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Survival Horror
The ‘Survival Horror’ genre of games has been around for over 30 years and is still seeing constant releases of games within it all the time. Games that are included within the survival horror genre include:

·       Resident Evil (Series)

·       Silent Hill (Series)

·       Alien: Isolation (2014)

·       The Evil Within (Series)

·       Alone in The Dark (Series)

The genre has been around since the 1980’s and has evolved heavily over the years to truly immerse the player and horrify them. The genre submerges players within a horrifying situation and may show them images of body horror, disturbing creatures or violent situations. Players will usually be given no weapons or a conservative amount of weapons/ammo to make them strategise how they use them, giving them a true sense of survival.

Camera and audio mechanics are usually tampered with as well to unnerve the player and give them a serious true sense of horror.

History of the Genre
There are many different claims on when the survival horror genre began. Some players argue that the first true survival horror game released in 1982. The game was an Atari VCS game title ‘Haunted House.’ The player takes control of a character who is trapped inside a house. They are defenceless from the monsters that haunt the building. The game was extremely basic and didn’t really allow the player to do much. The game was released in 1982 though so players didn’t really expect anything ground-breaking. However, people argue that this wasn’t the first instance of survival horror as many games make players defenceless. Grand Theft Auto V has sections where players cannot defend themselves but its not classed as a game within the Survival Horror genre.

Another game that is considered the start of the survival horror genre is the adaption of the horror novel ‘Rats’ by Five Way Software. The game was a text adventure that allowed players to play as different citizens of London about to encounter the man-eating rats. The game featured an interesting mechanic at the time which was rather than being turn-based encounters, the games encounters happened in real-time. Rather than allowing players to strategise the way that they play, they were working against an invisible timer which pushed players anxiety and truly horrified them.

In 1992 the first entry in the Alone in The Dark series was released which trapped players within a mansion with disturbing/horrifying creatures. The game tasked players to escape the mansion playing as a weak character who could fight back however, it wasn’t very effective. The game was one of the first horror games to deliver 3D visuals however, they were far from spectacular. Alone in The Dark managed to provoke fear in its players by manipulating the environment. The mansion where the game was set was filled with all sorts of traps such as fake floors. Alone in The Dark became a well-known franchise within the survival horror genre and helped pave the way for the most well-known game in the genre.

Resident Evil was released in 1996 by Capcom. Resident Evil is the most iconic and well-known game within the survival horror genre. The game allows players to choose to control Chris Redfield or Jill Valentine who both have unique elements of the games story in their playthroughs. It sees players taking shelter in an abandoned mansion as they are under attack from creatures that attack them in the night. Players need to scavenge the mansion for weapons and items so they can progress through the mansion and find a way to escape to safety. The game featured a horrific scene which is linked here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgr1zoSB9dM) that still haunts players to this day. The zombie head turn is as iconic as it is terrifying. The Resident Evil series is still successful to this day with multiple sequels, spin-offs and remakes of some of the classic games. This series established the survival horror genre and helped it grow immensely.

Gameplay Features
Survival horror games contain many key features. The first being limited resources. Most survival horror games pitch the player impossible odds of survival unless they manage their resources carefully. In Resident Evil, depending on what difficulty the player picks less ammo will be available for them to find. The player will most likely have to rely on the knife in many situations as shooting their way out just might not be possible.

Another key gameplay feature is inventory management. Survival horror games usually allow the player to see a full overview of their inventory. The inventory usually contains very limited space so players need to be wise on what items they pick up and what items they discard so they can make room for more. Some items may be able to be combined within the inventory. For example, in the Resident Evil series combing two green herbs together makes a mixed herb which heals the player a medium amount of health.

The sense of dread is a major key element in survival horror. Most games give the player the feeling that they are constantly being followed. This sense of dread causes anxiety within the player which truly scares them. They don’t know whether to be careful with where they go in the game or to rush so they aren’t caught by whatever is following them. Resident Evil 2 is an example of being followed in a game, causing a sense of dread. The creature known as Mr X follows the player around the police station, they are trying to escape within the first third of the game. He starts to stop following the player through later points in the game however, the game doesn’t alert the player of this to continue to cause the player anxiety and true fear that they are being followed.