15 Scary Moments in Non-Horror Games

It’s that time of the year again where many people watch horror movies and play horror video games to get into the Halloween spirit. But some of the most creepiest, weirdest, and most disturbing moments have occurred in non-horror games. This is 15 scary moments that have occurred in non-horror games in no particular order.

1. The Morgue Scene in Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009)

The Scarecrow

Batman is already a dark character, but Rocksteady Studios decided to amp up the scariness in the morgue scene of Batman: Arkham Asylum. When Batman arrives at the morgue, the hallways are filled with roaches, the freezer doors in the morgue open and close, and the sounds of spooky whispers echo throughout the room. It’s nothing too scary at first, but when players leave the room it loops back to the same room. This time three body bags sit on the tables. The only way to further the game is to open these body bags. Batman discovers the body of his dead parents who wake up to ridicule and blame him for their deaths. When Batman opens up the final bag, Scarecrow pops out and forces him into a strange hallucination where Batman has to sneak past a large Scarecrow in a large obstacle course. It’s one of the most unexpected moments in gaming.

2. The Cannibals of Andale in Fallout 3 (2008)

Delicious!

Bethesda’s post-apocalyptic world of Fallout is full of many horrors and dangers. Wonderers will encounter super mutants, killer robots, giant fire-breathing ants, mutant scorpions, raiders, death claws, and much more. But what makes the town of Andale scary is the mystery behind it. When players arrive at the town, the residents are very welcoming and they invite players to dinner. But as players talk to all the residents and explore the town, something doesn’t feel right. One resident even warns players to get out while they can. If players dare, they can venture into the basement to uncover the town’s mystery. It turns out the player is the dinner. Not only do the residents inbreed, the residents capture and consume their guests. The basement is covered in blood and full of dismembered body parts. When players discover this dark secret, the residents of the town become hostile and attack the players.

3. Lavender Town in Pokemon Red & Blue (1998)

Who you gonna call?

Perhaps the most well known moment on this list, Lavendar Town has become an online phenomenon with its many mysteries and stories. It is said that the theme song to the town in the original Pokemon Red and Green was so hi-pitched that it drove many children in Japan to commit suicide. But even if that’s a fictional story, the town does revolve around death and ghosts. Trainers from around the region go to this town to mourn the death of their beloved companion. This shows children that even in the world of Pokemon, their pets (or companions) eventually die too. Even the player’s rival Blue goes to Lavendar town to mourn the death of his Raticate (it is rumored that the player killed his Raticate in battle). The whole story of the town centers on Team Rocket trying to steal the skulls of Cubones to sell them for a lot of money. One of these Cubones is protected by the ghost of its dead mother. Players have to venture into the tower full of grieving trainers, psychics, and ghost Pokemon to stop Team Rocket and restore the soul of Cubone’s dead mother. Talk about growing kids up early.

4. Max Payne’s Hallucination in Max Payne (2001)

Is this the same game?

In the neo-noir world of Max Payne, Max is an NYPD detective who wants revenge for the death of his wife and baby. With several allusions to Norse Mythology and inspirations from Hong Kong action cinema, Max becomes a vigilante who uses a slow motion bullet time effect (influenced by the Matrix) to take down his foes.

It’s not the most original story, but what makes the story stand out is that players really feel his pain. Players are forced to play the moment his wife and child were murdered right from the start. It’s a very dark and depressing story, but there’s one disturbing moment that really stands out in the game. Later in the game, Max is overdosed with a drug that puts him in a disturbing hallucination. In order to continue the game, players must venture through a nightmarish version of the house where his family was murdered. The house is warped into a disturbing funhouse of endless hallways filled with the echoes of his suffering wife and child. At the end of this maze, Max has to enter a hellish abyss. The only way to get out is to follow a trail of blood while hearing the sounds of his crying child. Geez!

5. Snacker in Banjo-Kazooie (1998)

You’re gonna need a bigger boat.

Now several games have monsters lurking in water levels that can make players feel very tense, but Snacker in Rare’s classic platformer Banjo-Kazooie is perhaps the scariest because of his heart racing theme song. Many would say Cranker is scarier because the first thing players see after swimming out of the tunnel is his sharp razor teeth. Plus he’s a large metal shark with bloody gashes covered all over his body. But Snacker is on this list instead because it turns out Cranker is just misunderstood. Snacker on the other hand really wants to take a bite out of Banjo.

In the levels Treasure Trove Cove and Rusty Bucket Bay, if Banjo is in the water for too long, Snacker’s theme song will start to get louder and faster the longer he is in the water (a clear reference to the movie Jaws). Eventually, Snacker will show up to take a bite out of Banjo. Players can’t outswim him by normal means, but if they can get on land he will lose interest in a few seconds. Players can actually defeat him, but he does comeback after a minute or two so players need to make that time count. There are a couple of key items to collect in the water so if players want to collect everything in the game they will have to encounter this foe sooner or later. Sorry!

6. The Carnage Final Chase in Spider-Man (2000)

Nightmare Fuel

The sadistic and homicidal Carnage is one of the most dangerous enemies in Spider-Man’s long list of villains. Before Cletus Kasady took on the role of Carnage, he was sent to prison for being a serial killer. With the powers given to him by the Symbiote, Carnage became so powerful that arch-nemeses Venom and Spider-Man had to team up to defeat him. In Activision’s Spider-Man on the PlayStation 1, players have to battle Carnage after defeating Doctor Octopus in the final level. When players think the game is finally over, Carnage combines with Doc Ock to create a monstrosity that has scared many people who have grown up with this game. As the laboratory is exploding, Carnage chases Spider-Man in a dark hallway with a difficult camera and control scheme. Players have to maneuver through the difficult hallways as the monster creeps right behind them. This is one of the most intense chases in any game.

7. Don’t Go To Ravenholm in Half Life 2 (2004)

Zombie Town

Throughout Valve’s classic game, Half Life 2, players are warned to never go to Ravenholm. So naturally players will go to Ravenholm at some point in the game. The reason to never go to Ravenholm is because there are zombies and headcrabs in literally every corner of the town. Basically everything in the town wants to eat the player. But not only is there monsters everywhere, there are many traps set up everywhere by the town’s lone survivor. These traps can help Freeman combat the monsters, but they can also be pretty dangerous as well. Although it is a blast slicing through zombies with large blades using the gravity gun. Once the player discovers the fun of using the gravity gun it loses its scare factor a bit, but either way its dark atmosphere full of dismembered body parts, traps, and monsters makes it one of the scariest places in video games.

8. The Flood in Halo: Combat Evolved (2001)

One of the best unexpected enemies.

In Bungie’s science fiction first-person shooter, Master Chief battles a variety of aliens with a special suit that regenerates his health and suit. Many of these aliens are pretty cartoonish and the game has many colorful settings, so there is absolutely nothing scary about Halo… right? Wrong! The game throws players for a loop when it introduces an alien parasite called the Flood. These parasites take over the bodies of human and Covenants and mutates their bodies into hideous zombie-like monsters. These monsters come in many different forms ranging from small to large. These parasites have accounted for the death of many sentiment beings in the galaxy. They are considered to be the most dangerous enemy to the whole existence of life, which means they are the most dangerous enemies in the Halo franchise. Watching fallen comrades turn into the terrifying Flood is one of the most unexpected and scariest moments in gaming.

9. The Pentagram Children of Goldshire in World of Warcraft (2004)

What the heck?

The world of Azeroth is full of many dangerous supernatural beings and monsters, but perhaps the creepiest is the Children of Goldshire because of the mystery behind them. Appropriately called the Creepy Children, they are a group of six human children who move around Elwynn Forest in a pentagram formation. If players wonder into the second floor of one of the houses in Goldshire at around 7:30 AM server time, they will see the children stand in a pentagram formation in the room with a creepy song playing in the room. Players will randomly hear strange noises like a banshee scream, a ghoul call, growling, a female crying, and even one of the old gods C’Thun saying “You…will…DIE!” and “Death is close.” And then the children will eventually vanish. If players look this up and look for them it won’t be as scary, but imagine discovering this on accident, especially as a child back in the early days of World of Warcraft.

10. Death Hand in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998)

I need to change my pants!

The Legend of Zelda series has many disturbing moments and enemies, but perhaps the creepiest is Death Hand. Imagine being a young innocent child and playing Ocarina of Time for the first time on the Nintendo 64. While playing the game, imagine being a child and going down the well in Kakariko Village. Eventually, players will see giant hands stick out of the ground. Of course, it’s natural to investigate what’s going on. When players do, one of the large hands will grab Link and a giant zombie-like monster with a large mouth will pop out of the ground to consume the player. Players barely have time to get away from the hand as the monster slowly moves toward Link with its horrible eyeless gaze. But hey at least players get the Lens of Truth out of the encounter, which makes the also creepy Shadow Temple a whole lot easier.

11. The Dentist in Bioshock (2007)

Best jump scare ever!

People will say Bioshock is a horror game, but it’s more of a steampunk science fiction first-person shooter that has some horror elements. After his plane crashes into the ocean, the protagonist Jack goes into the underwater city of Rapture that was intended to be an isolated utopia. But the discovery of the genetic material ‘ADAM’ (that grants superhuman powers to users) drives many people crazy and the utopia eventually becomes a dangerous dystopia. In one part of the game, players will be in a laboratory where they will listen to the audio logs of a dentist. When the players are at a desk, they will start to be surrounded by mist. When they turn around, they will be greeted by that very dentist in one of the scariest jump scares in all of gaming.

12. The Winterlodge in Fable 2 (2008)

How lovely! Wait.. what?

In Lionhead Studio’s Fable 2, if players travel through the Bloodstone Demon Door, they will find a welcoming lodge in a beautiful and colorful winter setting. It’s straight out of Jack’s discovery of Christmas Town in The Nightmare Before Christmas. But when players walk into the lodge, it immediately shifts into a broken down and ransacked torture den. The floor is covered in skeletons of past murder victims. Outside the den, it becomes very dark and ominous. The welcoming street lights have totally vanished. The woodcutting block has a decapitated corpse lying next to it and a blood stained sack full of human body parts hang from a tree. But hey at least players are rewarded with a master longsword for being terrified and dumbfounded.

13. The Vortex Queen in Ecco the Dolphin (1992)

This is a kid’s game, right?

At first glance, Ecco the Dolphin seems like a very cute game about dolphins swimming in the ocean with its friends. Life is great for Ecco. He is hanging out with all his friends in a bright, sunny part of the ocean and doing cool flips. Ecco does a large flip in the air and then the screen suddenly starts to flash and a strange alien noise is heard as all of Ecco’s friends get sucked up in a large waterspout. Ecco is left all alone in the deep dark ocean. It turns out the whole ocean is in chaos and it’s up to Ecco to defeat the aliens to save it. But this isn’t even the scariest part of the game. The final boss of the game is the Vortex Queen which looks like a large Xenomorph from the Alien franchise. And the only way to defeat it is to dismember it. Did anyone see this coming when they bought this game?

14. The fight against Giygas in Earthbound (1995)

Very disturbing

Earthbound (known as Mother 2 in Japan) isn’t a horror game at all. Most of the enemies are animals, robots, or aliens. But then Nintendo unleashes one of the scariest and most disturbing bosses of all time, Giygas. This boss is literally just a background of screaming faces with a very creepy background song. The final part of the game is a huge contrast form the rest of the game as players have to travel up weird fleshy looking pipes to reach the boss. There’s been a long Internet debate on whether the boss is a fetus or not. Looking at the image above, the black parts of the picture are clearly in the shape of an infant. But it’s unclear if that it was intentional or not. Either way, the final boss is hellishly psychedelic as the background constantly warps and twists. There’s no way to fight it. All players can do to damage him is to pray (not kidding). The end of the fight gets even more disturbing as the background becomes very staticky and the music becomes more disturbing. This is easily one of the scariest bosses of all time.

15. The Piano in Super Mario 64 (1996)

Perhaps the scariest memory of all for 90’s kids.

As seen on this list, Nintendo has a history of terrifying children with their games. Super Mario 64 is no different. There are several scary moments that could be put on this list from this game, such as Chopper attacking the player from its chained post, the giant eel, or the large piranha that will eat Mario whole. As Mario ventures through the castle, he will eventually see a Boo in one of the hallways. If players follow the Boo, they will be lead to a small fountain area with several boos. One of these boos contains the scariest level in the game, Big Boo’s Haunt. The level is a haunted mansion and has a lot of spooky elements, but it’s nothing too scary. That’s until the players arrive in a large empty room with just a piano. Of course, there is a red coin behind it so players will jump over it to get the coin. If they get close, the piano will wake up and attack Mario with its large razor sharp teeth. The piano’s crunching sound is terrifying as it chases Mario throughout the room. It may be the most classic jumpscare of all time considering nobody would think they would get scared in a Mario game. This piano will forever be in the hearts of anyone who grew up with this game.

And that’s 15 scary moments in non-horror games. Even to this day, many of these moments are just as scary as they were the first time. If they aren’t anymore, people will still remember being a child and being absolutely terrified. There are many more scary moments that could be on this list, so please share anymore in the comments below.

Happy Halloween!