From Escape Rooms to Hide and Seek, Games in Horror Films Make the Genre Better

The Big Picture

• Game-centric horror films are entertainingly creative & different, offering unique twists & atmosphere.
• Playing off nostalgia & turning innocent childhood games into a survival situation adds to the fear factor.
• The sub-genre mixes humor with horror, creating a thrillingly unique, claustrophobic, & anxious viewing experience.

Horror, especially in recent years, is a very crafty and unique genre. Some films are fairly straightforward, some make you think, and some are just off-the-wall bizarre. But some films are just purely and simply fun. The films that are good for movie nights or those just dipping their toes into the genre. Perhaps the most interesting and entertaining concept for a horror film is that of games. Now you may think we’re talking about horror video games being adapted into films, but while that is absolutely a fun genre, it’s in a league of its own. We’re talking about in-person games being turned into the plot of horror movies — whether it be party games or puzzles.

The sub-genre has a knack for spoiling the audience’s nostalgia with terror and often plays off of such a thing. There are takes on classic childhood games like hide and seek, and intricate escape rooms. The most interesting thing, though, is how different each one feels from the next — where some lean more toward the horror aspect, others opt for a more humorous and aesthetic route. Whatever the choice may be, they’re always a unique piece of the genre and are a grand ole time.

The Gamification of Horror

It’s only natural that when one thinks of horror they think of gore and jump scares or killers stalking around in the shadows — so the thought of fun games slipped into that environment seems like something that just wouldn’t work. But it’s quite surprising how well it does. It’s also surprising how games in horror can sometimes derive from the fun they originally seem to be. Sure, on paper turning silly party games such as Would You Rather and Truth or Dare into horror flicks sounds like a fun concept, but seeing it actualized is quite terrifying. In 2012’s Would You Rather especially, the film fills its audience with so much dread and a game that’s normally played with the most outrageous and silly options is turned into a game of life or death. Or 2019’s Ready or Not which takes the game Hide and Seek and turns it into a murderous affair. It’s clever- but it’s nonetheless unsettling.

There are also films like Bodies, Bodies, Bodies that are more of a comedic take on the sub-genre, opting for more modernized humor and tricks of light rather than jump scares and gore. But even with the humor, it’s still a terrifying situation that feels rather helpless, especially given how they’re pretty secluded to a single location, which is often the case in game-centric horror flicks. The characters are usually stuck to one singular location, fighting against whatever their challenge is and trying to make their escape. It can feel claustrophobic and anxious and only adds to the severity of the character’s situation.

Oftentimes, these films take the aspects of classic horror and mix them with a more humorous or lighthearted feel that appeals to a lot of audiences today. It’s a balance that was most famously attempted by Scream in 1996 but has become a more mainstay part of the genre since, and it fits extraordinarily well when incorporating games into horror. After all, they’re just that: games. They’re meant to be fun. But there’s also the underlying morality within these films that is often lost. Given how the games played often become a fight to survive, the characters will do anything to make it out. Even if it means sabotaging those around them or sacrificing someone else to ensure their own safety. It makes the characters hard to root for at times, since everything becomes so carnal, but perhaps that’s what makes them so interesting to watch.

Why Gamification Works

Game-centric horror films are entertaining because of how different they are. There’s so much creativity that can be had within the sub-genre and each film is different from the last, often having stellar twists to them that you don’t see coming. But that doesn’t always equate to something being successful in what it’s attempting. On paper, it doesn’t feel like games in horror should work as well as they do — in fact, they often sound like they’d be better suited for comedies or straightforward thrillers. So it’s surprising every time a new one hits theaters. But what is it that makes them work?

As we know, horror has certain rules, and those rules help make games work so well. You can’t drink or do drugs and a lot of games are drinking games. You can’t ask who’s there. You can’t go places alone. You can’t split apart from your group. You can’t have sex. And of course, these are all things that seem completely natural, so, of course, they’re done. It only adds to the atmosphere and amps up the tension, just knowing said actions are big no-no’s in a horror flick. But perhaps the fear factor also comes from playing off of nostalgia and turning classic childhood games into survival of the fittest situations. It’s always going to be unnerving to see a game we know to be innocent and friendly become a terror-filled nightmare. But sometimes it also boils down to how hopeless the situation often is, since most of the games the characters play are tricked out and unwinnable, making the character’s situations more stressful. The biggest example being Saw, of course, and while not all the games are truly unwinnable, there’s often some sort of body modification that needs to be made in order to successfully win.

At the end of the day, horror is a consistently changing genre, and it’s always nice to see something new come from it that gets audiences talking. And while game-centric horror is a relatively small sub-genre in the grand scheme, it only serves to make each film feel unique in its own right and like a breath of fresh air.