Horror game franchises have long been captivating gamers with their spine-chilling atmospheres, heart-pounding gameplay, and scarily immersive narratives. With that in mind, 2022's Spooktober has been a particularly exciting time for fans of horror games who like to be petrified. We're getting grand announcements, top-notch releases, and a huge celebration of everything horror. What more could you possibly wish for?

In this here article we've singled out five of our favorite ongoing horror game franchises for you to sink your teeth into. And yes, we know that Silent Hill didn't make its way onto this list. That is bound to change over the next couple of years now that Silent Hill is being revived, but we're not interested in hypotheticals. The goal of this article is to show you a list of games you can play right now.

To deliver that, we've tried our hand at choosing as varied a selection of game series as we could. Lurking below is a roster of survival horror games that should satisfy even the most critical of gamers, all the while sticking within the purview of a specific IP and/or franchise.

READ MORE: Top 12 Best Horror Games Without Jumpscares

Greatest Horror Game Franchises in 2022

While sticking with specific IPs may sound a tad limiting to some of you, it's worth pointing out that we published a hefty list of the finest horror games you could get on 2Game. If just one game will be enough for you, that's the article to check out. If, however, you're looking for something that'll keep you busy for dozens, if not hundreds of hours on end - look no further.

This is the article for you!

Resident Evil

Greatest Horror Game Franchises: Resident Evil

Obviously, Resident Evil is one of the single most prolific horror franchises in the video game industry. Not only has Capcom slowly but certainly been filling out RE over the past couple of decades, but it's continuing to do so, as this is one of the company's crucial flagship IPs.

Over the years, Resident Evil has mutated about as many times as one of its bio-organic weapons. From a high-octane shooter with John Wick-style action sequences to a slow, plodding first-person psychological horror with unkillable foes. Add a few tank control schemes to the mix, and you've got a recipe for timeless legacy, that's for sure.

This is a situation of you needing to pick your poison. Which RE game are you personally most interested in? If you need help, we do in fact have a ranking list ready to go, so have at it.

Oh, and don't forget: the Winters DLC for RE: Village is coming out later this week. Stay tuned for more coverage on that particular bundle of joy!

Dark Pictures

Greatest Horror Game Franchises: Dark Pictures

We had talked about The Dark Pictures Anthology and its uniquely passionate approach to modern horror gaming several times now. Quite simply, Dark Pictures has no proper competitors, and what else is there in the narrative-heavy adventure gaming horror niche was made by the very same developer in the first place.

Indeed, both the two standalone games - Until Dawn and the more recent The Quarry - were made by Supermassive Games for various different publishing houses. These guys and gals are knocking it out of the park, and their approach to narrative progression and gameplay permutations is effectively unique in today's gaming industry.

What you're getting here is a social horror experience for up to five players at a time. Each of them can make their own choices, and then you all get to live with the consequences. Every Supermassive horror title has a whole slew of unique endings and extra sequences, so you never know quite where the story might go. Perfect for long Spooktober evenings, if you ask us!

Bioshock

A first-person shooter franchise that sometimes flirts with immersive sim elements, Bioshock has always been in a class all of its own. While we may be quite unphased by many of the topics that Bioshock handles over the course of its three games in this day and age, it's always worth remembering that - indeed - it was Bioshock that normalized the notion of games being art. Not all on its own, of course, but this was the big thing back in the day.

Horror, then, comes in many forms in Bioshock. Sometimes, it's a Splicer crawling across the ceiling. Other times, it might be the realization that your perceived free will was, in fact, conditioned into your brain at an early age. It's a hard universe to parse through, one that's every bit as merciless as its worst villains often turn out to be.

Will it be as scary in moment-to-moment gameplay as, say, a Resident Evil game? Not necessarily. Bioshock will, however, ask some uncomfortable questions. Odds are that it's going to stick with you for a good long while, and for some, that's just the right kind of horror to experience.

Aliens / Aliens vs. Predator

Whether you love it or hate it, it's a simple statement of fact that Aliens is a fascinating franchise. We won't make any judgment calls as to whether The Yautja or the aptly-named Predators belong in the consolidated Aliens universe, but we will admit that Aliens vs. Predator games certainly have their own horrific moments worth talking about.

As of late, we've been quite enjoying Fireteam Elite, whose rather novel rendition of the franchise not only offers a live-service element we hadn't yet seen, but also a new avenue for moving the story forward. Indeed, its big Pathogen X-Pac finally managed to include the titular viral agent into a video game story, and we'll never stop being thankful for that.

But, Aliens isn't just about constant mortal combat against a foe that never sleeps, stops, or shows mercy. In fact, we rated Isolation about as highly as we could in our list of top 25 best horror games, and if it's pure terror you're looking for this Spooktober, there's simply no better candidate to deliver such a thing.

The Remedyverse

Greatest Horror Game Franchises: Remedyverse

Surprised? Well, you shouldn't be, really, because Remedy Entertainment has been readying up to pull this one off for quite a long while now. After Alan Wake came out, it was all but clear that it wanted to do something - anything, really - with the New Weird sub-genre of speculative fiction. Yet, the time wasn't right, and it was safer for Remedy to lean more heavily towards Stephen King and his own niche of strange horror fiction.

Now that Control's been out and about for some time, and its AWK X-Pac confirmed that Alan Wake was set in the same universe, things started to fall into place. In fact, words is that Max Payne, too, takes place in a tangentially related universe, which means Remedyverse is cranking up - slowly, but certainly. We're here for it, that's for sure.

As of right now, we're slated to receive Alan Wake 2, a new Control game, Codename: Condor, and a veritable remake of the old Max Payne games, if you can believe that. So, if you haven't been keeping up, now might be the time to do so. This loose "franchise" is quite unlike most anything else. And, really, if you're into Weird and eat Vandermeer for breakfast, this is the ticket for you. Don't miss out!

But Wait, There's More!

There you have it! These are the five essential horror franchises to play this Spooktober. With a bit of luck, we'll have an entirely different list ready to go next year, but these things take a while to ramp up. We've got immensely high hopes for Silent Hill, for example. Konami will need a few years to spin up its proverbial engines, however.

With Dead Space, Callisto Protocol, and a variety of other spooky games coming up, though, we're all set. It's an excellent time to be a horror game fan. Whether you're looking back with a nostalgic eye or looking forward with hopes for the future - things are looking up in this genre. All we gotta do in the meantime, though, is to handle the hype! Spooky stuff, indeed.

CHECK OUT: Finest Classic Horror Games to Play in 2022

Horror game franchises have long been captivating gamers with their spine-chilling atmospheres, heart-pounding gameplay, and scarily immersive narratives. With that in mind, 2022’s Spooktober has been a particularly exciting time for fans of horror games who like to be petrified. We’re getting grand announcements, top-notch releases, and a huge celebration of everything horror. What more […]