This 12 months’s version of the PAX West gaming present in Seattle was an incredible alternative to get an early look and hands-on time with a few of the upcoming horror video games we’re enthusiastic about, in addition to getting some extra publicity to video games we’ve already lined or reported on.
We linked with a number of publishers and builders on their upcoming video games, so right here’s a set of what we had been ready to take a look at.
After reporting about Drowned Lake means again in late 2023, we lastly acquired to strive it for ourselves, and it was a unbelievable expertise.
The story is ready in a small fishing village in Brazil that’s been utterly flooded. The one option to get round is through the use of a small boat, whereas making an attempt to unravel the thriller of a person whose disappeared. The number of gameplay varies from a top-down boating exploration to a first-person exploration and clue-finding mode, in addition to some first-person boat-driving sequences, making for a really various expertise.
There’s a wide range of analog horror components, one in every of which is a video digital camera your character carries to doc findings alongside the best way. It’s additionally used throughout gameplay, as you attempt to uncover and doc clues from the lake and different places. Lastly, the foreboding environment and sound design spherical out the expertise.
The phrase is that developer Monumental Collab is aiming for a launch both late this 12 months or early subsequent 12 months. That is excellent news, as the sport is shaping as much as be much more thrilling than the unique trailers confirmed it to be, and because of this, is closely on my radar for the close to future.
Our subsequent cease on the present flooring was the DreadXP sales space to check out the complete construct of their upcoming retro survival horror title, The Lacerator. The sport is a solo-dev affair by Brazilian developer, Fernando, who I additionally acquired to talk with after taking part in a full playthrough of the sport. The Lacerator performs like a basic Resident Evil sport, with fastened digital camera angles and a crunchy lo-fi aesthetics. There’s additionally a trashy grindhouse aesthetic to go along with it, and the gameplay is fairly distinctive for just a few causes.
You’re taking management of Max, a former porn star and smug fool, whose crassness and stupidity make for lots of humor within the sport. Apart from the terrifying moments, that is an fascinating option to strategy the sort of sport, much like a few of the video games by Jordan King and different retro horror devs lately.
Whereas the sport is on the shorter aspect (most runs common round half-hour), the gameplay and paths you play can change wildly relying in your selections. Since a lot of your selections lead to completely different elements of your physique being severed, the gameplay modifications wildly round that dynamic. For instance, should you lose a leg, you’re compelled to crawl round in your abdomen, barely ready to make use of any weapons or gadgets, should you lose an arm, you’ll discover it very troublesome to swing a melee weapon or intention a gun, and so forth. You would possibly even have the chance to switch your severed physique elements with souped-up substitute prosthetics sooner or later, resulting in much more distinctive gameplay alternatives.
This playthrough was quite a lot of enjoyable, and speaking with Fernando about all of the completely different prospects the sport affords on every run in addition to talking about his influences and what he loves about basic horror video games was a deal with.
I can’t wait to take a look at the complete sport when it launches earlier than the tip of this 12 months. You’ll be able to at the moment wishlist on Steam and take a look at the demo for your self.
We additionally had an superior alternative to attend a personal preview occasion with Bandai Namco to spend just a few hours with Little Nightmares III, which included taking part in just a few hours of the sport on co-op in addition to getting to talk with the sport’s producer. The occasion had an awesomely-themed visible setup with artwork and props from the sport arrange within the house.
We’ll have a full-length preview of Little Nightmares III up in just some days with much more particulars on the slice of the sport that we acquired to expertise in addition to additional particulars we obtained in our time with the dev staff behind it.
The present flooring was plagued by a ton of different horror video games, together with Eclipsium, No, I’m Not A Human, Caput Mortum, an superior “reside” model of Buckshot Roulette (full with shotgun, game-accurate desk, and gadgets), and Resident Evil Requiem, which we have already got quite a lot of nice protection of on our website and up to date YouTube movies.
We had an all-around superior expertise at PAX West 2025, and might’t wait to get our arms on the completed model of all video games we had been ready to take a look at. We’re additionally wanting ahead to extra nice horror gaming experiences at subsequent 12 months’s present.
Within the meantime, keep tuned for extra protection on all of those video games as they turn into accessible, and for our in-depth preview of Little Nightmares III later this week!
