Guide to Making Better Horror Experiences

TEARAPARTJAMES · March 9, 2023, 5:53am

introduction

Hello! My name is FROGMIRE! I will be covering how you can make better horror experiences!

I want to cover a number of topics:

story
visuals
audio
gameplay
qol

edit history

EDIT 1:

fixed line spacing issue on The Mimic example

EDIT 2:

rewrote/reformated the story section
added environmental storytelling
reformated the visuals sections
added Lighting and Effects

EDIT 3:

added edits section
changed “Doors” to “DOORS”
added small sound design section(I might add onto this later)

EDIT 4:

complete rewrite/restructure..
other stuff

EDIT 5:

finished rewrite on some subjects

Prior to beginning, I would like to refer similar posts and topics to this:

story

main story:

My previous version of this put a bit of emphasis of having a good story but I’ve changed up on this.

Stories are important and yet no so important at the same time. This is probably one of the hardest topics to cover here as some games have and don’t have them and can be both great or horrible. But, I think that your game really should be carried by gameplay over story.

But hey! What if you want a good story, what makes it that way? I couldn’t tell you but I think it a lot to do with pacing, plot, and characters. Try researching those!

It should be mentioned that I personally think that darker topics are almost always conveyed poorly on the platform. Tons of weird romanizations of suicide and mental illness. If you plan on covering that then research that stuff. But as I stated in previous edits, I think these should stay off platform.

environmental story-telling

Now, this is something I can cover!

Environmental story-telling refers to using the environment to convey a smaller story or guiding the player with cues from the environments.

I cannot think of many Roblox games that utilize environmental story-telling very well other than BUNKER.

Example

Some people consider notes to not be environmental storytelling, but in this game. You are isolated in a bunker with nobody so having corpses or blood would make it much less mysterious as to where the people went.

Outside of Roblox, there is a ton of games that do this. Fallout is known for their unique take of throwing skeletons everywhere in various different poses.

How does one go about using environmental storytelling?

notes/logs/other text based things
corpses
inventory notes
decal placements
enemy placement

An example could be finding a note from another survivor about meeting up in some future location and as your approach said location you find an individual zombie that looks recently infected.. its the survivor!

I would like to provide a video on the topic.

visuals

model consistency

I don’t need to mention this but this applies to all genres of games. Model consistency basically means that all models look similar to each other in quality and appearance.

For example, this could be your sword model:

and your dagger:

It’s pretty obvious that these models are NOT consistent. One looks like something you’d see in Elden Ring and the other looks like its from TLOZ: The Wind Waker. If you wanted to fit that Elden Ring style then you’d find a more complex dagger model with nice high resolution textures.

Basically, just balance out your visuals with similar amounts of positive and negative space.

Roblox has a RDC presentation on this and I think it is awesome!

I think player avatars not fitting is fine though. Cannot control everything!

lighting & effects

This is a hard one to cover as lighting completely depends on so many different factors but I think one of the worse things to do is have excessive darkness where it shouldn’t belong.

But obviously, there are so many factors on this. For example, lets say we want to make players want to avoid going out at night in the game so we’ll make it excessively dark so its hard to navigate and while we are at it.. lets toss in a couple of monsters in the darkness!

But overall, darkness is really dependent on the game.

As for effects like the post-processing effects, I find that DepthOfField and Blur sorta suck. If you think they add to the experience then go for it but I would not.

Another cool thing about lighting is that you can use it to guide players in dark environments and you can also use it to trick them.

audio

subtly

Audio in Roblox games are LACKING. There should be a larger focus in the subtle sounds stuff that make an ambience in a game.

Sound ideas include stuff like:

movement
wood floor creaking
glass cracking
machinery
light humming
pipes
insects
liquids
heartbeat
breathing
wind
thunder

soundtracks

This is not that important but is nice to have. It can give your game a bit of a unique identity and it allows you to have that creative freedom in how your game’s music sounds. Not everyone has musical talent or the resources to pay for it!

Here are a couple of games that use their own soundtracks:

But again, it really needs to be mentioned that soundtracks are nice to have but you can always just use Roblox’s APM music or use free music.

gameplay

What exactly even is a ‘horror’ game in the first place? What exactly is a genre in a video game? We have genre’s for:

action
adventure
rpg
strategy
sports
and more

and those can be divided into their own genres.. and be combinations of genres.

Horror is more of a theme or style than a genre. Funny enough, Roblox places used to have ‘genres’ which were mostly just themes like ‘pirate’, ‘ninja’, ‘wild west’, and even ‘scary’.

So we’ll just generalize some things to make this easier for me and you.

uncertainty

This is pretty self explanatory. Patterns are comforting and breaking those patterns causes a bit of unease and uncertainty. You’ve probably heard this before where someone uses the HP Lovecraft quote of “blah blah the strongest fear is the fear of unknown.” Hence why some people are afraid of the dark because of what could be in the dark.

This is why changing up rules you establish is a great way of scaring the player! For example, Amnesia: The Bunker does this with the safe room. Near the end of the game, the same hole that the monster uses appears in your safe room!

And yes, this also can be applied to the story.,

pacing

There should be buildup and releases of terror. You should allow time for recovery. Safe rooms are good example of this in the Resident Evil games and other games.

enemies(/monsters)

So this is going to be against the generalization a bit but I think it’ll apply to most projects.

I think designs are very important but this is such a hard thing to tell you how to do better! But, I’d argue that using blocky Robloxians or anything that looks remotely like a Roblox avatar is not very threatening looking.

Of course, you should consider your target audience or the art style. Back when I was a kid this spider enemy from Total Miner: Forge gave me nightmares for weeks.

It did play a loud screaming sound though.

For some nice design references I recommend checking out Bloodborne, Dark Souls trilogy, and other souls-like games.

As for something, I think would benefit a lot of games for immersion would be giving these enemies some sort of behaviors pattern so that they do more than just wandering. I have a incomplete topic about some frameworks for nice NPCs. Half-life’s cockroach AI is more advanced than most enemies in Roblox horror games… Think about that.

Instant death enemies aren’t very fun to deal with in most games. If you provide tools to prevent it like in Amnesia: The Bunker, it is fine. Otherwise, if its just based on running away I would make them hurt the player. I think it is much more scarier to know how close it was killing you than having it instant kill you.

jumpscares

Jumpscares are fine.. they work their magic sometimes… just don’t overuse them.

There should be an expectation that something is going to happen, but it should not be predictable. You could also bait out jumpscares by not even doing them.

If you plan on having instant kill enemies then please do not force players to see the same jumpscare each time.

quality of life

This is such a weird topic but I feel as if it necessary since so little games provide nice qol things like:

progression saving
subtitles
hints for objectives/puzzles
skippable cutscenes
brightness sliders
toggleable movement states like crouching/sprinting

This just makes for a better player experience but clearly not all games need these.

conclusion

We are officially done!

Horror games(honestly all games nowadays even off platform) on this platform are mostly uninspired but my hope is that will change, and more importantly that my topic has helped you create a better horror experience on Roblox!

Thanks for reading or skipping down here!

GuyguybobOriginal · March 9, 2023, 6:10pm

You forgot to talk about atmosphere

TEARAPARTJAMES · March 10, 2023, 3:20am

Atmosphere is completely dependent on the story, the level design, and other effects such as lighting and sound. It is difficult to provide insight into it since atmosphere is very subjective and can only be hoped to match the themes of the game/story.

While I could add this to this topic, it is rather short and feels a bit pointless.

zMsHz · March 19, 2023, 3:19pm

I would say that game’s atmosphere requires yet another thread here. It’s quite a lot to tell here

izNatt · June 9, 2023, 7:45pm

Nicely written!

Lol onryo cliche kinda overused good that you pointed it out.
Also great Mr. X reference & association from RE2!

It feels like every 2nd/3rd horror game is a puzzle game. Like no that’s not what it’s supposed to be. Amazing that you pointed it out.

NormalDeveloperX · June 18, 2023, 4:59am

Truly fantastic, and well-written. I think the game design subject of ‘invisible choice’ has been absent in many horror games on the platform. As a horror game developer myself, these posts contribute to the overall design of the game as they help us rethink what is horrifying, thought-provoking, and interesting about our horror game.

The only downside of this post in my eyes is the model quality section. I believe that it is very true and uncanny having a detailed enemy model on a visually and graphically dull scene is immersion-breaking and ugly, but this platform does not allow for that level of freedom visually, as us developers have to optimize for lower-end devices and are extremely limited on budget and time. For examples such as DOORS, I believe that it sacrifices on overall player mobility and freedom for limited and linear sections with frequent unloading of levels. The environments are beautiful, but the character models aren’t a piece of art. Most of the game’s enemies are 2D, and the 3D ones aren’t visually appealing.

Overall though, great post. If you found it useful, I suggest checking out @izNatt post about horror games and also checking out the Game Maker’s Toolkit channel.

nightssa · July 20, 2023, 10:42pm

Absolutely fantastic of a guide.

As a horror developer, this guide can, and will, really help upcoming devs who are interested in making horror games. Even I will be using this help for my game, too!

Also I found it hilarious how you bashed on The Mimic. And I completely agree! The Mimic is nothing but jump scares.

Great Guide, @TEARAPARTJAMES, looking forward to more!

chris_gaming489 · July 22, 2023, 5:47pm

It’s nice to see a very experienced person take on game design for horror games

Bubblebuddy200 · July 22, 2023, 7:59pm

Some stuff I would add into making a horror game is immersion. You’ll lose a lot of the horror aspect without immersing the player into the game. Some of the ways you could create immersion is with good sound design, lack of UI elements and good environments. An exception to this would probably be trying to make a horror game about a regular game but something is off (No Players Online is a good example).

Also if you truly care about making a horror game rather than a horror themed game then you would want to make the game singleplayer, multiple players would kill the immersion of the game.

You could take the route of Amnesia: The Bunker and turn the weapons into tools due to their ineffectiveness or if you’re willing to put in the effort, make it like Alien: Isolation where the monsters will fear your weapons less if they are used too much.

TEARAPARTJAMES · September 20, 2023, 8:35pm

Hello to anyone reading this!

I’ve decided to contribute a bit more to this topic because I’ve noticed an increase in terrible horror games that essentially function as tedious busywork simulators just to serve as easy money for the greedy developers.

These being “The [BLANK] Experience” games although I suppose it would be better to identify them with the icon as some do change up the name.

These games are so repetitive. You just keep doing the same things like picking up trash, checking outside, and pressing and holding ‘E’ over and over again. And there’s always some monster chasing you, but it never actually catches you(unless you let it) - it just disappears when it’s supposed to.

The thing about these ‘games’ is that they’re like really basic games where you just keep triggering the same stuff, whether it’s running into a monster, hearing a spooky news report, or suddenly finding more trash.

It’s frustrating to see how unoriginal and boring these games are. And it’s annoying that the people making them don’t seem to have any new ideas. The worst part is, that as long as people keep playing these games, they’ll keep making more of them. Who knows when this trend will finally go away?

I am just sick of the developers on this platform constantly opting for basic and repetitive ideas solely to make money… just take a look at the game passes (in different games, by the way).

It is just so pathetic.

While this may come across as a rant, my intention is to highlight a pressing issue—these games and the subpar developers responsible for them. I firmly believe that the developers themselves pose a more significant problem than the consumers who persistently engage with these awful games.

joke video that features trash clean up irl so be warned

Thanks for reading!

Maxtoxin_Music · January 12, 2025, 1:31am

You also have to remember that Roblox has restrictions on what horror experiences are allowed to do as to maintain a reasonable age rating.

TEARAPARTJAMES · September 22, 2025, 7:12pm

Decided that this needed a significant update since the last time I worked on it.

Should be much more concise and more generalized for a variety of horror games.
Also tried to remove most of my criticisms of games on the platform since this is a guide not a review!

Let me know of anything else I should add to this.

LuigiRulez2022 · October 20, 2025, 4:35am

i feel like forsaken is bad example when it comes to its soundtrack when it comes to killers is the music is more “catchy” than “horror” with a lot of forsaken music being more “silly and upbeat” i think a better example would be to use dead by daylights soundtrack because its layer (which is what i think you going with forsaken) but dead by daylight killer music gose with layer 1 of the song being a bit quiet and playing a new notes, layer 2 adding a another small track, layer 3 playing part of the main song and the last layer being a chase added more notes to the layer before making a chase type music wear it makes you panic or fear.