The Halloween season is always an excellent time to dig into the survival horror genre of video games and it’s impressive to see just how much these types of titles have been able to grow and change over time. Resident Evil has often been seen as the leader in survival horror, but it’s also a franchise that’s shown considerable evolution and the games have come a long way from how the original title plays.
There are lots of extremely frightening video games that are out there, but there are also some satisfying options for those that are nostalgic for something that looks and feels a lot like the start of the Resident Evil series.
10 Dino Crisis
It shouldn’t be a major surprise that Dino Crisis plays in a similar nature to Resident Evil considering that the prehistoric survival horror series also came out of Capcom during the height of Resident Evil’s development. The title replaces zombies for dinosaurs and while it’s a slightly more action-heavy experience, it still shares a lot of its DNA with Resident Evil, right down to the fixed camera angles, weapons, and inventory. The franchise never caught on in the same way as the Resident Evil games, but it’s still a satisfying and frightening video game experience.
9 Silent Hill
Silent Hill is often framed as a counterpoint to Resident Evil and while Konami’s survival horror series definitely came to be as a response to the zombie antics in Raccoon City, the games have been able to find their own voice and become much more about trauma and the allegorical horrors that the town of Silent Hill brings to life. However, the original Silent Hill is a much closet fit to Resident Evil and a simpler game. The look and style of the titles are the same, yet Silent Hill skews more towards puzzles than combat.
8 Deep Fear
The Sega Saturn often gets overlooked when it comes to looking back on retro consoles and even though Sega’s console couldn’t seriously compete with Sony’s PlayStation, the Saturn still is the home for some exceptional games that can’t be found anywhere else. Deep Fear is one of the few original survival horror games hidden away on the Saturn.
It features a creative setting where players are trapped in an underwater research facility with a monstrous threat. The game looks and plays in a very similar fashion to Resident Evil, but even adds more features to manage, like oxygen levels.
7 Alone In The Dark 3
The Alone in the Dark series has gone through many different facelifts over the years as the horror franchise has pursued unique approaches to its story of beleaguered private investigator Edward Carnby and his tendency to stumble upon supernatural entities. Alone in the Dark has fallen into obscurity over the years, but Alone in the Dark 3 is a noteworthy entry in the series. It features a haunted Wild West premise, but the chaos feels quite similar to the zombie fallout in the Spencer Mansion in Resident Evil. There’s also a similar balance on shooting, puzzles, and exploration.
6 Countdown: Vampires
Resident Evil’s success led to the franchise monopolizing the zombie genre, so many survival horror clones attempted to take the same mechanics and experiment with a different monster. Countdown: Vampire is Bandai’s attempt at the survival horror fad and it amounts to a fairly lackluster title that mixes tedious vampire slaying with light puzzles and the collecting of keycards. One novel idea in the game is that players can decide if they want to kill or heal their vampire victims, which is still a concept Resident Evil has never incorporated.
5 Fear Effect
Fear Effect and its prequel, Fear Effect 2: Retro Helix, are fantastic titles for the original PlayStation that take survival horror aesthetics and lean more into the action-adventure genre with a story that centers around the Hong Kong Triad and a power struggle that erupts in the city. Both Fear Effect titles feature tank controls typical to Resident Evil as well as pre-rendered backgrounds.
However, Fear Effect makes these concepts feel original thanks to the games’ inventive cel-shaded art design. Other creative touches, like its approach to a health bar that incorporates the character’s heartbeat, help Fear Effect stand out.
4 Blue Stinger
Blue Stinger is a very unusual survival horror title that was released as a launch title for Sega’s Dreamcast in North America. Blue Stinger features fully 3D environments and a plot that is millions of years in the making and involves a meteor, mutant monsters, and an angel-like species known as Nephilim. Blue Stinger features a wide arsenal of weapons and quality of life improvements over Resident Evil, but its basic action and puzzle solving, plus the use of characters with B-movie voice acting all feels indebted to Resident Evil.
3 Galerians
Galerians feels like one of the more creative spins on the Resident Evil formula and even though the game received a sequel on the PlayStation 2, it’s not a franchise that’s gained a lot of attention. Galerians features tank controls and a monster killing and puzzle solving formula that should feel familiar. However, the game earns points for how it gets rid of traditional weapons and instead features an array of psychic powers. Resident Evil, but with telekinetic abilities, is a lot of fun and Galerians feels like it was too sophisticated for its time.
2 OverBlood
The game developer, EA, has built up a reputation for their many sports franchises, but OverBlood and its sequel mark EA’s foray into the survival horror genre. OverBlood trades Resident Evil’s zombies for vampires and it tells a story about genetic experimentation that’s perhaps ambitious for its own good. The gameplay and missions in OverBlood are very reminiscent of how Resident Evil operates and the characters feel like they could easily be S.T.A.R.S. members. However, OverBlood title throws a lot more in the mix, like the ability to switch between third- and first-person perspectives and even light platforming elements.
1 Illbleed
Illbleed is one of the best survival horror games that have ever been made, but it’s also a very niche release due to how it’s an exclusive for the Dreamcast. Illbleed features a bunch of teens at a dangerous amusement park and the entire game acts as a self-aware tribute to the slasher genre and old horror cinema. As a result, Illbleed is an evolved survival horror game and contains things like a fear meter for characters, but its basic structure and the way that multiple characters are used to tell a single narrative immediately call Resident Evil to mind.
NEXT: 10 Scariest Zombies In Horror Games
