Gaming Geekery: I Is Be Scared

Patrick's mischievous smile should have warned me. The little voice in my head was screaming "This is a BAD idea!" But who really listens to their inner monologue when a pair of pretty blues are staring you down? Besides, he just wanted me to try it once. I mean, if he liked it, it couldn't be that bad… could it?

Trying to appear as casual as possible, I picked up the controller and pressed start. The Playstation whirred and whizzed for a moment before the intro scene for Resident Evil came on and in no time I was plopped right in the middle of Raccoon City. I was surrounded by zombies and had almost no way to protect myself. My character was running across the game's cityscape, but my heart was pounding and my mind was screaming in terror. But I did not let that show on my face for one second, even though Patrick was watching me like a hawk for any sign of being scared.

I almost made it to a point where I could save the game and suggest another activity without seeming like I was freaked out. Almost. That is until something skittered by the window my character was standing by and I jumped. Before Patrick could even register that I had jumped, the creature that ran past the window dived through the roof and landed right in front of my character. And that's when the shriek came. From me. Oh, and the controller might have "slipped" out of my hand and found its way on the other side of the room.

Patrick did not know how easily I got spooked until that evening. And to be honest, I didn't either. I suspected, but I had never tested the theory. Of course, as teenage boys are prone to do, I was then subjected to some ribbing from Patrick about my inability to play Resident Evil, but I learned a valuable lesson about myself that night: I can't play horror games.

I always hear about how great the Resident Evil series is, and about how awesome these survival/horror/shooter type games are, but I just can't play them. And it's not just games specifically trying to be horror games. In the first Halo game the hero encounters The Flood, which is basically an alien zombie race, about half way through the story. Guess who stopped playing story mode?

Crackdown 2 introduced the world with mutant zombies, that got turned off within 10 minutes. Conker's Bad Fur Day had a level that was all about suspense/horror (although poking fun at it) and I barely pulled through that level, with only the humor to push me forward (where the hell is another Conker's game, Rare?). BioShock was going great until I wandered into a room and all the lights went out for a few moments until a spotlight came on to highlight a corpse hanging from a table nailed to the ceiling in a crucifix pose. I have no idea what happens in the game after that point.

I just can't play horror games. It is really an oddity to me because I love horror movies, but games are a different story. I feel like with a movie things continue to move forward for 2 hours then it's all over, but with a game I'm expected to walk myself into a room to scare the crap out of myself. For 10 hours straight. No thanks.

Try and try as I might, I just can't do it. I've even sat back and watched The Husband play Resident Evil 4 on the Wii, but I can't do it for more than a few moments. When my former roommate use to play Fatal Frame in the living room, I would have to go into my bedroom or put on headphones while I sat at my computer because I couldn't handle it.

Am I the only one out there that would rather play Beautiful Katamari than Ultra Mega Space Alien Zombies That Are Actually Vampires And OMG There's A Scary Little Girl Over There Trying To Eat My Face? Those of you who can force yourselves to play these survival horror games can you tell me how? What's the draw?