TOP 5 INSANE Upcoming Games Like Silent Hill (2022 & 2023)

by Mike Alexander / Lists, Articles / 29 Jan 2022

As a franchise, Silent Hill is an anomaly. The first entry was released in 1999 and completely set the tone for what the survival horror genre would be for decades afterwards. The intensely psychological story, cunningly aimed fixed camera angles and tank controls, were then improved upon a mere 2 years later with the release of Silent Hill 2. The issue with this is, that Silent Hill 2 knocked it out of the park so hard, that the rest of the franchise has just been chasing that success.

Each entry that has followed sold less than the one before it, and were received increasingly poorly. Up until Hideo Kojima’s P.T. demo, which was a mystery upon its release, but was later revealed to be a complete reimagining of what a Silent Hill game could be. At that point, the fan excitement reached a fever pitch… until the project was canceled. Since then, indie developers (and maybe a few AAA studios) have been creating their own psychological horror games to feed the void that Silent Hill and P.T. left in their wake. Many of them have been very successful, and perhaps there might be a few more nightmares to be had with this list of the TOP 5 INSANE Upcoming Games Like Silent Hill (2022 & 2023).

Post Trauma

First, we have a very promising project being developed by RobertoSerraG, an indie developer. Their game is Post Trauma, and in it, you step into the shoes of a 57-year-old man named Roman, as he wakes up in a strange, twisted place he does not recognize. As Roman, you will explore this strange locale and encounter creatures that may or may not be hostile, despite their appearance. Fans of the original Silent Hill games will feel right at home thanks to the game’s fixed camera angles, and new fans will appreciate the sections that play out in the first person. Scan the environments to find clues that you will need to help solve the game’s many puzzles (the developer recommends playing the game with a notepad next to you). At the moment, there is no solid release date, but there is a demo available for Post Trauma on Steam and Itch.io, so hopefully, RobertoSerraG will be able to deliver this experience to fans fairly soon.

Wronged Us

Return to a town where the citizens seem just a little off, and the faint scent of rot hangs in the air in Wronged Us by Delusional Studio Limited. In it, you will play as a man named Isaac as he returns to his off-puttingly religious hometown that is inhabited by a cast of characters that appear to either be on meth or suffering from some kind of disease. From the footage shown in Wronged Us’s trailer, that sense of uneasiness carries over into the environments, which seem to be mostly run-down buildings and apartments, and also into the creatures you will face. There is a quick glimpse of a fast-moving, crawling creature and a frighteningly tall humanoid who ducks into a doorway in a horrifying manner (if you’ve seen the film It Follows, this scene seems to be lifted from that). Gameplay occurs from an over-the-shoulder perspective and appears to be mostly narrative with light gunplay, and maybe some puzzles are involved as well. I’m excited to see how the story plays out when Wronged Us arrives on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC sometime in 2023.

Stray Souls

Teenagers have enough to contend with these days, and if you’re Daniel, you also have to deal with a sordid past and a haunted house. The third-person psychological horror game Stray Souls by Jukai Studio is another game that takes inspiration from early Silent Hill games, and it seems to be a project worth keeping an eye on. As Daniel, you will solve puzzles in the third person and engage in branching dialogues with other characters that will determine the outcome of the story, but sections of the game will also have you taking control of other characters in first-person, literally experiencing their stories through their own eyes. Development on this game seems to be of the highest quality; Jukai Studio should be very proud, even just from the short trailer on the game’s steam page. It features fantastic-looking facial animations using Unreal Engine 5’s Metahuman tech and will also allegedly feature “Motion Matching”, a new method of mocap that is meant to be more realistic and fluid in game. Stray Souls is labeled as “coming soon” on Steam, but there is a demo available if you’re curious. Hopefully, the full game will be released sometime this year.

Luto

Our next game is more in the same vein as the P.T. form of Silent Hill, rather than the PlayStation 1 and 2 iterations. Luto, by Broken Bird Games is a first-person psychological horror game where you play as a person who is trapped in their own house, unable to leave no matter how hard they try. This is the same premise as P.T. and even Visage, another highly successful game, but Luto appears to be setting itself apart with its content rather than how it is presented. The game features themes of the anguish, loss of a loved one, insecurity, anxiety, and depression. Many phobias will also be explored throughout the game, including monophobia (fear of being alone), nyctophobia (fear of darkness), and agoraphobia (fear of leaving one’s house). These themes are explored through environmental horror, in a house that constantly changes depending on how deep you have delved into your psyche. What was once a bedroom might become a never-ending hallway, an abstract desert realm, or an endless void. Fight your phobias with Luto when it releases in 2022 for PlayStation 4 and 5 and PC.

Westwood Shadows

The last game on this list is Westwood Shadows by RedSoup Studio. This game is a first-person puzzle-solving game that has you playing as a detective who returns to his abandoned hometown to resolve an unsolved case and is faced with his past along the way. The abandoned town is portrayed through highly detailed environments. So detailed, in fact, that you can almost feel the atmosphere of dread that hangs over the entire town as you play through the story. RedSoup Studio has made a demo available on Steam, and the full game is scheduled to be released some time in 2022 on PC.

Mike Alexander

Mike has been playing video games since he was able to hold a controller, having been fascinated by Sonic 2 on his mom’s Sega Genesis. That fascination and passion for the art form has grown exponentially nearly 30 years later, and he doesn’t see that fading away anytime soon.
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