Whether you’re looking to be frightened or you just want to escape into a world darker than our own, then here are our top horror picks on Xbox Game Pass to wind down to this Halloween.
These horror games won’t always be available on Xbox Pass, so if you’ve never played these before, we highly recommend picking them up this Halloween, 2024. No matter what type of horror fan you are, there’s something for everyone in this list.
The best Xbox Game Pass horror games to scare your socks off this Halloween
Amnesia: The Bunker
- Release date: June 6, 2023
- Developer: Frictional Games
- Titles similar to this: SOMA, Lazaret, and Meridian 157.
- Scare factor: In the end, you’ll be the one questioning your sanity.
The newest entry in the Amnesia series, The Bunker repackages the fear and isolation from The Dark Descent and modernizes it. While The Dark Descent pioneered the idea of running away from the fear—rather than face it head-on—the original entry hasn’t aged particularly well. Being more of a walking sim than anything else, Amnesia made the switch to a more polished and challenging setting where you’re under attack from the moment you wake up.
It wouldn’t be an Amnesia game if you knew more than your protagonist. You gather bits and pieces of the story, told through diary entries from the people who came before you. Manage your resources carefully as fuel is scarce and that winding flashlight sure attracts a lot of attention. The level design is so detailed and compact, making navigating the bunker incredibly claustrophobic and lonely.
But you know you’re not alone in this mess. There’s something crawling in the walls and it’s searching for you.
Firewatch
- Release date: Feb. 6, 2016
- Developer: Campo Studio
- Titles similar to this: The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture.
- Scare factor: Careful, paranoia is contagious.
Perhaps a controversial pick as it isn’t classified as a horror game, Firewatch is our next recommendation this Halloween. The game creates a feeling unlike any other when it comes to mysterious walking simulators. Things seem simple on the surface. There is no complexity in its design. The gameplay is as basic as you can get. But the storytelling is where a game like Firewatch shines.
Firewatch is mysterious, isolating, and eerie. Carried by the voice acting, Firewatch‘s story has so much life in it. It’s wholesome and heart-breaking, lonely and anxiety-inducing. You cannot help but want to see how this game concludes. It is a beautiful game, but don’t let that beauty distract you—you can’t shake the feeling you’re being watched.
Telltale Games: The Walking Dead Season One
- Release date: April 24, 2012
- Developer: Telltale Games
- Titles similar to this: The Last of Us, Until Dawn, and Heavy Rain.
- Scare factor: Lemon and herb mild.
Telltale Games: The Walking Dead was an episodic series that followed one of the best written characters in gaming history—Lee Everett. Lee was so incredibly human, as his good qualities and glaring flaws were on display from start to finish. We join Lee on his way to jail as the apocalypse unfolds around him. It’s a rare showcase of a zombie game that doesn’t have its main focus on the undead. Instead, the story revolves around Lee and Clementine, the 11-year-old girl who doesn’t know where her parents are.
The cast of characters that join Lee on his survival journey have a lot of depth to them, making the setting more believable and allowing us to easily connect to each character. Similar to The Last of Us, the paternal bond between Lee and Clementine is wholesome and beautiful.
You will gasp, you will scream, and you will cry as you dive into the first season of The Walking Dead.
INSIDE
- Release date: June 29, 2016
- Developer: Playdead
- Titles similar to this: LIMBO, Little Nightmares, and Bramble: The Mountain King.
- Scare factor: Run. Just run.
INSIDE is one of those unique little horror games that fit into a particular subgenre where you play as a cute character while everything else tries to kill you. This side-scrolling horror focuses on platforming with puzzle elements. In a similar vein to Amnesia, there is no possibility to fight back. You are at your most vulnerable in this one—a nameless boy being punished for his curiosity.
You have no idea where this road will take you. All you can do is join the boy on his adventure and hope there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Its high contrast visuals and otherworldly sound design perfectly encapsulate the feeling of loneliness and mortality.
It feels like you are the last human on Earth and are perhaps a part of something far bigger—something beyond our scope of understanding.
Resident Evil 2
- Release date: Jan. 25, 2019
- Developer: Capcom
- Titles similar to this: Silent Hill 2, Tormented Souls, and Dead Space.
- Scare factor: Mr. X. That’s all I’m saying.
Capcom’s Resident Evil 2 remake is an adventure that keeps your attention throughout. Time easily flies by as you wade through the mutated citizens of Racoon City, desperately searching for a way out. Disney, take some notes—this is how you do remakes. It is quintessential survival horror that blends action and puzzle-solving perfectly together. The remake only improves on the original, modernizing it with impeccable graphics and polishing it with fluid animations for all enemies.
Its replayability is also through the roof, as you can beat Resident Evil 2 as two different characters. Leon and Claire walk separate paths, but serendipity has them cross each other at key moments in the story. A bond is formed between the characters, although you spend the majority of time separate. Boss fights are compact and repeat, but they never bore. The enemy variety keeps you on your toes and at the edge of your seat.
Good luck finding a moment to breathe.
