First up is Layers of Fear, a game we reviewed earlier in 2016.

The story revolves around a painter sometime in the 1900’s who has gone through some turmoil and come out the other side as an overly addicted mad painter looking to finish his masterpiece at any cost. Although it is not a horror title some avid fans of the genre will find particularly scary it does have a couple decent jumps and tells a story through an ever changing haunted house landscape as you collects “ingredients” for your painting.

Layers of Fear is a pretty short game, something you can complete in just over 5 hours but if you do enjoy the title, the are plenty of secrets hidden away in the house for you to find. A lot of them more bizarre than the last.

A title which sits on the line between horror, FPS and down right blow everything up, DOOM 2016 is a title which makes the list for a couple reasons.

You may be thinking, why DOOM it surely is not a horror game but just look at it… DOOM 2016 has the gruesome monsters, hellish environments and some down right creepy moments when you are ripping the heads of your enemies. It may not be a true “horror” title where you are in an abandoned mental asylum and have just woke up without any memory of being there, loaded with only your trusty Camera Obscura (10 points who get the reference) but, DOOM 2016 is a great re-imagining of the original title with some scares to boot.

Load up your arsenal and get going.

Oxenfree is a title which is unlike your usual horror titles, it looks into the darker recces of the human psyche and how relationships are formed, broken and stretch in times on peril. Set on an island you are played as Alex, a girl who is trying to connect with her new step-brother after as she tries to deal with the brother she has lost.

Playing Oxenfree is a game rooted in classic 80’s horror such as Poltergeist but is similar to The Walking Dead where it looks at more about the human element of a dark situation rather than the ghosts, ghouls and things in the dark. They are still embedded within Oxenfree but if the story is much deeper than a few jump scares, that and it is 2D.

If you want to find out more about it, read our full review of Oxenfree.

Dark Souls III is a title which many will deem as a damn hard game but with the monsters and bosses you have to fight, they can be downright terrifying. We reviewed Dark Souls III and although it was not the pinnacle of the series, with recycled elements and a difficulty decrease, it is still a tough game to beat with monsters that can quite easily give you nightmares.

On top of monsters, Dark Souls III’s biggest scare is the fear of dying. Although it may be different from jump scares and typical horror, when you are low on health and flasks are dwindling with a no sign of the next campfire, anxiety and fear kicks in round every corner, hoping to not bump into some big dude with a giant sword.

Dying Light: The Following is a giant DLC pack for the original Dying Light game. Instead of the densely populated slums, you are moved to vast open farmlands that still teem with zombie (not)life.

Your new main toy is a weaponised buggy which you can use to burn rubber across the new landscape and mow down the undead. Nighttime is still a terrifying place with hunters roaming but this time if you are spotted, hiding is more difficult when the nearest building is a mile away. If you are left out in the open without your ride home, night can become, very quickly your final resting place.

Feeling more powerful in Dying Light: The Following can quickly disappear if you do not have your wheels and you’ll still wish you could just curl up in a corner when the sun goes down.

So far, 2016 has not had any standard out horror titles but with Halloween round the corner, some titles are soon to be released which could change the the tide.