Welcome to the second week of Halloween because one's never enough. I gotta say I am shocked
We've never done this topic before I feel like we must have but I can't seem to find it in the archive so alright
This week we'll be talking about the tension and release curve for a horror game
You remember that video about pacing and interest curves that we did
ages ago? If not you might want to go watch that one again to refresh because we're gonna build off of a lot of the
Stuff we said in there. I'll put a link down below, and there's probably an annotation somewhere around me all right here
We go in horror games the goal is still to build the same basic interest curve you would in other types of games
But how you go about that in a horror game is radically different than in other genres. Which is something
That's too often misunderstood. So let me put the question to you
How do you ratchet up the interest in a horror title? this is actually a really tough question. It's the reason that so many horror
Games seem to have given up on Horror entirely
instead turning to all the [tried-and-true] methods we know from action Gameplay to craft their interest curve and just
Layering a horror skin on top of that
It's also why so many horror games fall flat
Even when horror games don't give up on horror many of them think that in order to build up interest they need to pile on
The scares and the surprising or disgusting moments, packing the game with traditional horror genre moments at every turn
But those horror moments aren't actually how we build up interest in a horror title
They are the payoff the height of an interest peak you see horror is about a cycle of tension and release. It's about anticipation
It's about those stretches where you know something's coming, and that something terrible is about to happen
But you don't know when. The build-up to the scare is as important as the scare itself
Play One of the first few Silent Hills and compare the frequency of intense action moments with any comparable third-person action title
Note how long the lulls between enemy encounters are rather than fighting a new enemy every second
There's often 10 to 15 seconds between enemy encounters. As you play through watch for the sections where they simply let you walk around with
nothing happening. In most games this would be the death of engagement, but in a horror game. This is what brings it all together
Why? because the best horror lets you do the work for it. So let's talk about Pt
When you look at it, the actual scares in Pt
Aren't anything exceptional the ghost wasn't particularly horrific and many of the different types of scares it offered were things you've probably
Seen before. But what made it masterful was its use of tension and release as you were walking down that hallway
You knew something was going to happen and you were just waiting for it and every second
It didn't happen you are making yourself more tense
Anticipating it trying to second-guess when it was going to come. You were building the fear for yourself with every step you took down that
Hallway until just when you almost couldn't take it anymore WHAM scary thing, and that scare? That's the payoff
It makes you jump and it frightens you, but after it hits some of that tension is relieved
You're actually less tense now less afraid of what lies ahead than you were just a few seconds before
Imagine if they just threw those scares or those jump moments or those disgusting scenes at you one after another, after another in fact you've
Probably seen some game or movie try to do that
It loses its impact very quickly. Instead you have to let us build up that tension again. So we're in the right place
Psychologically to really get the most out of that next big scary moment, so how do you set this up? well,
there's a couple of parts that are integral to building tension in a horror product. First they have to set you up with the
Expectation of the terrible. Say you're playing an action game, and you clear an area of enemies
But then for some reason you've got to reach retraverse through that area which is now completely empty and enemy free
That's not going to build attention boredom and frustration, yes,
But not tension. in horror games on the other hand quiet areas make us nervous
Why is this? It's because the world sets up an expectation that something terrible is about to happen. In horror
This is a pact that the game immediately makes with the player
You get some of this just by knowing what you're getting into when you pick up the title.
After all we know that terrible things are going to happen in Silent hill. Terrible things always happen in Silent Hill
But look at how much effort games like silent hill or fatal frame put into making sure that the setting itself is uncomfortable
That there's something not quite right there
Next this tension is usually enhanced by letting us into a situation that in some way limits our perception
Allowing us to psych ourselves out even more as we try to guess
What sort of ghosts or horrors may lurk just out of sight.
Silent hill this is done with the fog. Fatal frame does this with the invisibility of the ghosts
Slender does this with darkness and many other games, heck even PT
achieved this with right angles and closed doors. If you've ever had that moment of tension right before you turn a corner or open a
Door in a horror game. This is why.
Finally crafters of good horror will make sure that you can't
Actually anticipate the real threat. In horror you have to make sure you don't overdo it
But many games will use things like the sound of a door creaking or the rustle of leaves or the sound of a pebble falling
Behind you to get your brain thinking there are threats where there are none.
we do this with Shadows and
Mirrors and Mannequins all the time. These red herring threats keep your brain from feeling safe, from being able to predict when a real terror
Is coming. This in turn adds to the creeping unease you feel waiting for the real threat.
So to create the interest curve we want in our horror games rather than building in action or even surprises scares or ghastly bits
We need to focus on building tension during the quiet slow moments that put the player in the right frame of mind to be truly
horrified when those big moments finally come. Only by thinking of this tension and release cycle can we actually create a good interest curve for
This genre and this is even more important for us as an industry as we start branching into genres beyond our typical action game
While the desired interest curve is similar regardless of whatever genre you're working in, what actually builds that interest within the genres is not
All right, I guess we can pack up the halloween stuff for now until next year