Sure it’s Horror, but is it Scary?

 
It is easy enough to slap a horror theme onto a game, but to make it into an experience it needs to be scary.

Is it even possible to make a scary boardgame though? The fact that it is a boardgame in itself adds difficulty to the task, it may just be too abstract from reality to incite feelings of fear.

So lets take a look at the elements of scary, and see how they can be translated into boardgames.

Mood:

Mood is a big part of scary.   It sets the stage for horror.  It’s the difference between reading a scary book in the afternoon while you are on the bus going to the mall, and reading the same book at night at home, alone, with a storm going on outside.    Movies use music and setting to enhance this feeling.  While not scary in itself, mood gets you ready to be scared.  It builds tension, which is important.  I think this can be duplicated somewhat in boardgames.   A very in theme game, with a scary soundtrack playing in the background, can set the right mood in your horror gaming night.  Arkham Horror is a good example of a well themed game that promotes the right mood, as long as there are other external factors to contribute to it.  Many movies and some video games can get this right,  Alone in the  Dark (the video game) scared the bejeezus out of me, but I only played it at night, alone, in a dark room, thus I got the full enjoyment out of the game.

Setting:

Setting is cousin to theme.  While almost any setting can be used to incite horror, there are ways to to enhance the feeling by the proper environment, and is used to set the mood.  An abandoned prison, a scary house, a mysterious empty ship in the middle of the ocean all promote the feeling of being cut off from reality where anything can happen.  A game with a good setting can really contribute to the scary feeling.  It takes good artwork and nice components to give a believable setting, a joystick pawn just won’t do it.

Gore:

Typically overused by Hollywood, the proper amount of gore adds to the scariness factor.  I’m not talking slasher flick amounts, it can get too graphic and thus become simply disgusting and stomach churning.  A bathroom with the shower running and no one in it isn’t particularly scary, but add some blood splashes on the walls and a word written in blood on the mirror, and your heading towards scary.  Again, this can be accomplished in a boardgame, via the artwork.  It seems to me that the trend is to go overboard though, and if it grosses me out I won’t play it. 

Surprise:

A typical trick used most effectively in movies and haunted house attractions.  The hero is looking for something, the spooky music builds, he cautiously opens a door, and a cat jumps out with a loud meow.  Everyone jumps, then the hero and the audience breath a sigh of relief.  Usually this is followed with Mr Evil Guy standing behind them and then pouncing, to give the payoff scare.  To me this is a trick and not real scary.  The purpose is to make you jump and scream, and it works for the most part if the tension has been built properly. 

I have played video games that have used this effectively. It still remains the easiest way to elicit a scare and then be done with it, which is why it is so popular.  I don’t see an easy way to translate this into a boardgame however.  Perhaps a book that you have to open which sometime emits a small shock?  Or perhaps a card that you draw that requires you to grab the player next to you and scream?

Suspension of Disbelief:

The final factor in making scary is the ability to get the audience to believe that what they are experiencing could really happen.  To draw them into the story so they have a personal investment in the proceedings and the characters. Why sit in alone in your house late at night and read a scary book?  Because you want to be drawn into it so that when the phone rings it will make you jump.  The scariest movies that I have seen are those that claim to be based upon a true story.   In these cases, they didn’t even need to use gore to make it scary.  Back when the Blair Witch Project came out, the film company had a website dedicated to promoting that this was a true story, and had a lot of background information on the Blair Witch, and the three college students who disappeared.  Many people were terrified by the movie because they thought it was true.  It didn’t take long for the truth to come out that these were all actors, but the promotion served its purpose and the movie was a big hit.  Unfortunately, I did a lot of checking and realized the truth before I saw the movie, but I was still able to suspend my disbelief and get a good scare.   This again is difficult to do in a boardgame, because it is just to abstract from reality to accomplish it.  I have the feeling that it is possible though, if the other factors mentioned above met.

True scary movies, for me at least, are rare.  Usually they involve the reality factor as mentioned above.  I was scared by the Exorcist, and most recently Paranormal Activity, but a lot of people didn’t find them scary at all, especially the younger crowd.  My only thought is that perhaps they have been made so immune to horror because of its prevalence in today’s society, that they just can’t seem to be able to suspend their disbelief and enjoy a good scare.  They have become jaded it seems, so more gore and surprises are needed to make a scary movie for them.

I do believe that you need to combine most of these factors to create a true horror board game, I don’t know of any that have accomplished it,and I am not sure that it is even possible, but wouldn’t it be cool?

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Elliott Miller

Elliott is well versed in all tabletop gaming subjects and brings his expertise mostly to bear on strategy, family, and Euro-style gaming.

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