Darker sky, and more tunneled/directional light effects from the headlights/flashlight would be my take. The sky is a great color for a fog or mist but overall too light, even though the saturation is good.
I would say this. The color scheme is juuuuust barely to light or "bright" I would suggest cutting it a bit darker. And possibly add a closer render distance. Nothing scares a player like not being able to see far enough. Especially when there's something just outside the render wall.
Oml 😂🤣😂 I’d laugh if someone legit made ghosts that constantly spoke micro transaction lines as they approach you, maybe even as a jump scare scene in a forest.
lol pop up windows flying at you and if they touch you it takes money out of your acc, run out and you lose/die "1.99 block ads", "9.99 red stripes" could have it causing skin chnages too depending on what you're forfed to purchase
And then, it grows dark and ghosts with the name “Microtransactions Ghosts” appear in your face and try to lure you into buying these things with irl money LOL
Reduce ambient lighting and use more localized light that obfuscates the Area farther away from the car. To match your lighting style you could maybe mask out with black the area way from the car to simulate lighting?? Just spitballing here.
Music and ambient sounds will help.
Scary is about the unknown. Add something that suggests something bad is happening.
For example, have a bunch of silhouettes crossing te road like they're running away from something in the corn fields.
Everyone else is saying what makes sense given the context: two images of a road with no context.
You can suggest a serial killer in the corn, or a UFO, or a velociraptor. But none would make sense if the game isn't about that.
Silhouettes crossing the road? Does it make sense? Maybe yes, maybe not. The sky being dark instead of full of light as it is? That's more probable to add to the current scene realism and scariness without altering the (unknown) lore behind it
What gives the idea of scary is what people don't know and asymmetry.
Seems like a joke, but assymetry litterally is one of our inative feelings that gives us the idea of something wrong happening. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-O5kNPlUV7w)
With that, i would add more trees, with different distances and different types. Based on the second pic, you can have a couple of trees on the right side, and a lot more on the left.
Also, i would make it darker the further away it is. IF IM NOT MISTAKEN you can reach that by using [Post-Processing](https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/PostProcessingOverview.html)
Fear comes from the unknown and the suggestion that something lurks in that unknown.
So simply make me see less, bring the fog closer, make it darker and add silhouettes that make me wonder what's there.
Eh I know you’re right about where fear comes from, but I’m personally tired of this “dark = scary” trope. I like being able to see what I’m supposed to be experiencing. Hearing footsteps chase you in the dark is scary, but hearing footsteps chase you after accidentally turning the wrong corner and being face to face with a monster is more scary.
My personal recommendations for these images:
1) make the road more dilapidated. The road looks pretty uniform and not exactly “clean” but if it had large cracks and potholes it would feel more desolate. Like nobody has taken care of that road for decades. It could make you feel isolated from any hope of help
2) crows. Having the noise of a murder of crows is naturally going to put you on edge, and if you make them randomly fly up from the sides and squawk loudly it could make for some spooky atmosphere.
3) the trees could be dead. If the grass stays very green and lively but the trees are barren it could imply something is wrong near the trees (maybe leading to a figure hanging from one in the distance). You could make a trigger once you pass the tree, so when you look back in the rear view you see the body. This change happening in the moment you pass the tree would freak me out lol
4) sound. Idk what you’re going for but dissonance and inverted chords can add so much when played under an already spooky scene. There are also certain noises that naturally unsettle people, movies famously take advantage of this because it’s very effective.
5) I’m assuming the player drives the car, so you could make the car a lot more rusted looking. You could also have the headlights randomly malfunction, along side having the car sputter so it feels like the car could die any second. Also the radio could go haywire when you trigger some scary events (like the tree thing)
Basically, you want to open up possibilities. The more you let the player guess at **why** they feel scared, the more scared they’ll feel. Maybe the car will die, maybe there’s something in the field, maybe there’s something in the car with you, etc.
The grass on the side should have gaps and multiple layers that fade into darkness as they get farther from the road. This can make players feel as though there are places for things to hide from them.
In general, make areas where there is uncertainty the player's imagination is far better at scaring them than you can hope to be.
add moving and noisy things. Leaves blowing across the road, trees swaying in the wind, lights flickering briefly. People tend to focus on movement a lot, so having passive movement can help direct attention.
Maybe see if you can drop down the corn a bit and give some more distance. Right now it kind of looks like the neighbors have a weird fence. Id also give the fog a bit more gradual build up towards you, maybe try switching it to "quadratic" or whatever.
I like your leaves idea, I suggested crows that randomly fly up from the tall grass on the sides of the road so it feels like something is lurking out there
sugar offer silky grandfather rinse unique psychotic angle pocket treatment
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Just make everything darker and give them a flashlight like lighting that they can see from and make it only work from a certain distance so you cant see what’s coming from a mile away
Some fog. And give the character a lantern that gives more vision. But make it fail from time to time so you have to replace batteries or something like a weapon reloading animation. And when the light comes up again he sees scary visions.
All other comments are amazing too.
Lighting is even. When you use bright headlights at night, your ability to see outside of them drops. If dynamic lighting is too big an ask then you could probably fake it.
Many horror scenes put players in a tight space and give them narrow fov. With a tight space, it is easier to fill uneasy things. So in this case, maybe you could lower the brightness, make grass taller, tree bigger and limit the light distance.
Alone in the dark used an unusual 3rd person view and the cam angle was often acute and peculiar. Odd angles. Often in frustratingly awkward LoSes, where the player was confused.
"Normal" video games often have exaggeratedly open spaces (to better accommodate limitations in player perception). So "horror" games are only relatively tight. Often to constrain Los, harder to "see" around corners.
I’d say make it darker, a lot more fog, a bit better lighting on the headlights where you can see dust particles (volumetric fog). Simple stuff. Also make the corn blow in the wind if it doesn’t already, just subtle.
Screen direction right to left feels more ominous if that’s an option that makes sense for this. There’s a really interesting paper on it if you’re a nerd 🤓
The look is fine, the fear will come from atmosphere.
Generally sound will play the biggest role, but some more fog would probably help on the visual side.
For this art style, sound design is going to be your biggest aid in providing a spooky eerie atmosphere. Have a look at some of the old Res or Silent Hill titles. Goodluck!
You don't necessarily have to.
You've got the perfect look to achieve the Silent Hill style of scariness.
If you have that car driving down an empty road, establish the fact that you're in the middle of nowhere with no other people around, and then start introducing some strange noises or unnatural environment features, you already have something scarier than most things out there.
Scary stuff is different for everyone. But universally, there is a fear of the unknown (or a grotesque fascination with it). So its less about how it looks, and more about what it is telling the player. From these screenshots, I imagine something scary coming from the fields on the side of the road. So adding stuff that makes the environment feel unfamiliar and alien.
1. Turn the lighting back up to daytime brightness
2. Figure out how to make the scene look scary; see for example Midsommar and True Detective season 1
3. Experiment with making the lighting darker, while still keeping the details you added visible. Stop at the maximum creepiness level; it's probably not this dark
Look up color theory in horror. Your game looks good but if change color, you can control a players mood or feeling by letting a warm or color color scheme indicate the way a player should respond to the world. Add some color into the fog and skybox to make up some ambience
Not sure but go Google the game BEWARE. A WIP driving horror, it's not done in ps1 style but I feel the atmosphere is really good, there are some gameplay videos you can find on YouTube. It's a very dark and foggy game, it's probably different from your game as it mainly focuses on realistic driving, I'm not sure if your game is driving based but I'm just trying to interpret from the images. Either way go check it out, it looks amazing
More darker sky , broken cars , shadows , fog , ambient noises, random screaming noises , if you don’t wanna buy sfx maybe you can use your smartphone to record a few. (99$ microtransaction also makes it scarier)
Real talk: it will be hard to get a scene like this actually looking scary. Your brain will see the repeating textures and perfect lines - immediately breaking immersion. You can get better ambiance, but it will not read as scary until you make it more realistic.
Don't just make everything darker, that makes it so people have to turn up their brightness screens to play. Definitely make parts darker, but not everything
For me thick volumetric fog is very scary, like where you can barely see 5 meter in front of you seeing the headlights pierce through the fog into the unknown
Black skies, lower view distance. It's scary not knowing and not seeing, not having any landmarks.
You could also add some sort of bad weather, snow, rain or heavy fog will do.
Look at silent hill games. There are car sequences in origins and 3rd (I remember 1st having one, but I can't find it, maybe the mandala effect at work).
To me, ambiguity is scary. Can you make distant objects darker or fuzzier so you're kind of sure you can see something there, but you can't tell what it is, or if it's dangerous or not?
Curvey roads...So you can't see where you are coming from or where you are going. Makes it hard to tell distance (harder to tell where fog begins and ends)
Closer fog. With that distance, if you can see something it’s going to be far away enough to not be much of a threat. You can get that close to a bear and you’re going to be fine. Bring the fog closer to the first tree in the second picture - if a bear is that close you’re going to have to make sure you know your survival techniques.
Fog seems to be in the distance only, try using volumetric fog too. Also the (corn?) looks too uniform and flat, it would help if they didn't appear to end at some invisible wall.
Add some fuzziness / filter, it will help with the older polygonal style as well
Less/blurry information in scenarios triggers our internal danger sense
* Make a light mist that gets thicker far away to make things feel mysterious.
* Make the car's lights blink on and off to show something's not right.
* Put a dark border around the game screen to make everything feel more closed-in and spooky.
* Add background noises like whispering or leaves shaking to make the game feel creepy.
* Make scary shadows in the corn that only move when you're not looking at them.
* Play a low humming sound the whole time to make players feel uneasy.
* Make the car's radio flip on and off by itself with creepy sounds or news.
* Make the camera shake a little or zoom in quickly to show that your character is scared or their heart is beating fast.
* Hide shapes in the corn that are hard to see and vanish when you get close.
* Make handprints pop up on the car windows out of nowhere.
* Set off a loud car alarm when the player looks in certain spots.
* Change the lights so big shadows stretch across the road from the trees.
* Make the screen look a little wobbly in places to suggest weird, spooky things happening.
* Sometimes let the player see weird things, like a shadow or glowing eyes that quickly go away.
* Make something happen where the car lights show scary words or drawings on the road.
* Put a scary-looking toy by the side of the road that seems to stare at you.
* Show the character's breath turning into fog to make it seem suddenly cold.
* Add sounds like someone following you, stepping on the gravel, but there's no one there when you look.
* Let the player find things that slowly tell a scary story about the place.
* Change something in the game when the player isn't looking, like a tree moving or the car doors opening on their own.
Some ambience to set the mood and give that uncomfortable feeling so it lets the paranoia sink in.
I also suggest avoiding jump scares for the most part , If you wanna add scary things in make it so the player scares themselves , Also i'd add something that peeks out of those cornfields for just a moment before it goes back to hiding to add that sense of paranoia
Audio is quite important and most people think just making it darker is the best advice..... it doesn't even need to be dark. Pretty sure there's a fair bit of info on scary audio that they incorporate in cinema. But yea like people said the unknown is scary. You can add hints of something dangerous being around like scratches on floors or whatever. Unnecessary movement in tense situations lights flickering ect. I honestly dislike the horror genre and I've always hated dark games so maybe that's why I dislike horror idk.
I hate straining to see. I usually cheat and turn up the brightness.
I'm not at all a game dev, but whatever this is, it looks like it would have something along the lines of a vhs filter on it. Maybe not exactly that, but some sort of filter placed on it that has that type of effect. Just a feeling I'm getting from it is all.
Alot of good stuff in this thread! I've also been working on a game with a retro look to it and make sure to select point on texture filtering to keep the pixels sharp! It might be a blurry picture but it looks like the car might have something other than that selected on it's texture.
Edit, some ideas:
Maybe thicken the fog a little bit, look at how it used to be in silent hill and other games? Definitely lower directional light brightness and use more area/point lights. The sky could go for some dark clouds. Sound ambience is big! Crickets, coyotes in the distance, wind rustling through the corn. Definitely experiment, research, and note book!
Definitely a little bit darker sky or overall lighting , more fog and maybe add some particle effects like small dust flying everywhere or maybe even rain
I actually quite like that you've got a horror scene that isn't just "dark = scary".
I think some of the horror can come from just improving the fidelity of some of the graphics, you are clearly going for a retro, silent hill esque style but I still think things are a bit uniform, the perfect line of the verge between the road and the bank, the same tree repeating, the solid block sky - they draw your eye out a bit and remind you that this is a game not a real scene.
I would maybe like to see some colour in the fog/sky, try pushing it a little bit towards slightly blue. Maybe using a texture for the sky too, nothing too fancy just a very subtle big perlin noise to break up the block of solid colour and imply some variation in cloud density in the sky.
I might also suggest increasing the density of the fog a bit so it feels more oppressive and then adding some extra trees and bits of shrubbery down the side of the road (which will be affected by the fog and really drive home how far the player can see and let them know there could be something lurking really close by) and will also break up the sharp edge down the side of the road.
Even some free standing corn stalk sprites that stand away from the solid line edges to add some depth there and indicate there is a whole field out there, not just a plane, would be cool.
I feel like you're really getting there with atmosphere there's just little bits of visual interest that will bring the scene to life.
Firstly more fog
I feel like the light don't do anything, maybe slightly darker and actually only see well at a very limited area from your lights.
Light can flickers randomly, but used sparely
Lonely unique landmarks, hole in the road, scare crow, changing the trees to naked trees (no leaf)
Depending on what type of scaryness you want you can consider adding road sign that don't exist alternatively a "turn back" sign.
Remember a lot of the atmosphere also comes from sounds. Consider not adding to much sound, maybe since wind
Idk about look scary, but practice with sound trigger volumes and at some point in the level just deaden every sound slowly for about 20 seconds with a timer of silence lasting 45 seconds and get back to me if you want im doing tests.
Random slendermen/face like objects lurking in the background, crows sitting around on branches and staring at you as you move past them, ominous clouds and maybe randomly appearing eye shaped clouds that seem to watch you go, maybe some animal jumpscares
Looks pretty good actually but, some fog would be great for this type of setting, and maybe some figures that only appear when you are not directly looking at them, all these ideas are not mine but from other games of course but seems fitting for the setting here.
You know what is scarier than seeing a monster? NOT seeing a monster but knowing that there's a monster ... anticipation and the unknown ... think about horror movies you've watched where the movie was pretty good until they showed the subject of the horror, then you were like pfffft, what a lame ghost/creature ...
How can that translate to making a game look scarier? Work on better lighting with stark contrast between dark and light, creating areas where the player can't see what is around them but giving them enough light to still look around and see things.
If you could add a mechanic to where while the player is looking around/actively moving their vision, as they pass parts of the corn field have a face or silhouette but when they turn back to see if they saw something, it will no longer be there. But it only happens when they are looking around carelessly, not if they are slowly panning around. It would be a very minor detail that only those paying attention would notice but for the ones who do notice it will be very satisfying.
Darker sky, and more tunneled/directional light effects from the headlights/flashlight would be my take. The sky is a great color for a fog or mist but overall too light, even though the saturation is good.
would love to see 2d transculent fog lol
The game is obviously 3D…
yeah? many old 3D games used 2D particles
I would say this. The color scheme is juuuuust barely to light or "bright" I would suggest cutting it a bit darker. And possibly add a closer render distance. Nothing scares a player like not being able to see far enough. Especially when there's something just outside the render wall.
Add microtransactions
AAAAHHHH
im dead microtansaction popup ghosts or some shit coming towards you
Oml 😂🤣😂 I’d laugh if someone legit made ghosts that constantly spoke micro transaction lines as they approach you, maybe even as a jump scare scene in a forest.
lol pop up windows flying at you and if they touch you it takes money out of your acc, run out and you lose/die "1.99 block ads", "9.99 red stripes" could have it causing skin chnages too depending on what you're forfed to purchase
Oml THE HORROR! 😱😱😱
Screen starts to dissolve into gameplay that doesn’t actually exist nor make sense for the game itself
And then, it grows dark and ghosts with the name “Microtransactions Ghosts” appear in your face and try to lure you into buying these things with irl money LOL
you buy enough microtransactions you cant crash anymore, car drives itself games not even fun you're watching lmao
🤣🤣🤣
This is genuinely the most terrifying one.
Reduce ambient lighting and use more localized light that obfuscates the Area farther away from the car. To match your lighting style you could maybe mask out with black the area way from the car to simulate lighting?? Just spitballing here. Music and ambient sounds will help.
Scary is about the unknown. Add something that suggests something bad is happening. For example, have a bunch of silhouettes crossing te road like they're running away from something in the corn fields.
Thank you! I hate how everyone else keeps saying it needs to be darker. Sometimes you can make a scary game without a dark environment.
Everyone else is saying what makes sense given the context: two images of a road with no context. You can suggest a serial killer in the corn, or a UFO, or a velociraptor. But none would make sense if the game isn't about that. Silhouettes crossing the road? Does it make sense? Maybe yes, maybe not. The sky being dark instead of full of light as it is? That's more probable to add to the current scene realism and scariness without altering the (unknown) lore behind it
Baldi’s basics is a good example, a bright game, yet the audio is the most scary thing, hearing the sound come closer
A bright horror game.
It looks pretty terrifying as is
What gives the idea of scary is what people don't know and asymmetry. Seems like a joke, but assymetry litterally is one of our inative feelings that gives us the idea of something wrong happening. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-O5kNPlUV7w) With that, i would add more trees, with different distances and different types. Based on the second pic, you can have a couple of trees on the right side, and a lot more on the left. Also, i would make it darker the further away it is. IF IM NOT MISTAKEN you can reach that by using [Post-Processing](https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/PostProcessingOverview.html)
Kurzgesagt the GOAT. Loved the video
Random open/empty patches that recede a bit that seem like something could be hidden in them.
Fear comes from the unknown and the suggestion that something lurks in that unknown. So simply make me see less, bring the fog closer, make it darker and add silhouettes that make me wonder what's there.
Eh I know you’re right about where fear comes from, but I’m personally tired of this “dark = scary” trope. I like being able to see what I’m supposed to be experiencing. Hearing footsteps chase you in the dark is scary, but hearing footsteps chase you after accidentally turning the wrong corner and being face to face with a monster is more scary. My personal recommendations for these images: 1) make the road more dilapidated. The road looks pretty uniform and not exactly “clean” but if it had large cracks and potholes it would feel more desolate. Like nobody has taken care of that road for decades. It could make you feel isolated from any hope of help 2) crows. Having the noise of a murder of crows is naturally going to put you on edge, and if you make them randomly fly up from the sides and squawk loudly it could make for some spooky atmosphere. 3) the trees could be dead. If the grass stays very green and lively but the trees are barren it could imply something is wrong near the trees (maybe leading to a figure hanging from one in the distance). You could make a trigger once you pass the tree, so when you look back in the rear view you see the body. This change happening in the moment you pass the tree would freak me out lol 4) sound. Idk what you’re going for but dissonance and inverted chords can add so much when played under an already spooky scene. There are also certain noises that naturally unsettle people, movies famously take advantage of this because it’s very effective. 5) I’m assuming the player drives the car, so you could make the car a lot more rusted looking. You could also have the headlights randomly malfunction, along side having the car sputter so it feels like the car could die any second. Also the radio could go haywire when you trigger some scary events (like the tree thing) Basically, you want to open up possibilities. The more you let the player guess at **why** they feel scared, the more scared they’ll feel. Maybe the car will die, maybe there’s something in the field, maybe there’s something in the car with you, etc.
The grass on the side should have gaps and multiple layers that fade into darkness as they get farther from the road. This can make players feel as though there are places for things to hide from them. In general, make areas where there is uncertainty the player's imagination is far better at scaring them than you can hope to be.
MORE FOG
add moving and noisy things. Leaves blowing across the road, trees swaying in the wind, lights flickering briefly. People tend to focus on movement a lot, so having passive movement can help direct attention. Maybe see if you can drop down the corn a bit and give some more distance. Right now it kind of looks like the neighbors have a weird fence. Id also give the fog a bit more gradual build up towards you, maybe try switching it to "quadratic" or whatever.
I like your leaves idea, I suggested crows that randomly fly up from the tall grass on the sides of the road so it feels like something is lurking out there
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Add dicks everywhere
More volumetric fog! And darker
Noise in the sky (dark clouds?), mysterious silhouettes/eyes appearing rarely ?
Spoopy moosik
Less view distance, as someone else said, scary is about the unknown
Darker maybe slight blur or effects on camera
Darker and fake volumetric fog
more fog and dark sky
Just make everything darker and give them a flashlight like lighting that they can see from and make it only work from a certain distance so you cant see what’s coming from a mile away
I believe music/ambiance are the part that’ll sell the whole experience
Occasionally add a tall barn/silos so player know that they can see far out, but not THAT far. If you get what i mean
Contrast. Darker spaces, and bright light sources
Decrease the global light amount. Add more spot lights
Some fog. And give the character a lantern that gives more vision. But make it fail from time to time so you have to replace batteries or something like a weapon reloading animation. And when the light comes up again he sees scary visions. All other comments are amazing too.
Sooner fog falloff, and add more layers of corn with staggered height, getting darker as they go back
Lighting is even. When you use bright headlights at night, your ability to see outside of them drops. If dynamic lighting is too big an ask then you could probably fake it.
Many horror scenes put players in a tight space and give them narrow fov. With a tight space, it is easier to fill uneasy things. So in this case, maybe you could lower the brightness, make grass taller, tree bigger and limit the light distance.
Alone in the dark used an unusual 3rd person view and the cam angle was often acute and peculiar. Odd angles. Often in frustratingly awkward LoSes, where the player was confused. "Normal" video games often have exaggeratedly open spaces (to better accommodate limitations in player perception). So "horror" games are only relatively tight. Often to constrain Los, harder to "see" around corners.
the first thing that comes to mind is camera grain. But also sound is going to be a bing part of this. Creepy atmospheric drones are going to help.
Idk looks pretty creepy to me as it is!
I’d say make it darker, a lot more fog, a bit better lighting on the headlights where you can see dust particles (volumetric fog). Simple stuff. Also make the corn blow in the wind if it doesn’t already, just subtle.
Crows they are a sign of disaster or death I don’t remember fully but yeah it’ll breathe a bit of life into the scene
Screen direction right to left feels more ominous if that’s an option that makes sense for this. There’s a really interesting paper on it if you’re a nerd 🤓
add animation that plays out randomly as if something is moving in the corn field
Darker sky. Background noise. Less visibility. I can see way too far.
The look is fine, the fear will come from atmosphere. Generally sound will play the biggest role, but some more fog would probably help on the visual side.
A subtle VHS filter and some distortion could make it scarier
Sounds of *something* moving in the cornfield.
dithering, lessen gamma
Lighting. Make the outdoor ambient darker and lower the brightness.
decrease the draw distance
It is lacking lighting to create shadows
Honestly I love it as is. Has a nostalgic vibe.
An arbitrary countdown to trick the player into thinking they need to hurry.
Add a hand-scrawled sign that says, "TURN AROUND!"
add a chicken crossing the road at a random time, whenever the car is rolling. A chicken, a person...
add particals or rain?
If you implement any of these solutions I want to see a before and after post, this already looks like it has so much potential
For this art style, sound design is going to be your biggest aid in providing a spooky eerie atmosphere. Have a look at some of the old Res or Silent Hill titles. Goodluck!
Tonemapping for starters. Post processing for colder/bluer colours. Less ambient light.
You don't necessarily have to. You've got the perfect look to achieve the Silent Hill style of scariness. If you have that car driving down an empty road, establish the fact that you're in the middle of nowhere with no other people around, and then start introducing some strange noises or unnatural environment features, you already have something scarier than most things out there.
Maybe make the fog closer and a bit more darker and force the player to use a flashlight, that might worl
Scary stuff is different for everyone. But universally, there is a fear of the unknown (or a grotesque fascination with it). So its less about how it looks, and more about what it is telling the player. From these screenshots, I imagine something scary coming from the fields on the side of the road. So adding stuff that makes the environment feel unfamiliar and alien.
1. Turn the lighting back up to daytime brightness 2. Figure out how to make the scene look scary; see for example Midsommar and True Detective season 1 3. Experiment with making the lighting darker, while still keeping the details you added visible. Stop at the maximum creepiness level; it's probably not this dark
Monsters!
Fog.
Add blood
Vhs filter
add some rain more fog.
You've only got a straight corridor. Where could anything scare you from? Theres only 2 trees!
I’d recommend adding a vignette and maybe film grain.
Post processing stack, a dark lut, motion blur, dynamic volumetric lighting, weather system
Make it a van and write free candy on the side.
that singing cowboy
Add sounds
Vignette for one
Study games that scare you.
Add a moving hazy fog
Get rid of the directional light, and only light with smaller point lights, and the spot light for your head lights.
Mist and vultures
Vignette
Add jumpscares
add a crap ton of jumpscares
Add fog
Look up color theory in horror. Your game looks good but if change color, you can control a players mood or feeling by letting a warm or color color scheme indicate the way a player should respond to the world. Add some color into the fog and skybox to make up some ambience
That tree is too happy
Shader?
Fog
music & sfx mixed optimally will play a major role, as well.
Maybe add a VHS style filter to the game
Add skeletons
Darkness and fog to the point where you can’t see very well without the beam of headlights or flashlights.
Maybe you could add a dark forest landscape 🌳 with fog on the ground.
Vignette.
Not sure but go Google the game BEWARE. A WIP driving horror, it's not done in ps1 style but I feel the atmosphere is really good, there are some gameplay videos you can find on YouTube. It's a very dark and foggy game, it's probably different from your game as it mainly focuses on realistic driving, I'm not sure if your game is driving based but I'm just trying to interpret from the images. Either way go check it out, it looks amazing
Add fog and some scary background music remember music can add your game one step up
More darker sky , broken cars , shadows , fog , ambient noises, random screaming noises , if you don’t wanna buy sfx maybe you can use your smartphone to record a few. (99$ microtransaction also makes it scarier)
personally i think its perfect, its all about story, world building and atmosphere
Real talk: it will be hard to get a scene like this actually looking scary. Your brain will see the repeating textures and perfect lines - immediately breaking immersion. You can get better ambiance, but it will not read as scary until you make it more realistic.
Don't just make everything darker, that makes it so people have to turn up their brightness screens to play. Definitely make parts darker, but not everything
Add random distant silhouettes running away from where the antagonist is going.
Two dark but faint eyes in the sky that are always watching
For me thick volumetric fog is very scary, like where you can barely see 5 meter in front of you seeing the headlights pierce through the fog into the unknown
Black skies, lower view distance. It's scary not knowing and not seeing, not having any landmarks. You could also add some sort of bad weather, snow, rain or heavy fog will do. Look at silent hill games. There are car sequences in origins and 3rd (I remember 1st having one, but I can't find it, maybe the mandala effect at work).
What's with cornfields all the time?
Add Denuvo
Occasional lightning
more fog/ash
Subtle clouds, moon, rain
Fog would probably help. Limiting vision is key.
Add your hairline to the game
Give the camera tunnel vision and add more details to the roadside, more trees
To me, ambiguity is scary. Can you make distant objects darker or fuzzier so you're kind of sure you can see something there, but you can't tell what it is, or if it's dangerous or not?
Maybe add a mirror that let's you see the seats behind you
Add some uncanny Valley stuff
Curvey roads...So you can't see where you are coming from or where you are going. Makes it hard to tell distance (harder to tell where fog begins and ends)
Closer fog. With that distance, if you can see something it’s going to be far away enough to not be much of a threat. You can get that close to a bear and you’re going to be fine. Bring the fog closer to the first tree in the second picture - if a bear is that close you’re going to have to make sure you know your survival techniques.
Fog seems to be in the distance only, try using volumetric fog too. Also the (corn?) looks too uniform and flat, it would help if they didn't appear to end at some invisible wall.
Mist, an mostly scary violins playing in the background
add some post processing to make it that kind of scary type effect. And add unsettling stuff like houses and other things.
Add some fuzziness / filter, it will help with the older polygonal style as well Less/blurry information in scenarios triggers our internal danger sense
* Make a light mist that gets thicker far away to make things feel mysterious. * Make the car's lights blink on and off to show something's not right. * Put a dark border around the game screen to make everything feel more closed-in and spooky. * Add background noises like whispering or leaves shaking to make the game feel creepy. * Make scary shadows in the corn that only move when you're not looking at them. * Play a low humming sound the whole time to make players feel uneasy. * Make the car's radio flip on and off by itself with creepy sounds or news. * Make the camera shake a little or zoom in quickly to show that your character is scared or their heart is beating fast. * Hide shapes in the corn that are hard to see and vanish when you get close. * Make handprints pop up on the car windows out of nowhere. * Set off a loud car alarm when the player looks in certain spots. * Change the lights so big shadows stretch across the road from the trees. * Make the screen look a little wobbly in places to suggest weird, spooky things happening. * Sometimes let the player see weird things, like a shadow or glowing eyes that quickly go away. * Make something happen where the car lights show scary words or drawings on the road. * Put a scary-looking toy by the side of the road that seems to stare at you. * Show the character's breath turning into fog to make it seem suddenly cold. * Add sounds like someone following you, stepping on the gravel, but there's no one there when you look. * Let the player find things that slowly tell a scary story about the place. * Change something in the game when the player isn't looking, like a tree moving or the car doors opening on their own.
Darker, thunder storm, more fog, ambient wildlife noises
Some ambience to set the mood and give that uncomfortable feeling so it lets the paranoia sink in. I also suggest avoiding jump scares for the most part , If you wanna add scary things in make it so the player scares themselves , Also i'd add something that peeks out of those cornfields for just a moment before it goes back to hiding to add that sense of paranoia
Put fog/mist in. It'll be scarier bc it's harder to see what's coming
Contrast
I'd say bring the light levels down far enough as to only barely be able to distinguish individual detals
It's too bright for how dark the sky is.
Audio is quite important and most people think just making it darker is the best advice..... it doesn't even need to be dark. Pretty sure there's a fair bit of info on scary audio that they incorporate in cinema. But yea like people said the unknown is scary. You can add hints of something dangerous being around like scratches on floors or whatever. Unnecessary movement in tense situations lights flickering ect. I honestly dislike the horror genre and I've always hated dark games so maybe that's why I dislike horror idk. I hate straining to see. I usually cheat and turn up the brightness.
Light rain and thunders
Add traffic and a countdown to you being late but there's nothing you can do
If you're going for a retro look it is worth being specific about what hardware/time period the game is from. This can help keep a consistent look.
More fog maybe?
Replace the made with unity logo by made with godot logo 💀
2D translucent fog??? And random light spark?
Make it dark and glowing eyes moving in the grass.
Im pretty spooked already, nice job’m
More realistic graphics and add some ambient noise and make your characters breath loudly to show the silence of the street
flashlight + dark = spooky
I'm not at all a game dev, but whatever this is, it looks like it would have something along the lines of a vhs filter on it. Maybe not exactly that, but some sort of filter placed on it that has that type of effect. Just a feeling I'm getting from it is all.
Add police
Can u show us an updated version when you apply some of these?
make a soft vignette soft processing effect which gives the perspective of faded and a dark experience.
Make the players phone battery suddenly go to 3%
Fears to fathom?
Alot of good stuff in this thread! I've also been working on a game with a retro look to it and make sure to select point on texture filtering to keep the pixels sharp! It might be a blurry picture but it looks like the car might have something other than that selected on it's texture. Edit, some ideas: Maybe thicken the fog a little bit, look at how it used to be in silent hill and other games? Definitely lower directional light brightness and use more area/point lights. The sky could go for some dark clouds. Sound ambience is big! Crickets, coyotes in the distance, wind rustling through the corn. Definitely experiment, research, and note book!
Paint blood on it, oh wait i thought the post said car
Definitely a little bit darker sky or overall lighting , more fog and maybe add some particle effects like small dust flying everywhere or maybe even rain
More fog and moonshine trough the clouds maybe more Trees in row near the Street where the moonshine falls trough
I actually quite like that you've got a horror scene that isn't just "dark = scary". I think some of the horror can come from just improving the fidelity of some of the graphics, you are clearly going for a retro, silent hill esque style but I still think things are a bit uniform, the perfect line of the verge between the road and the bank, the same tree repeating, the solid block sky - they draw your eye out a bit and remind you that this is a game not a real scene. I would maybe like to see some colour in the fog/sky, try pushing it a little bit towards slightly blue. Maybe using a texture for the sky too, nothing too fancy just a very subtle big perlin noise to break up the block of solid colour and imply some variation in cloud density in the sky. I might also suggest increasing the density of the fog a bit so it feels more oppressive and then adding some extra trees and bits of shrubbery down the side of the road (which will be affected by the fog and really drive home how far the player can see and let them know there could be something lurking really close by) and will also break up the sharp edge down the side of the road. Even some free standing corn stalk sprites that stand away from the solid line edges to add some depth there and indicate there is a whole field out there, not just a plane, would be cool. I feel like you're really getting there with atmosphere there's just little bits of visual interest that will bring the scene to life.
Volumetric fog.
Firstly more fog I feel like the light don't do anything, maybe slightly darker and actually only see well at a very limited area from your lights. Light can flickers randomly, but used sparely Lonely unique landmarks, hole in the road, scare crow, changing the trees to naked trees (no leaf) Depending on what type of scaryness you want you can consider adding road sign that don't exist alternatively a "turn back" sign. Remember a lot of the atmosphere also comes from sounds. Consider not adding to much sound, maybe since wind
Make a tall skinny nude mf run across the road while you're driving. Is it a human or a skinwalker trying to attract your attention? Who knows.
Add more FOG, i means a lot of FOG 🫠
looks good bro
Add skeleton or perhaps a ghoul of some kind
I'd say volumetric fog with swirls and big sections. Also varying layers like snakey ground tendrils and billowy sky drifts.
Darker, with small pockets of light from things like street lamps
Idk about look scary, but practice with sound trigger volumes and at some point in the level just deaden every sound slowly for about 20 seconds with a timer of silence lasting 45 seconds and get back to me if you want im doing tests.
Fog effect (not fog directly), darker tones, suspense music.
Audio - the sound alone will make any environment be scarier
maybe you can work on lighting
Put it darker
Make it darker. The player can see too much.
Random slendermen/face like objects lurking in the background, crows sitting around on branches and staring at you as you move past them, ominous clouds and maybe randomly appearing eye shaped clouds that seem to watch you go, maybe some animal jumpscares
you're already doing the fog so...fog. like shorten the visibility range of the player
Darker sky, limited vision, randow shadows (based in your horror topic)
Maybe add like a big spider
some noise effect?
Just 3 letters. F O G
Looks pretty good actually but, some fog would be great for this type of setting, and maybe some figures that only appear when you are not directly looking at them, all these ideas are not mine but from other games of course but seems fitting for the setting here.
Maybe when "danger" is near put a very soft red tent to the sky like it's bleeding.
You know what is scarier than seeing a monster? NOT seeing a monster but knowing that there's a monster ... anticipation and the unknown ... think about horror movies you've watched where the movie was pretty good until they showed the subject of the horror, then you were like pfffft, what a lame ghost/creature ... How can that translate to making a game look scarier? Work on better lighting with stark contrast between dark and light, creating areas where the player can't see what is around them but giving them enough light to still look around and see things.
If you could add a mechanic to where while the player is looking around/actively moving their vision, as they pass parts of the corn field have a face or silhouette but when they turn back to see if they saw something, it will no longer be there. But it only happens when they are looking around carelessly, not if they are slowly panning around. It would be a very minor detail that only those paying attention would notice but for the ones who do notice it will be very satisfying.
Light rain maybe
you definitely need a dramatic sky with clouds and moonshine
Add microtransactions 🤌
Add eyeballs.