The best horror games without weapons

Key conclusions

• The best horror games leave players with a strong sense of helplessness by stripping them of their weapons and defenses.
• The scariest horror games show players as the hunted, not the hunters, facing huge odds.
• Helplessness in horror games is achieved by making players completely defenseless with no weapons or combat options.

Good horror gamesgreat at making players feel helpless. While most action and role-playing games allow players to wield weapons and special abilities, horror games go in the opposite direction, putting the hero in a truly hopeless situation and forcing him to fight to survive and find a way out.

One of the easiest ways to get rid of this feeling of hopelessness is to make the player completely defenseless. Some of the scariest horror games have no weapons, or any kind of fighting at all. The main character is completely at the mercy of the monstrous forces trying to finish them off, and the player must fight to survive the onslaught, with no way to fight back. Here are some of the The best horror games without weapons.

10 Five Nights at Freddy's

A week of grief

The original Five Nights at Freddy's this is a game that needs no introduction. The popularity of this indie pet has become very popular thanks to its simple but unique principle and the fascinating design of the terrifying animatronics. The title has since spawned a massive multimedia franchise that includes multiple games and even a major motion picture.

One of the reasons the game works so well is the sheer helplessness of the player character. The door to the protagonist's tiny office offers only weak temporary protection against the bulky animatronics, and players must carefully monitor the entire restaurant to stay alive. With no real way to fight back against these monstrous machines, the player is a duck for five agonizing nights.

9 I'm under observation

Hunting for anomalies

I'm under observation is a small horror game that has spawned a respectable series of sequels, all based on the same mind-blowing premise. U I'm under observationplayers assume the role of a surveillance operator who must thoroughly investigate a mysterious house using a series of security cameras. The only way to survive is to catch supernatural phenomena when they happen and report them on the spot.

This simple yet high-stakes gameplay cycle results in intense tension and paranoia that flares up strongly within a short playing time. Fans looking for more suspense can turn to the game's many sequels, but the first game alone makes for a solid evening of pure terror.

8 Mortuary Assistant

Condemned among the dead

Even among other horror games, Mortuary Assistant it is a particularly terrifying experience. As the title suggests, the player character was caught working in a morgue late at night when he was attacked by a terrifying demonic entity. The player must fight to stay alive before it is too late to banish the demon.

Although the game is quite short, the robust randomization element ensures high replayability. With each playthrough, there will be different ghosts and ghostly events that keep the game from becoming predictable or stale. Each visit to the morgue will provide unique, gruesome demonic encounters that the player is almost helpless against.

7 Doki Doki Literary Club

Appearances can be deceiving

A shocking turn of heart Doki Doki Literary Club it's the stuff of legends now, but when it launched it took the gaming world by complete surprise. This gripping psychological horror game hides its highly disturbing content behind a seemingly innocent visual novel of romance and poetry, only to lure fans into the true horror that lies beneath.

Doki Doki Literary Club covers some surprisingly deep and difficult topics about the nature of relationships and even the limitations of the video game genre itself. There is no combat in the game, and not even enemies in the traditional sense, but Doki Doki Literary Club Fans will likely be on the edge of their seats from the first reveal of his true nature until the end.

6 Iron lungs

Unimaginable depths

The horror genre's constant attempts to scare players in new and unexpected ways have resulted in some truly imaginative games, and Iron lungs is one of the strangest. This game casts the player as a prisoner on an alien moon, adrift in an ocean of blood, sealed in a tiny windowless submarine and forced to explore the Stygian depths.

The main character's only way to interact with the world around him is through a slow, old-fashioned camera that gives him short time-lapse shots of the deep water outside. These blind flashes of understanding of the incomprehensible sea, combined with the intense claustrophobia of the player's tiny submarine, create a sense of helplessness and fear that is almost unparalleled in the genre.

5 Immortality

The mystery of Marissa Marcel

Immortality may be stretching the definition of what a video game is, but it's still a wildly creative horror experience that fans of the genre won't want to miss. The game is presented as a collection of archive footage from three unfinished films, all featuring a mysteriously missing actress named Marissa Marcel. While watching the footage, players can try to piece together what happened to her, but it soon becomes apparent that something much darker is going on beneath the surface.

Secrets Immortality much more experiential than generalized, but they take the game to some really disturbing places. This is far from your average horror video game, but it will lead to just as many sleepless nights until the mystery is solved.

4 Phasmophobia

Ghost hunting with friends

Phasmophobia became popular in late 2020 when it served as a seasonal way to scare friends online. This game features up to four players as professional ghost hunters who travel to haunted locations and gather spectral evidence to identify the ghost before it kills them.

Players can subdue and drive away the game's hostile spirits through various means, but they cannot fight them back directly. Generally, when the player sees the phantom face to face, it is too late. Players must tread carefully and battle malfunctioning equipment and intrusive spirits to stay alive and earn.

3 Amnesia: The Dark Descent

The depths of madness

Amnesia: The Dark Descent is in many ways the gold standard of helplessness in horror games. This survival horror game features players as a man with no memories, lost in a dark and ruined castle teeming with horrors beyond comprehension. The game in no way offers the player a specific way to deal with these abominations, forcing them to rely on stealth and evasion if they want to stay alive.

An oppressive atmosphere of madness and terror that pervades every second Amnesia made it an icon in the horror genre and provided the blueprint for several sequels. For all the horror these later games produced, Amnesia: The Dark Descent remains one of the most iconic survival horror games ever.

2 SOMA

Sea nightmare

This nightmare game from the creators Amnesia : The Dark Descenttransports players to an abandoned research station at the very bottom of the ocean. This creepy facility is populated by creepy robot horrors and horribly mutated humans and fish. The main character, Simon, must find out how he got there and how to escape before he is slaughtered by the terrifying killing machines that are unstoppable.

Just like its sister game Amnesia, SOMA quickly turns to despair and horror as players learn how the facility was destroyed and how Simon ended up there. This game deals with dark and tragic themes concerning the fate of the human race and the nature of the digitized consciousness, and its philosophical implications are almost as thrilling as the horrors thrown into its waterlogged halls.

1 PT

A lost legend

Infamous PT is a video game legend both because of how deep, incredibly scary it is, and because it's forever lost to modern gaming. This short game served to prepare the basis for the future entry into Silent Hill franchise created by the famous Hideo Kojima, but unfortunately the game has been canceled and the playable demo has been removed from stores.

If it was available, PT was a revolutionary title. It trapped players in an endless looping corridor, going back and forth while players avoided the attentions of a malevolent spirit and puzzled over some very ominous environmental clues to unravel the game's dark past. Silent Hills could have been a truly memorable game, but fans were lucky enough to play it PT were still able to feel the hopeless sensation of being forever trapped in a madman's nightmare.