I'm totally biased

I wish somebody could explain to me what's so good about Lost in Vivo. I'm a fan of silent hill games (the first four and shatmem), the PSX aesthetic, even sewer levels... but that game felt completely lacking in nearly every respect.

 

Spoiler

It was only good and atmospheric in the very beginning tunnels where I would hear sounds but not yet have any enemies to fight. The ghosts in the subway maybe were a bit good, since I didn't dare attack them, but as soon as I encountered giant train cars with mouths that I could kill easily with my knife (or axe? whatever it was)... and then the hamfisted metaphors for self-image and stuff (with the eating and the puking and the passage picking with the pictures)... and the giant invincible enemy that was probably meant to kill you but kept glitching out and falling asleep... and the fact that story-wise the game isn't even trying to pretend to be anything more than imagined by the protagonist, unlike the silent hill games... and the fact that there was like zero difficulty to the combat, you could just melee everything, making the "survival horror" aspects moot...

 

I went in hyped up by people who I saw singing praises to that game and my disappointment was immeasurable (my day wasn't ruined though).

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On 5/29/2021 at 1:18 PM, rzh said:

Oh, it's there, first column, third from bottom

 

Ahhh, I couldn't see that for some reason. lol

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Gothic is in that image, but I prefer Gothic 2. Anyone who has played it knows why. It's a small game world, but never lets up on giving you a sense of danger. I still remember the feeling of exploring the forests, knowing a pack of worgs could be nearby and would ruin my day. The town has such a foreboding feeling to it that is hard to explain. It's probably my favourite game that I always forget about. When I do remember it though, the memories come rushing back.

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Far Cry 2 and Half Life 1, the latter of which it's a travesty didn't make it on the list, I'm sure they could have found room for it somewhere, maybe by getting rid of one of the 3 or 4 FromSoftware games where you fight yokai and demons with swords. They've got their fans, but I'm willing to assume that once you've played one of them, you've played them all.

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