Halloween Gaming Playlist: Build Your Own!

For some of us, Halloween gaming is a festivity in its own right. The whole world gets all caught up in spooky, scary stuff, and there's something very special in deciding to immerse oneself in horror alongside everyone else. To that end, we thought it might be a good idea to help you build your very own Halloween gaming playlist!

The way we can help you do that is twofold! First, there's the obvious fact that we've got a huge Halloween sale going on, featuring dozens upon dozens of awesome games at massively discounted prices. Second, there's a hefty library of Halloween-themed content we've been working on over the past couple of weeks.

Combine these two together, and you're a hop and a skip away from enjoying a pretty comprehensive guide on building the greatest Halloween video game playlist you've ever had. Naturally, depending on the games you end up going with, your playtime is bound to extend well after Halloween is over. That's a feature, though - certainly not a bug.

CHECK OUT: Halloween Horror Gaming on Game Pass

Creating Your Own Halloween Gaming Playlist

Halloween Gaming Playlist: Xenomorph Stalking

Obviously, you can put any two games together and call them a playlist. Of course. If you're into spending the afternoon doing GTA V heists and then follow that up with a classic F.E.A.R. shindig - who are we to stop you? That being said, you could certainly try thinking outside the box here.

If you're hoping to really make this Halloween memorable, gaming-wise, then you may choose to go with a thematic playlist. This, too, can be just about anything. Depending on your interests, you may choose to go with high-octane monster shooters. Or slow, plodding spook machines by the likes of Silent Hill, perhaps.

Coming up with something like that, though, won't be easy. That's precisely where our custom selections come in - shortlists of top-tier video games that mesh together incredibly well. You're free to use our ideas as-is, or use them as a starting point for something custom, instead. The world's your oyster, as it were!

Play the Best Horror Games of All Sorts: The Variety Horror Playlist

Tormented Souls atmospheric camera angle

Start off with a safe bet! Basically, these are the games that John Everyman would choose if he wanted to play a little bit of everything for good measure. That's also why they don't necessarily stand out in any specific way. To be sure, there's nothing wrong with any of the games we'd recommend for this playlist. Quite the opposite, even, as these are awesome titles that will easily keep you scared through Halloween and beyond.

In other words, games on this playlist are the ones that have repeatedly appeared in much of our top-tier horror content. They're classics in their own right, offering much to enjoy on every level of gameplay. Certainly, the focus is mainly on the slow-settling horror of Tormented Souls and Alien: Isolation, but games such as Resident Evil Village will add more momentary tension to the mix.

Play Strange, Mind-boggling Horror Games: Weird Fiction Playlist

control game combat sequence

If you just don't see yourself playing something normal with zombies and whatever else, then these are the games to go with. Both Control and Death Stranding champion their own respective vision of New Weird - a post-modern literary genre that meshes elements of speculative fiction with those of regular horror and - believe it or not - fantasy.

Things don't always make perfect sense here, and that's because the games' respective narratives don't bother explaining everything to the player. Instead, the story is out there in the world, sometimes comprehensible and other times not. Will you understand what's going on? Probably not, but that's okay, because the setting still serves as a phenomenal point of contention from the player's point of view.

Coincidentally, these games also don't rely on jumpscares all that much. Instead of bothering with cheap shock value, they'll let dread sink in every so often. Fridge horror will be a major consideration here, and you'll find yourself thinking about Control and/or Death Stranding for way longer than you probably think you would.

Play Horror Games with your Friends and Family: Community Terror Playlist

little hope hanging scene

Here's an odd idea: multiplayer horror gaming. But not quite the sort of multiplayer gaming many of us would normally expect! No, we've got something different in mind here. The ongoing releases in the Dark Pictures Anthology have proved that there's a non-insignificant market for hotseat horror sessions. With support for up to a whopping five players at a time, no less!

This shortlist of must-play games is simple, then. If for no other reason, then because there's literally nothing else in this niche that you should bother playing, to begin with. With The Dark Pictures titles, you can sit your whole family down and see how long it takes for you to collectively get scared.

The beauty of Dark Pictures titles is that they serve up a linear, though ever-changing decision-making tree that will shift around depending on the decisions that players themselves make. In other words, choices have consequences, and anyone can die. Prime Halloween fun, that's what this is.

Play Old-School Horror Games: The Purist Playlist

Do you find yourself scoffing at the mere idea of a new horror subgenre? Do you yearn for the olden times of horror, where camera angles were fixed and controls were tanky? You're in luck! We can't promise that the games on this shortlist will be quite as cumbersome as those of the first Resident Evil, mind. Regardless, nostalgia comes part and parcel with any of these games!

What's particularly beautiful about this shortlist is that all the games featured on it are reasonably modern, if not outright new. They'll work on your PC out of the box, they'll handle and perform perfectly well, and - most importantly - they'll bring you back.

For sure, you'll need to contend with high-resolution assets and non-horrific control setups, but at least you'll now get to focus on actual horror, rather than just being terrified of whether Jill will turn the right way or not when the zombie attacks.

Play Horror Games You Probably Never Heard of: Hipster Horror Playlist

fade to silence cityscape planetoid

Alright, this is the shortlist for those who need to play something that most other people hadn't even heard of. Don't let the Resident Evil title fool you: Revelations 2 is as overlooked as it gets. On top of that, it's arguably one of the finest Resident Evil games ever made - but that's a topic for another day.

Whether you'd like to lean on pixel-art nightmares of The Long Reach, or on the abject strangeness (and jankiness) of Fade to Silence - that's up to you. We can just vouch that these are awesomely scary games that will definitely be solid conversation starters if you need them.

2Game veterans are bound to recognize a bunch of these games from having been featured in some of our previous content. That's because we find that most people are genuinely unaware of their existence, which is a huge shame in our book. If you'd like to be a purveyor of fine spooks this Halloween and onwards - these are the titles that could very well kickstart your hypothetical career.

Which games will you build your playlist from?

Halloween Gaming Playlist: Lady Dimitrescu from RE: Village

Now that we've shown off some of our ideas, it's time for you to come up with a shortlist/playlist of your very own! Where to begin? Well, any one of our feature-tier articles could prove to be an amazing showcase, we think. Here are a couple of examples!

Halloween doesn't really have to be a one-and-done sort of thing if you ask us. If you really find yourself vibing with it, you may well extend it as much as possible. What better way to do so, other than to use Halloween as a starting point for your many horror game playthroughs?

As the Halloween gaming playlists featured above have shown, there's a lot to choose from if you're a fan of horror. Even just the last couple of years led to a veritable proliferation of amazing horror games. For those of us who might not have had the chance to play through them properly, this Halloween could easily prove to be the nudge to see them through.

With our sale raging through the weekend, this is also your chance to save a pretty penny, to boot. It's not every day that you come upon a deal like that, is it now?