So with it being close to Halloween and whatnot, here's a countdown list that's 2spooky4me.
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5.
- Spoiler:
- Zombines
Combine soldiers that have been turned into zombies by Head Crabs in Half-Life 2. Ok, now I know these guys aren't the most visually disturbing of the various Head Crab Zombies in Half-Life 2, but looks aren't everything. The first time you run into these guys, it's pitch black and with not much room to avoid them. What makes these guys the creepiest thing in the game for me are the sounds they make. The standard zombie sounds in Half-Life 2 are decently creepy enough, but Zombines make these sounds over a Combine helmet's voice disguiser. To top it off, their method of attack is pulling out a grenade and rushing at you, Kamikaze-style, while gurgling through their voice disguisers. Thanks to having the Combine soldier's armor, their also a little more bulky than a standard Zombie. The best way to deal with these guys is to either shoot the grenade in their hands or just avoid them until they blow themselves up.
4.
- Spoiler:
- Clannfears
Dinosaur-like monsters from the planes of Oblivion in various Elder Scrolls games. These guys have given me more trouble and more reason to run away than any other enemy in Oblivion. Except that running isn't much of an option since they can easily catch you and start attacking you. They hit like a truck too, always taking off big chunks of your health. It's even worse when other Deadra summon these guys over and over. It didn't take me long to learn why these guys have "fear" right in their name.
3.
- Spoiler:
- ReDead
Zombie-like monsters from various Legend of Zelda games, but first appeared in Ocarina of Time. They stand or sit still waiting for prey to come close. Then they let loose a high pitched shriek to temporarily paralyze anybody who get's too close. You're then totally helpless as it slowly shambles over to you to start gnawing on your head. These guys are encountered pretty early on into the game, when you first go to the graveyard in Kakariko Village. The way you first encounter them is set up pretty well, and adds to their creepyness. You go down into the tomb of the Royal Family of Hyrule and find piles of bones everywhere. Going up to a perfectly intact skeleton against a wall, you're suddenly told by unseen ghosts that trespassers in the tomb will be "obstructed by the lurkers in the dark". Right away, you know you're about to face something creepy if you keep going. Go further into the tomb, and you find a dark room with toxic water making mist everywhere with tall motionless figures standing around hunched over making groaning sounds. You have to fight your way through the room (as the child version of Link, with a weak sword) to get to the end of the tomb. Your reward is the Sun's Song, which makes day into night or vice versa, but also has the power to temporarily paralyze ReDeads, making them easier to kill. I still have to wonder though, why were these things in the Royal Family's tomb?
2.
- Spoiler:
- Regenerators
One of the results of Plaga experimentation on a person in Resident Evil 4. You'll always know one is nearby when you hear it's disturbing breathing sounds. The thing about these guys is that they are the next best thing to being unkillable. They have a handful of leech-like Plagas in their bodies that all need to be shot to kill this thing. Anything less, and they'll just regenerate any lost body parts. They can keep going like nothing happened even after getting their head blown off. Shoot it's leg off, and it'll slither after you like a snake, even faster than it's walking speed. Get too close to it, and it'll stretch it's arms out to pull you in and start chewing away at your shoulder. The way these guys growl when they bite you is pretty creepy too. The worst part is the first few Regenerators you come across, you aren't even properly equipped to kill them, because you need a thermal infrared scope to see where the parasites in their body are. Meaning that you pretty much have to spray them down with loads of bullets and hope you hit all their internal weak points.
1.
- Spoiler:
- Cougars
The ones from Red Dead Redemption. These guys are the reason I never went into the brush without a horse and a gun with me at all times. Just being alone out there and hearing the cougar's (almost cartoonishly silly) stock sound effect growl is enough to get me to start running around shooting at anything that moves. Other times, it'll come up on you with no noise at all, usually from behind or just darting out of the brush in front of you. About 2 attacks from them is all it takes to kill you too. Another time, I was just strolling along on my horse, only for a cougar to come out of nowhere and literally kill my horse out from under me. Before John Marston could even get back up off the ground, the cougar had already doubled back around and then killed him too. Red Dead Redemption's cougars are proof that you don't have to look or sound scary to be scary. If you can get the player to be paranoid and think that you're behind that bush and up in that tree and under that rock all at the same time, you've successfully done your job.