The horror genre has become the staple of entertainment for movies and games. Nintendo Switch, although portable, is powerful enough to immerse players into the dark world of horror games. Playing horror games on the Switch at night while you cover yourself in the protective layers of blankets adds a new dimension to the dreadful experience. From Psychological survival to action horror, Nintendo Switch has no shortage of terrifying games that will send chills down your spine.
15 Best Horror Games on Switch
Nintendo Switch has a library of horror games, from artistic gore to horror visual novels. Here are the 15 horror games that will twist your mind in every mysterious way.
Little Nightmares Complete Edition
Little Nightmares sets you in the horrific world of creepy creatures constantly giving you jump scare and trying to snatch you to make their meal. The 2.5D visuals look like stop motion videos inspired by Tim Burton movies. In dark and creepy settings that have you jumping from platform to platform, solving puzzles and escaping monsters makes Little Nightmare frustratingly fun. The game makes you feel uncomfortable in every possible way hinting at the approach of dangerous creatures throughout the game. Little Nightmare Complete Edition comprises three DLC chapters, The Depths, The Hideaway, and The Residence. All these DLC includes an additional set of levels with new monsters and puzzles to solve.
Detention
Detention is a 2D side-scrolling atmospheric horror game where you slowly unravel the hidden mysteries of Greenwood High School, where you are trapped. It’s a psychological horror game that also portrays the history of Taiwanese lives back in 1960. The game does a great job of delivering the sentiment of hopelessness and nausea characterizing the martial law period. The art style reinforces the concept of bleakness and lack of freedom during the period. The horror is not present in the jump scare or the visuals but in understanding the concept of loss and dreadful fear once you dive deep into its story through gameplay. Detention also has the movie adaptation that goes by the same name.
Outlast: Bundle of Terror
Outlast is a terrifying game leaving you with nothing but sheer dreadful moments keeping you on your toes all the time. You are helpless against the monster; all you can do is run and hide in a safe place. The dark and dilapidated design of a psychiatric hospital will have you sweating out of fear every time you open the door, hoping not to be any mutant monster on the other side. The first-person view also adds to the immersion of the survival horror genre. The ability to be helpless and having only the choice of running or hiding is the key to making a truly terrifying experience.
Little Nightmares 2
Little Nightmares 2 heightens up the eerie feelings of its previous predecessor and adds new gameplay mechanics for creepy immersion into the dark whimsical world. You play as Mono, who can wield weapons and items to smash smaller enemies and objects. Like its predecessor, Little Nightmare 2 heavily implements the stealth aspect of the game. By hiding against big monsters, the game creates a sense of intensity and the fear of getting caught. You also find Six, and the story progresses together as both try to advance the game by solving puzzles, overcoming platforming, and escaping from the hellish clutch of monstrous creatures. Discover the secret of Signal Tower as you and six journey together in the horrifying world of Little Nightmares 2.
Eyes: The Horror Game
Eyes are a survival horror game where you have to run for your life against various monsters and collect money bags hidden throughout the levels. You can unlock the steel door with enough money bags to complete the level. The game has a simple premise: you enter a haunted mansion and are chased by ghosts and other creepy monsters. There are five modes you can play: Standard Mode, Endless mode and, Trick or Treat mode, Sandbox Mode, Double Trouble. The game can be considered a typical horror where players have to survive from ghosts roaming around the maze-like mansions and collecting money bags to escape. Behind the mentally ill patient in the abandoned asylum lies the secrets that you have to uncover. As an independent journalist, you will be using your camcorder mostly in the dark to find the truth behind the horrific asylum.
Amnesia: Collection
A classic horror game where you have to maintain your sanity by staying in well-lit areas. Staying too much in dark corners will have you hallucinating. You will have nothing but your lit lantern to scare away the dark and items you will get during gameplay to unlock secrets. Amnesia Collection contains three types of levels with different gameplay settings. The classic Dark Descent, the dungeon cell Justine, and a different take of horror in A Machine For Pigs. Most objects you find can be picked up and tossed around to break and unlock new secrets. This creates a new depth in environmental puzzles. Besides its aged graphics, Amnesia delivers a great amount of immersive and claustrophobic experience along with clever puzzles.
Darkwood
In an unsettling forest overtaken by plague, you are stranded in a semi-open world where you have to scavenge to survive. Although the game is played in top-down visuals, the limited view keeps the claustrophobic aspect in the open terrain, heightening the fear of the unknown. The curiosity amplifies as you dive deep into the woods discovering the little bits of bizarre forest. Darkwood’s shift of characters changes the player’s perspectives as things keep on getting stranger, and you are left with abnormal feelings. The game mixes up horror aspects with survival elements as you explore areas, collect resources, craft items and survive from horrifying mutants. Get ready to take on the mutants, harvest their crops, fight the cult and find the doctor to unravel the origin of the hideous plague.
Layers of Fear: Legacy
A creepy surrealistic mansion made in the mind of a mad painter, Layers of Fear has you roam around the unsettling hallways and corridors of the everchanging mansion. Everything is turning into abstract form for you to paint and go crazy. The game overthrows many jumpscares, making the heart-pounding moments severely exhausting, and getting paranoid all the time is exhausting. The story keeps the player going to make sense of all these bizarre events. Wandering around the creepy mansion that changes its perspective on the player approach has a lot of weird moments. With the inclusion of Legacy DLC, players can now experience the horrors of Manson, which adds a fine little touch to the story of its main game.
Bendy and the Ink Machine
Explore the failed animation studio as Joey Drew calls you back because he wants to show you something mysterious. The game begins in a monochromatic studio in a first-person mode, where you are introduced to an ink machine. Things start to get visually pleasing to bizarre from there onwards. The game resembles simple black and white cartoons from the late 1930s to 1940s. It delivers the intense, horrific experience in a unique yet beautiful shell-shaded studio that incorporates high contrast texture art into a grim 3D art style. Survive from the creepy robots to horrifying ink creatures and figure out what’s going on in the studio as you meet new unsettling characters along your journey.
Call of Cthulhu
Call of Cthulhu is a cosmic horror adventure game inspired by H.P Lovecraft’s short story and adapted from a 1981 tabletop role-playing game with the same game title. You play as a Private Investigator, Edward Pierce, who is sent to the isolated Darkwater Island to seek out information about the tragic death of the Hawkins family. The game is heavily story-driven with puzzles to solve and very few combat elements, but that all is overtaken by excellent writing that keeps players indulged in keeping progressing more. Fight your way through madness and experience cosmic horror like never before.
Observer
Dwell in the cyberpunk world and the psychological horror delivered through the narration and glitch beneath the dystopian setting in the year 2084. From amazing visuals to the wonderful story, everything is balanced beautifully to emerge you into the horrifying side of the Sci-Fi aesthetic era. You play as Daniel Lazarski, an Observer’s Police, and your task is to hack into people’s minds to gain information. With the Dream Eater device, you can explore the mind of suspects gaining information about their thoughts and emotions. In their twisted minds, things get crazy that might drag you down to insanity. Experience the psychological horror of the dystopian sci-fi world and discover the digital plague that is taking over people’s minds.
Alien: Isolation
The game is terrifying due to its unpredictable alien approach in a claustrophobic space station. Danger lurks in every corner, and you must survive by evading the indestructible alien, Xenomorph, as you search for clues to your mother’s disappearance. Staying alive is the key to the game and is done by scavenging for resources and using your survival instinct to hide and run away from the sudden appearance of creepy aliens. True horror comes from the fear of getting caught while hiding in absolute stillness. Overcome your constant dread by carefully planning your next move in the confined area of the space station.
Dead By Daylight
What happens when you combine multiplayer aspects in the horror genre? You get Dead By Daylight, where one Killer player is up against four players who have to escape the map by repairing seven generators placed in different parts of the map. An asymmetrical survival horror game that has you running for your life against the big bad killer if you are playing the four-player. The true horror is getting chased by the killer and hooked to get sacrificed. Play through Procedurally generated levels where each player is randomly spawned to make them unpredictable, highlighting the level of fear as the killer can come from any corner.
Resident Evil
From claustrophobic hallways with intense enemies chasing moments to gruesome monsters trying to butcher you, Nintendo Switch provides an array of Resident evil games keeping the action horror genre alive and well. Resident Evil keeps the fear level balanced with action elements by providing a limited supply of ammo for the weapons compelling the player to use other methods such as melee or stealth. Capcom has a remastered version of Resident Evil 0,1,4,5,6, Revelation one and two on Switch. Unfortunately, RE7 is cloud-only and only available in Japan. Relieve all the nostalgic and heart-pounding moments to piece together the larger picture of many mutant viruses that have overtaken the world. By playing all the games and re-encountering boss villains, you will learn the true story of Umbrella corporation and their intentions in the Residental Evil franchise.
Among the Sleep Enhanced Edition
You play from the perspective of a two-year-old baby, and you have to find your missing mother by entering the surreal and creepy world where you solve puzzles, hide from shadowy creatures and unfold the story. The game does an excellent job by putting you in the shoes of a baby, and gameplay also functions similarly by unbalanced baby steps adding layers to the immersion. You crawl through small vents and hide under furniture to avoid ghosts or waddle on your two feet to reach heights to reach places as things are larger in the eyes of a two-year toddler. You are also accompanied by your teddy bear, who will guide you through this hellish nightmare. Overcome your fear by exploring the dreadful dream and learn about your mother’s disappearance in a short but gothic game, Among the Sleep.
