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Game Design Deep Dive: Horror
The Game Design Deep Dive series examines a specific game system or mechanic over the course of the history of the industry. This entry will examine the history and design of the horror genre and elements in video games. The author analyzes early video game examples, including the differences between survival, action-horror, and psychological horror. Thanks to recent hits like Five Night’s at Freddy’s, Bendy and the Ink Machine, and recent Resident Evil titles, the horror genre has seen a strong resurgence. For this book in the Game Design Deep Dive series, Joshua Bycer will go over the evolution of horror in video games and game design, and what it means to create a terrifying and chilling experience.
FEATURES
• Written for anyone interested in the horror genre, anyone who wants to understand game design, or anyone simply curious from a historical standpoint
• Includes real game examples to highlight the discussed topics and mechanics
• Explores the philosophy and aspects of horror that can be applied to any medium
• Serves as a perfect companion for someone building their first game or as part of a game design classroom
Joshua Bycer is a game design critic with more than eight years of experience critically analyzing game design and the industry itself. In that time, through Game-Wisdom, he has interviewed hundreds of game developers and members of the industry about what it means to design video games. He also strives to raise awareness about the importance of studying game design by giving lectures and presentations. His first book was 20 Essential Games to Study. He continues to work on the Game Design Deep Dive series.
FEATURES
• Written for anyone interested in the horror genre, anyone who wants to understand game design, or anyone simply curious from a historical standpoint
• Includes real game examples to highlight the discussed topics and mechanics
• Explores the philosophy and aspects of horror that can be applied to any medium
• Serves as a perfect companion for someone building their first game or as part of a game design classroom
Joshua Bycer is a game design critic with more than eight years of experience critically analyzing game design and the industry itself. In that time, through Game-Wisdom, he has interviewed hundreds of game developers and members of the industry about what it means to design video games. He also strives to raise awareness about the importance of studying game design by giving lectures and presentations. His first book was 20 Essential Games to Study. He continues to work on the Game Design Deep Dive series.
144 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 7, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 6, 2023
Did this book have no editor? I found many clunky sentences like: "With both the acts of raising and releasing the tension, there are difficulties with each" and " Some of the best jump scares in games were understated, such as walking out of a room and seeing an enemy standing there that just appeared or something appearing in the distance where there was not anything a second ago." Both of these were found in under 10 minutes of reading time and it's safe to say the book is plagued with sentences of this quality.
There are also some spelling mistakes (which IMO are even worse than bad sentence structure) like "hocky mask" and "anthesis" instead of antithesis in the sentence: "Frustrating elements are often the anthesis of good game design ..."
It's embarrassing that the book got published in this condition and it's an insult to fans of horror and gaming who take these topics seriously and deserve much higher standards of reading material.
It's such a shame because the subject matter is truly interesting, but the book is impossible to finish in this condition
There are also some spelling mistakes (which IMO are even worse than bad sentence structure) like "hocky mask" and "anthesis" instead of antithesis in the sentence: "Frustrating elements are often the anthesis of good game design ..."
It's embarrassing that the book got published in this condition and it's an insult to fans of horror and gaming who take these topics seriously and deserve much higher standards of reading material.
It's such a shame because the subject matter is truly interesting, but the book is impossible to finish in this condition
September 19, 2025
Should this be given one star? Probably, I've never seen such an atrocious way of using figures: random images from games, which don't fit the context nor reference the game. Wtf bro?
The content is definitely not a deep dive into horror or game design. The writer mentions that you do not have 'horror' mechanics, since horror is theme + tension. Duh.
He luckily provides us with some mechanics that are often used: resource management, puzzles, stealth and enemy design. So does he expand on it? You ask? No, not really.
The content is definitely not a deep dive into horror or game design. The writer mentions that you do not have 'horror' mechanics, since horror is theme + tension. Duh.
He luckily provides us with some mechanics that are often used: resource management, puzzles, stealth and enemy design. So does he expand on it? You ask? No, not really.
November 3, 2025
I am not sure who this book is for, but it certainly isn't a deep dive. It would be better titled as a quick introduction, because that's really what it is.
It certainly isn't useful to a game developer. It simply lacks the depth and technical knowledge to be useful to any designer, and I would know, because I am one. This isn't surprising, as the author has never developed a game and is simply a critic, but it's rather misleading to call this a design deep dive and then have no real design experience. I would have liked to see explorations of setting atmosphere, examples of mechanics from a plethora of games, possible issues and how to solve them, the types of feedback people can expect on a horror title and how to incorporate those into the design without harming atmosphere, etc. As it stands, this book glosses over only the most basic and obvious details of horror game development in a way that's not useful to a designer who is even the slightest bit familiar with the genre.
Is this for gamers who have an interest in horror? Well, not really, because of the same issues stated above. If you're familiar with horror, this book brings nothing to the table. What about new gamers wanting to get a start in horror? Again, no, because this book only really discusses about a half dozen or so of the most famous horror IP out there and briefly mentions a few others. If you've heard of Resident Evil or Silent Hill, well, that's about 90% of the book. If it were aimed at new horror gamers, it would have been better suited as a horror game encyclopedia, having entries for hundreds of horror games, stating their features and providing a miniature review.
That's all underlying stuff, though. The fundamental issue with this book. There are plenty of technical issues as well. From dubious claims to inaccurate statements to complete misinterpretations of design, this book utterly fails to deliver whatever it's trying to deliver to whoever it thinks its for. The images are too dark to see and appear completely unrelated to the topic; seriously, I have never seen such ineffective use of figures in a non-fiction book before. The chapters make very little sense and the organization is off. In each section, before you really even know what the author is getting at, the section ends (to avoid diving deep, of course, who would want that?!). The book also has an issue with constantly referring to itself with: "I'll talk about about this in Chapter 9," or "I already covered this in chapter 2.1." This makes the book feel more like a maze, as the information is spread all over the place and you can't really lock down a cohesive idea without jumping around in the book and losing your place. If you do read it linearly, by the time you get to chapter 9, you've already forgotten what you were supposed to be looking for there.
The book seems like it wants to be more about the history and evolution of horror games, not a design deep dive. That could have been interesting on its own, but, again, the book doesn't seem to be committing to any specific audience or goal. It would have been very interesting to read a book about how horror came to be, how it's ideas evolved, how one game borrowed from another and evolved the genre/medium, etc. This book is about 80% there, but fails to really connect the dots into any sort of meaningful or interesting narrative and, as mentioned, the formatting is really working against it here. It almost feels like this was just the author deciding he had to write something, deciding it may as well be horror games, and then tried to flex is horror game knowledge, which turned out to be severely lacking.
Overall, this is the worst design book I've read. It shows a complete lack of knowledge from the author, it's formatting makes it impossible to understand, and, worst of all, it's not really useful to anyone who has the potential to be interested in what it has to offer. Steer clear of this title. You're better off watching a few YouTube video essays.
It certainly isn't useful to a game developer. It simply lacks the depth and technical knowledge to be useful to any designer, and I would know, because I am one. This isn't surprising, as the author has never developed a game and is simply a critic, but it's rather misleading to call this a design deep dive and then have no real design experience. I would have liked to see explorations of setting atmosphere, examples of mechanics from a plethora of games, possible issues and how to solve them, the types of feedback people can expect on a horror title and how to incorporate those into the design without harming atmosphere, etc. As it stands, this book glosses over only the most basic and obvious details of horror game development in a way that's not useful to a designer who is even the slightest bit familiar with the genre.
Is this for gamers who have an interest in horror? Well, not really, because of the same issues stated above. If you're familiar with horror, this book brings nothing to the table. What about new gamers wanting to get a start in horror? Again, no, because this book only really discusses about a half dozen or so of the most famous horror IP out there and briefly mentions a few others. If you've heard of Resident Evil or Silent Hill, well, that's about 90% of the book. If it were aimed at new horror gamers, it would have been better suited as a horror game encyclopedia, having entries for hundreds of horror games, stating their features and providing a miniature review.
That's all underlying stuff, though. The fundamental issue with this book. There are plenty of technical issues as well. From dubious claims to inaccurate statements to complete misinterpretations of design, this book utterly fails to deliver whatever it's trying to deliver to whoever it thinks its for. The images are too dark to see and appear completely unrelated to the topic; seriously, I have never seen such ineffective use of figures in a non-fiction book before. The chapters make very little sense and the organization is off. In each section, before you really even know what the author is getting at, the section ends (to avoid diving deep, of course, who would want that?!). The book also has an issue with constantly referring to itself with: "I'll talk about about this in Chapter 9," or "I already covered this in chapter 2.1." This makes the book feel more like a maze, as the information is spread all over the place and you can't really lock down a cohesive idea without jumping around in the book and losing your place. If you do read it linearly, by the time you get to chapter 9, you've already forgotten what you were supposed to be looking for there.
The book seems like it wants to be more about the history and evolution of horror games, not a design deep dive. That could have been interesting on its own, but, again, the book doesn't seem to be committing to any specific audience or goal. It would have been very interesting to read a book about how horror came to be, how it's ideas evolved, how one game borrowed from another and evolved the genre/medium, etc. This book is about 80% there, but fails to really connect the dots into any sort of meaningful or interesting narrative and, as mentioned, the formatting is really working against it here. It almost feels like this was just the author deciding he had to write something, deciding it may as well be horror games, and then tried to flex is horror game knowledge, which turned out to be severely lacking.
Overall, this is the worst design book I've read. It shows a complete lack of knowledge from the author, it's formatting makes it impossible to understand, and, worst of all, it's not really useful to anyone who has the potential to be interested in what it has to offer. Steer clear of this title. You're better off watching a few YouTube video essays.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews