13 Best Free Horror Games

Update[10/02/2014]: We’ve updated this list with two titles, both free to play. One is a triple-A title while the other is indie. Read on to find out what they are.

The best things in life are free. Or so the saying goes. But so are the worst things in life. Literally. Here you find a list with the best, most horrifying and mind melting horror games you won’t have to pay a dime for. You can find these titles online, most of them playable in your browser. The Unity 3D titles will prompt you to download the Unity Web Installer.

Some of these are fun, some of these are just plain terrifying. And some will stay with you even after you’ve stopped playing. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Midnight Man is a free-to-play horror game that’s inspired by a Creepypasta—kind of like Slender Man. The objective of the game is to avoid the Midnight Man at all costs. You have to move through your house at night while carrying only a candle. If the Midnight Man is near, the candle might go out, you’ll hear a low whisper, and he’ll appear right in front of you. You have to relight the candle in ten seconds or lose the game.

P.T. is the interactive teaser for Silent HIlls. Developed by Kojima Productions for Konami, the game is a collaborative effort between Hideo Kojima and horror film director Guillermo del Toro. In P.T. players must navigate the inside of a house in a repeating corridor in an effort to uncover the mysteries hidden within the home and eventually escape it.

1: Slender: The Eight Pages

Also available as a souped up “proper” game now, the original proof of concept game that started the Slenderman microgame craze last year is still as potent as ever. Walk through a dark forest after sundown and collect the eight pages. And pray you don’t run into the Slenderman. If you see him, run. Don’t look. This game is about pure paranoia. And even better if you’re into the Slenderman lore of Marble Hornets. The game has been created in Unity and is available for Mac and Windows download here.

 

2: SCP: Containment Breach

Another game that’s based on a collaborative online writing project. This time, it’s the SCP Foundation, a vast database inspired by various horror stories, the X-Files, Men in Black, Twilight Zone and other weird mystery stories. The game features a  number of SCP entries, most prominently SCP 173, a malevolent, living sculpture which cannot move while being observed, but will rush in and break the player’s neck if line of sight is broken. Oh, and the game has a blinking mechanic, so once you blink, you die. Though there are ways to keep SCP 173 from doing that. The game casts the player as a test subject in the SCP foundations vast underground facility, which is procedurally generated. So no two games will ever be the same. The game can be downloaded for Windows here. 

 

3: The Visitor

A point and click adventure game classic made in Flash and originally from Newgrounds. Here the roles are reversed, the player is cast as a tiny alien parasite that has to eat all kinds of terran fauna from inside out, making its way up the food chain. It’s a delightfully gruesome little game that’s almost as much fun as the movie Slither. Almost. Can be played in your browser here. 

 

4: Deep Sleep

Another point and click adventure, this time though more as in Lucas Arts meets Silent Hill. Deep Sleep is both creepy, disturbing and - surprising for a point and click adventure game - features some frantic moments of panic. The goal of the game is waking up from a terrible nightmare, there are horrors about to kill the player and disturbing puzzles beg for solving. Sometimes literally. It’s a great little disturbing title for those who already went through both Home and Lone Survivor and want more of the same. Deep Sleep can be played in your browser at Kongregate

 

5: Covetus

A small, disturbing pixel art game about the undying desire to exist. More philosophical and more experimental than most other games here, but strong stuff none the less. Covetus can also be found at Kongregate. 

 

6: Eyes

Another Unity 3D game, still in development. It combines elements from Amnesia, Slender and the Siren games. The player is a burglar who breaks into a haunted mansion, the goal is to steal bags of gold, while outmaneuvering the rampant haunts. With the eponymous “eyes” that the player finds around the mansion, it’s possible to slip into the vision of the closest ghost. It’s a well done little game, and quite intense. The presence of a nearby ghost is given away by rattling poltergeist like effects, which makes creeping around the haunted mansion all the more intense. Eyes can be played in your browser at GameJolt. 

 

7: FPS Man

Perspective is everything. So once you get down into the eyes of little arcade icon Pac Man, running through the mazes in his shoes, things change from cheerful arcade fun to tense, nail biting terror. It’s an interesting little idea, well executed again in Unity 3D. Playable online in your browser at Kongregate

 

8 Corridor

Not a corridor shooter but a corridor uh, scare? In any way, this highly linear, first person game has the player walk down an endless corridor, intersected by a few rooms. The further the player advances the more reality starts to slip. It’s one of those games that do have a lot of jumpscares but not too much else really. Until someone or something starts to stalk you. Interesting concept though. Grab it for download at Mediafire. 

 

9 Imscared

In this pixelated first person creeper, you find yourself trapped in a strange house you need to find out what the hell happened, facing horrors and monsters and outlandish puzzles to solve. The game does some interesting things with the engine’s draw distance, the minecraft-style graphics actually helping the game being creepier. Download it at your own risk at gamejolt.

 

10 One Chance

Not technically a horror game, this little experimental adventure title sees you confronted with something more terrifying than demons or ghosts, namely human nature and utter despair. The player is put in the shoes of a researcher who found a cure for cancer that turns around to wipe out all life on earth. The rest is up to the player, how to react to the situation. The game gives each player one chance, blocking retries through cookies. Play it online at Newgrounds!

 

11 Vapour

Playing what seems to be a ghost, the player has to traverse a fog filled landscape where the dead commit hate crimes on the living and find a way to salvation. Possibly. Maybe. There are things moving about in the fog. Things that could drive your ghostly self insane. Another ghost envy of the player’s supreme ghostiness perhaps. Also the dead in the ground are trying to make you join them. Uh. Come on, it’s just one undead discriminating against the other! Download it here.

 

12 Stairs

Not related to the various SCP-087 games, this first person game also features a seemingly endless industrial stairwell in an abandoned factory, but it also features rooms and puzzles and more scary stuff than just an endless staircase with some bumpy noises. It’s a more fleshed out game than those experimental SCP-087 ones, and there’s some interesting ideas at work here. Take a look over here.

 

13 The Following

A nightmarish short, The Following is another first person game that does some interesting things. First of all, it’s one of the few instances where a game successfully simulates short-sightedness to some great effect. There’s a shape over there and you don’t know what it is. It’s not bad draw distances, it’s a deliberate effect. And then there is a floating ghost thing stalking your down a maze. You just can’t see very far so you have to be careful that it’s not too close. A true nightmare really. Download through mediafire.