Survival horror game

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Survival horror is a prominent video game genre in which the player has to survive an onslaught of opponents, often undead or otherwise supernatural, typically in claustrophobic environments in a third-person perspective. Horror movie elements are used liberally. The player is typically armed, but not nearly as well-armed as the player in a shooter game. The player's goal is generally to escape from an isolated house or town that is inhabited mostly by zombies and monsters through shooting and puzzle solving. Isolation is generally one of the most recurrent themes within this genre.

Survival horror is possibly the only video game genre that is defined primarily by theme rather than gameplay style. Though most commonly associated with the Resident Evil mechanics described above, the genre is also home to beat 'em ups (Nightmare Creatures, Splatterhouse), role playing games (Sweet Home), first-person shooters (Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth, Hungry Ghosts), and text adventure games (Kamaitachi No Yoru). Other games such as the Doom and Castlevania series include horror elements, but such games are not typically considered survival horror because horror is not the defining game play characteristic. However, the subjective nature of such discrepancies can make survival horror a difficult genre to classify.

Some popular survival horror games include:

Alone in the Dark series by Infogrames
Bioshock by Irrational Games
The Blair Witch Project by Take 2 Interactive
Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
Clive Barker's Undying
Condemned: Criminal Origins by Monolith Productions
Clock Tower series by Human Entertainment
Dino Crisis series by Capcom
Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem by Silicon Knights
Fatal Frame series by Tecmo
Haunting Ground by Capcom
Hungry Ghosts by Sony Computer Entertainment Japan
Kamaitachi No Yoru
Martian Gothic: Unification
Nightmare Creatures series
Nocturne by Take 2 Interactive
Onimusha series by Capcom
Parasite Eve series by Squaresoft
Resident Evil series by Capcom
Silent Hill series by Konami
Siren by Sony Computer Entertainment America
Splatterhouse series by Namco
The Suffering by Midway Games
Sweet Home by Capcom
System Shock by Looking Glass Studios
System Shock 2 by Irrational Games

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History

The term Survival horror was first coined by Resident Evil (1996). The Japanese version (Biohazard) was marketed under the previously non-existent Survival horror genre on the game's cover. A line of text also displayed the phrase "Enter the world of survival horror..." while the game was loading.

However, most credit Alone in the Dark (1993) with the invention of the survival horror genre. A number of earlier horror-themed games (such as Halloween (1983) on the Atari 2600, Friday the 13th (1985) and Ghost Hunters (1986) on the C64, Transylvania (1986), on the Apple II, Splatterhouse (1988 on the Turbografx-16), and Sweet Home (1989) on the NES) may have also helped form the genre.

The survival horror genre was popularized by Resident Evil (1996) on the PlayStation and Sega Saturn video game consoles. Resident Evil was heavily influenced by both Alone in the Dark and Sweet Home. Clock Tower: The First Fear (1995) predates Resident Evil, but it was only released in Japan and is not well known. D (1996) is perhaps the best known of a group of point-and-click horror games produced in Japan in the mid 1990s.

Clock Tower (1997) and Silent Hill (1999) created a group of survival horror games that focus on psychological terror rather than violence and gore. This category deemphasizes combat in order to increase the vulnerability of the protagonist and consequently build tension. Similar titles include Fatal Frame and Siren.

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Adaptations

A number of survival horror games have spawned adaptations in media outside of video games. Resident Evil and Alone in the Dark have been made into feature films, and a Silent Hill movie is forthcoming. Silent Hill and Resident Evil comic books are also available.

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