Every time I watch a good scary movie, play a great survival horror game, walk down a dark street, or turn off the lights in my house to go bed, I will occasionally get a feeling. It is a feeling of genuine fear and excitement: eyes tearing up, pulse pounding fast through frozen veins and arteries, hair standing on edge, the want to turn around but the complete inability to move your locked eyes, and a slow cold breath down the back of the spine. This is a feeling that I love and a feeling many people seek out when in the mood for excitement or adventure. It is also a feeling I hadn't had in a long while until I watched a popular episode of the hit BBC series Doctor Who.

The show had been recommended to me years ago but I procrastinated and didn't start watching until now through netflix instant watch on NXE. I am absolutely and hopelessly addicted to the series now, but that's not the point. The point is that I finally reached one of the episodes everyone talks about called "Blink." I have seen the classic horror movies and I was raised by a mom and dad who are both obsessed with scary movies, and I haven't been creeped out like I was while watching "Blink" for quite some time.

***SPOILER ALERT****STOP READING HERE****GO WATCH THE EPISODE NOW!!!******

The first time I saw the "weeping angel" in the backyard of the house I knew that I was about to see something special. The angels themselves look so very lifelike but just a little bit off to make the chills start to creep. Then the moment the angel shifted to reveal its blank emotionless eyes I had to reach for a pillow let out an excited squee because I knew the episode was going to be great. When the main character of the episode Sally Sparrow and her friend Larry Nightingale are confronted with the true mystery behind the weeping angels



my heart skipped a beat. The later moments of terror that lead to the angels falling for a trap set by Doctor Who (he does all while stuck in 1969) are equally intense. But no chill, no breath down my neck, no pulse was as cold, slow and intense as the first time a weeping angel attacks.

Now why am I mentioning this on a gaming blog, well if the title didn't make it obvious enough the episode made me feel the emotions I had while playing silent hill 2 for the first time, or any fatal frame game. It made me miss those genuine moments of fear I experienced with a controller in hand, miss moments I feel like I'll never have again. Those imaginative scares creepy moments that seem to beckon the player to explore just a bit further; moments that make us hold our breath while we push forward or squint our eyes and skew our head a bit away from the screen just before pressing the circle button to bring up the camera. Moments lost to attractive combat systems and overwhelming enemy forces.

I will admit that I do love Resident Evil 4, enjoyed Dead Space, Silent Hill: Homecoming was pretty to say the least, and I very much enjoyed Resident Evil 5 (although it kicked my ass), but why cant I have those games and my old survival horror back. Fatal Frame 4 does look promising (if it ever comes out in North America) and Ive been waiting anxiously for it, and Winter is another game that looks promising but that's not enough to feed my hunger for survival horror.

So far only indie games have been able to scare me in 2007 and 2008, and only one or two actually gave me chills. This is why I hope game developers who wish to make scary games will stop looking at past achievements such as resident evil and silent hill only to make game similar to it with a new "fixed" combat system and slicker graphics. I hope that developers will look to the book, films and tv shows that scared millions of people around the world: disturbing Italian horror movies such as susperia, classic horror novels written by H.P. Lovecraft or classic American cinema like The Changeling or even absurdist cinema like David Lynch's Inland Empire could inspire survival horror creators.

To make a game scary more than just disturbing visuals and overwhelming situations are required, a horror game requires imagination and fear of the unknown. A game needs input from the character, mental interaction that drives the player to explore what scares them. Although gaming is still in its teen years as a medium, I hope that developers will see the potential hidden within the gaming medium to scare the living shit out of millions of so called hardcore gamers around the world.

What do you think? Have we dug ourselves in a hole with shovels made of bullets, zombies and military trained heroes? Or is there still hope in the future that I can be terrified of an enemy that I haven't even seen. Is there hope that will fear whats around the corner again. Will I one day be too creeped out by a game, to mesmerized by fear, too terrified to blink.

I can only hope.