People told me that Soma isn't that scary compared to outlast or Amneisa. I guess fear is subjective because I found this to be far more terrifying. What Makes Soma so scary for me isn't the environment, water, darkness or atmosphere. ( All those things are top notch though) it's the monsters themselves. The monsters in Amnesia had bite to them but their bark was worse. This is not the case for Soma. Monsters in this game have a real sense of threat. It not just how they look but how they behave. Right now, I'm up to the part where I'm on this sunken ship trying to sneak past this thing with a glowing disco ball head that teleports. Oh also looking at him not only causes yor vision to distorted but also makes him tele-chase. This thing is fucking terrifying. Even with the sound off and the lights on this guy is a walking nightmare. He makes pyramid head look like a teletubby. Amnesia never had this affect on me.

Yeah, those monsters are really scary!
I died quite several times in this game, and that was very unpleasant.

With SOMA its a collective horror... the look, movement, sounds... its everything about them....

But the sound design, it's absolutely insane... I think this finally took over as my favorite game I have ever played/experienced.

Don't tell me... I suspended playing Soma four months ago because it was too scary. I liked it *a lot*, but It was like living a nightmare every time. I was terrified by every sound (and there are lots of sounds) and by every monster. Plus when there aren't monsters around, there are those very uncanny situations.
Frictional's developers are pure psychological horror geniuses.

The funny thing is that I watched and liked a lot of horror and weird movies: Begotten, Tetsuo, Eraserhead, damn... even Nekromanik!

Try Stalker Shadow of Chernobyl. It makes this look tame.


I was full of crap when I wrote this... They are both equal just in different ways. Stalker has an eerie sort of dread to it. Soma has a much more acute sort of fear quality to it, specially with the proxies.

Same here, SOMA is way more atmospheric and terrifying to me than Amnesia. In the latter, you can't escape if an enemy has spotted you, so after a time, I didn't try anymore but waited for them to kill me – a very dull experience. Anmesia also doesn't have the variety of enemies that SOMA has, where every enemy is distinct up to the way they detect you (sight, sound …) Also, what scared me even more was the slowly growing knowledge how they became what they are now.

By the way, Frictional Games' older games Penumbra 1+2 are also very recommendable, and in my opinion they also beat Amnesia in terms of atmosphere and horror. If you didn't play them yet and you can stand their vintage technology (though I think they aged well), you may want to give them a try. This doesn't apply to Penumbra 3, which is only a kind of tech demo with physics puzzles and no story at all.

Soma and Stalker are total diferent games, comparing them is like comparing apples to oranges.

Stalker is neither a horror game nor a physological triller is a action RPG with a dark but not that fearfull atmosphere, the only parts that you can say gave any sence of fear was the underground parts but they where few and between, 80% of the game is passed outside. Btw if you played Metro and never played Stalker, Metro undergrounds are just a evolution from the ones from Stalker.

I dunno, Teletubbies are pretty horrifying...

I am a little late to the party.

I bought this game because if was mentioned on one of the videos from Mojo.
I am thinking that this game is indeed very frightful.
The monster but more the sound. I always had the feeling someone is walking behind me which made me look to the back.
I am still early in the game where you come into contact with the mind reader, i call him.
It's pretty terrifying overall.
Partly i am reminded of Bioshock but this is different. You have nothing to defend yourself. You can only rely on your wits.
At the beginning i thought, oh my graphic card. Does it have a problem. Until i realized that i am actually not look with my eyes in the game but through a visor of sorts.
I really like this game because it's so well done.
Alone the premise of the story is very intriguing. I think that's why i loved Prey so much. Even though these games are not really comparable but they both seem to give you the sense of helplessness.

I like horrors (played all the Amnesia games and first two Penumbras), but SOMA was something else. I would call it more immersive, and thus more frightening. Rare game can immerse you in itself so deeply, for you to understand the true horror of it.

I only watched Outlast playthroughs, but its horrors are cheap for me. It stresses players with unlimited chases and identical threats. But in SOMA, when I encountered Proxy for the first time, I had to quit for a time to calm my nerves. I would call SOMA the best true horror game. It has exceptional world building, variety of enemies, good enough graphics to convey its rich story, organic puzzles, the list can be continued. For me it's Frictional's masterpiece. Though I'm yet to play Amnesia: The Bunker.