Summary
- Horror games set below ground are filled with dark and claustrophobic environments.
- Titles like Amnesia: The Bunker and Lost in Vivo make the player feel vulnerable through tight corridors.
- The first-person view of Cave Crawler and Penumbra: Overture makes those games scarier because of its immersiveness.
From gothic castles to the confines of one's own mind, horror games transport players to a number of creepy locations. But there's nothing like the primal fear sparked from the depths of the earth. Underground caverns, cramped and devoid of light, are claustrophobic nightmares that, in the real world, most people wouldn't want to find themselves trapped in - never mind the added threat of supernatural horrors that come from video games.
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The games below are some of the best horror titles that, for the majority of their runtime, keep players trapped beneath the earth's surface where all sorts of creatures lurk in the dark.
9 Hidden Deep
Sub-Oceanic Horrors
|
Release Date |
January 24, 2022 (Early Access) |
|---|---|
|
ESRB |
N/A |
|
Developer |
Cogwheel Software |
|
Genre |
Horror |
After a research facility based a mile under the ocean floor goes quiet, Hidden Deep sees an expedition team being sent to investigate what happened and find the survivors. The game shakes up this formulaic but classic horror set-up by having the player lead the rescue team, granting them a number of tools, ranging from heavy mining machinery to an armory of weapons, that will help them complete their mission.
During their playthrough, players will explore sub-ocean caverns and abandoned facilities - all of which are filled with fleshy monsters that are right at home with The Thing.
8 Subterrain
Surviving The Depths Of Mars
Subterrain
- Released
- January 21, 2016
WHERE TO PLAY
Assuming the role of Dr.West, Subterrain forces players to navigate the cramped halls of an underground city on Mars that has become overrun with monsters. At a glance, Subterrain might remind some players of Darkwood, thanks to its similar top-down perspective where the player's field of vision is limited by a cone. Like Darkwood, the inclusion of this camera angle makes Subterrain all the more intense, as players, though they have a visual of the room, won't always see an enemy coming for them.
7 Cave Crawler
Cave Rescue Gone Wrong
|
Release Date |
April 18, 2023 |
|---|---|
|
ESRB |
N/A |
|
Developer |
Technomancy Studios |
|
Genre |
Horror |
Technomancy Studios' Cave Crawler is a short, little indie game that has players taking control of a drone, aptly named a "Cave Crawler", as they explore a cave in search of a missing hiker. As is expected, all is not right in this cave, and the further players progress through it, the more strange happenings they'll witness.
Cave Crawler makes the most of its setting, confronting players with its claustrophobic and dark caverns by placing them in a first-person camera angle. The camera choice is what makes the experience, as players become truly immersed, feeling as if they're really crawling through those tunnels.
6 Penumbra: Overture
Exploring Icy Mines
Penumbra: Overture - Episode 1
- Released
- March 30, 2007
- Platform(s)
- PC
Penumbra: Overture is Amnesia developer Frictional Games' first and perhaps most underrated commercial release. Players assume the role of Phillip as he travels to Greenland after receiving a letter from his thought-to-be-dead father. Caught in the cold after arriving at the location in the letter, Phillip takes shelter in an abandoned mine filled with creepy crawlies and mystery.
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Like Frictional's other games, Penumbra is dripping in atmosphere, creating an environment that only feels claustrophobic and creepy, but cold too. While exploring the icy tunnels of Penumbra, players are bound to feel the chill of goosebumps on their skin, for more reasons than one.
5 Alisa
Underground Mansion
Alisa
- Released
- October 22, 2021
WHERE TO PLAY
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Nintendo Switch, Windows, macOS, Linux
- Genre(s)
- Adventure, Indie, Puzzle, Shooter
Underground is a term used a little differently in the case of Casper Croes' Alisa, as, rather than submerging players in dark caves, the game is set in a Resident Evil-style mansion, called the Dollhouse, that itself is located underground. Meaning Alisa elevates the classic haunted mansion atmosphere by stripping away anything that might have given the player some semblance of freedom. There are no windows offering peeks at the sky or sections, after the opening, above the surface, for players to catch their breath.
Naturally, with a setting called the Dollhouse, protagonist Alisa - an elite royal agent - is forced to fight through doll-like monsters in her attempts to escape back to the surface.
4 Metro 2033
Humanity Forced Into The Metro Tunnels Of Russia
Metro 2033 Redux
- Released
- August 28, 2014
WHERE TO PLAY
Following a nuclear disaster, Metro 2033 sees the surviving population of Moscow fleeing to the depths of the city's metro tunnels for shelter. In the ensuing years, a semblance of a civilization emerges, with survivors being split across multiple factions and tunnels that have managed to create some form of order.
On top of the lightless, cramped, and starving conditions the people of Metro already endure, these tunnels are filled with mutated monsters and strange, supernatural anomalies, making life within them even more miserable. In this world, the player assumes the role of Artyom as he travels through and beyond the tunnels to save his people from an impending threat.
3 Sunless Sea
Sail Across An Underground Ocean
Sunless Sea
- Released
- February 6, 2015
WHERE TO PLAY
- Genre(s)
- RPG, Adventure, Indie Games, Shooter
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Linux, iOS, Android, Xbox One
Sunless Sea combines an underground setting with another of video games' most frightening locations: the ocean. Set in the Fallen London universe, where the city has been transported to an impossibly large cavern called Neath, players captain their own ship as they explore the Unterzee, a subterranean ocean swimming with horrors.
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As the title suggests, the sun does not touch the ocean, making its waters black and inscrutable. Being constantly shrouded in darkness and not knowing what lurks beneath the game's waters is an unnerving experience that one never quite gets used to, making Sunless Sea a tense play throughout its runtime.
2 Lost in Vivo
Save Your Dog From Silent Hill 3's Subway
Lost in Vivo
- Released
- October 5, 2018
WHERE TO PLAY
Lost in Vivo tasks players with descending into the sewers to find their dog after it falls down a drain. Rather than a high-octane action fest, the John Wick of horror games is a claustrophobic nightmare that will force players through winding labyrinths of dark tunnels, each haunted by some sort of twisted horror.
Visually, Lost in Vivo seems to draw a lot of inspiration from the Silent Hill franchise, with a number of its levels being crusted with rust, caked in grime, or unsettling in their liminality.
1 Amnesia: The Bunker
WW1 Horror
Amnesia: The Bunker
- Released
- May 16, 2023
WHERE TO PLAY
- Developer(s)
- Frictional Games
- Genre(s)
- Survival Horror
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
- Platform(s)
- PC, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S
Amnesia: The Bunker saw Frictional Games diving beneath the earth once again to deliver one of gaming's scariest releases in recent history. In the game, players assume the role of Henri Clement, a French WW1 soldier who becomes trapped in a bunker with a monstrous Beast.
The suffocating, rat-infested interior of the game's titular bunker is unnerving enough on its own, but the Beast is what truly makes this game stand out. Stalking the player constantly throughout the game, the Beast harks back to enemies like Mr. X from Resident Evil 2 or the incredibly smart xenomorph from Alien: Isolation, forcing players to keep their wits about them.
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