10 Game Soundtracks That Scared the Crap Out of Players

Whether intentional or not, video game soundtracks are some of the best composed works of music and sometimes the scariest. In horror games, it's expected, but it's more disconcerting when the game isn't even a horror title! Hell, maybe even a kids' game!

Memories of playing video games growing up are almost always associated with the music and sounds, for better and for worse. We remember the touching, emotional songs, the heart-pounding epic battle music, and the absolutely heart-stopping shock sounds that made us stop playing immediately. But we always come back. We can't resist these games, we can just...play with the sound off.

So, without further ado, let's countdown the 10 Game Soundtracks That Scared the Crap Out of Players.

10. The Sims (2000) - Burglar Music

Why was this game terrifying to me as a child? Was it the existential thought that I was technically God over these little pixelated people's lives? Or was it the fact that I was 8 years old and hadn't learned how money works, so I'd be shit out of luck after spending all the money. At least, until I discovered the money cheat. Then my sims had their own dance club, casino, twenty pools, and a...suspicious room full of ovens, fireplaces, and carpets. Don't ask about the graves, it's just...decoration.

No, the true horror of The Sims 1 was that sound. Yes, a sound so terrifying, we call it that sound. It's literally just a violin strum and two piano keys, but goddamn, did it resonate with children everywhere. It happened when there was a burglar or a raccoon on the lot and it also happened if your sim got fired from their job. In later games, the sound was nerfed so it wasn't so...startling? Is that the word? And The Sims 4 just did away with burglars. Which is one of the reasons The Sims 4 sucks. I mean, I love EA and being alive. Yay, corporate America. Woot.

9. Darks Souls 2 - Demon of Song

I once fell asleep listening to the Dark Souls soundtracks. That was just asking for nightmares. I woke up to this one blaring in my ears and fear is not an emotion I want to experience waking up. It's something about the droning throat-singing that inspires dread and upcoming demise...like playing a Dark Souls game! I have not even halfway succeeded playing the first one. I don't have the patience for it. That might sound like an excuse, and it is, but I just don't have the time to git gud.

That's not the say the game isn't brilliant, because it is. The story, the atmosphere, the expansive game world, and the brilliantly creepy, imposing music all create a masterful yet punishing purgatory of delicious failure. But those times that you win a boss? Ohhhh, sweeter than the last Estus flask, my friend.

8. Super Mario 64 - Haunted House (Big Boo's Haunt)

The Boos in the Mario Universe disturb me. Are they the ghosts of dead Mario characters? Or are they just ghosts for the sake of being ghosts? But one of their levels in Super Mario 64 made me hate them forever. The low, humming bass just repeats on through this gauntlet of a level. You have to traverse through rooms looking for coins and stars and you find that goddamn monster piano. The Boos also follow you around, but go ethereal when you try to hit them. So, it's essentially a game of "I'm not touching you, and you can't touch me!" Bastards. Boo-sterds?

7. Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow - The Infamous Lavender Town Syndrome Creepypasta

Not only is the music creepy, but it also inspired one of the craziest conspiracies within gaming history. Sources claimed that over 200 Japanese children had committed suicide due the binaural effect of the Lavender Town theme in Pokémon Red and Blue, giving them severe migraines, nosebleeds, and vomiting. Again, this is a story on Creepypasta, which is a site dedicated to creepy horror stories about stuff related to websites and video games. Read this article for a more in-depth explanation of the whole debacle. Don't believe everything you read on the Internet.

Lavender Town is its own brand of horror and I'm having the same questions as I did about the Boos. This is a town with a mausoleum storing graves and urns of dead Pokémon but there are also Ghost Pokémon. So, do the dead Pokémon become Ghost Pokémon or are they just dead? Are Ghost Pokémon just called that because they have ethereal properties? My brain hurts.

6. Resident Evil 4 - Regenerator

Remember that time Resident Evil 4 went Silent Hill on you and threw this fucking thing at you? Allow me to remind you...

You've just accessed a new area, this weird lab. There's more information on a new type of enemy and you look at the photos like, "Oh, I don't want to run into that motherfucker at all!" You get to an unlock puzzle, then find a key on the ground among a bunch of viscera. That's fine, par for the course for a Resident Evil game. Then you hear breathing. Inhuman breathing. Why is an undead thing breathing? Then this music plays and you see this gray toothy monstrosity advancing toward you. You shoot it and hope to kill it but nooooo, it is doesn't die. It starts regrowing its limbs! Whatever you do, don't shoot its legs! The fucker can jump!

The music starts up when ever a Regenerator agroes. The only way to kill it is with an infrared scope in order to spot the individual Plagas within them. You'd think you'd be done with them, but nope. They have spiky cousins! The music is pure nightmare fuel. You're already panicking because of the breathing, the music is just gravy.

5. Undertale - No Mercy soundtracks

Toby Fox did something miraculous. He somehow created the most charming, intricate story in a pixel-art setting and also the most horrifyingly existential soul-crushing experience of your life. Even if you are the most sadistic video game deviant, the No Mercy run of Undertale will break you. One way he does this is by slowing down the soundtracks to create an eerie ambience. (Note that the videos do refer to it as "Genocide" run, but most Undertale players are reticent to use that term due to an infamous No Mercy run where someone named their main character Hitler. Uh, yeah. This fandom's whacky and often not in a fun way.)

The more haunting track is the scare chord that plays when you encounter monsters after killing a few. The words "But nobody came..." never looked so ominous. The reason the monsters aren't showing up is because they are terrified of you. Or they might be already dead. Or the monster was in you all along.

4. Alice: Madness Returns - Dollhouse [SPOILERS - skip if you haven't played the game yet]

You ever wondered what Lewis Caroll's Alice in Wonderland would look like if it took PCP and read H.P. Lovecraft? Well, you don't have to wonder anymore. Alice: Madness Returns takes you on downward spiral of horrors, machinations and monsters manifested from Alice Liddell's tortured psyche, a la Silent Hill 2. But this game isn't just central to Alice's pain, it involves a dark secret concerning her psychiatrist, Dr. Bumby.

The Dollhouse level is the final stage of the game where Alice finally pieces all of the story together. The reason the music is so unsettling is because of the subject matter. It sounds like a distorted lullaby and the level's design is themed around children's toys, specifically dollhouses. You'll know by this point in the game that Dr. Bumby has been running a child sex trafficking ring and uses therapy on the abused children to make them forget. Playing the game a second time, you'll understand the things you didn't last time, like why the kids are wearing number signs outside Dr. Bumby's office and why the kids act so weird and hostile. Truly, a disturbing track for a disturbing game.

3. Earthbound - Giygas Theme

How can such a seemingly light-hearted, humorous JRPG have one of the most terrifying end bosses of all time? What the hell went on during the storyboarding process for this game to suddenly divert into a Lovecraftian cosmological horror? And why is the final boss' music so goddamn horrifying?

Turns out that Ninten's family lineage is far more sinister than he could have imagined, his great grandparents forced to be surrogate human parents to an alien baby. He had sworn to prevent humans from using a power to defeat the alien race, but didn't want to hurt his foster parents. He's eventually forced into attacking Earth, making plans for an invasion in the future.

If I showed you photos of the early game and the late game, you would have assumed I just switched from Earthbound to an Alien game or just a photo of artwork by H.R. Geiger. Imagine this game getting a remake! That would be all kinds of fantastic frightening terror. Where do I sign the petition?

2. Silent Hill 2 - Nurse Piper

You ever get scared just looking at a dark hallway? You don't even know what's beyond it, you just know that it does not looking inviting. Especially knowing that there are more...things lurking in the dark, waiting to clobber you to death. Like the nurses of Silent Hill 2, which are absolutely terrifyingly dangerous. It's one hell of a difficulty curve coming into Brookhaven Hospital after fighting mostly weak enemies like Lying Figures and Mannequins.

What's more scary than a hallway full of nurse monsters? This music blaring in your goddamn eardrums at full blast. The track isn't listed on the official soundtrack, you have go looking for the special complete soundtracks on YouTube. Since these tracks are most likely ripped from the game, the names on the tracks probably aren't the official names of the ambient tracks. Yeah, due to the fact that Akira Yamaoka's masterful Silent Hill sound design tends to be 75% clanking industrial beats and 25% melodies, not every ambient song in the game is listed in the official soundtrack. That's probably for the best. You don't want to be jamming out listening to "Promise" one minute and then having your soul vacate your body hearing this hazardous cacophony the next.

1. Silent Hill 3 - "Prayer"

Yeah, I'm cheating and placing two Silent Hill games here. Whatcha gonna do about it? You can't honestly mention just one Silent Hill game when talking about the most horrifying video game soundtracks of all time. Truly, the entirety of Silent Hill 3's sound design is worthy of the Scariest Soundtrack of All Space and Time Forever award, but one song stands out in particular.

Is it the low throat-singing that disturbs me most or the theremin whines accompanying it that just make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up? This song (chant? vocal track? Satanic spell?) starts when Heather buckles over in pain from the demonic god within her growing in strength. Yeah, I bet the schools advocating that abstinence is a 100% effective from a birth control never considered "unholy demonic pregnancy resultant of reincarnation" as a phenomenon. The song also plays during the boss Heather has with the personified memory of her childhood suffering. Talk about dealing with childhood trauma.

Also, chef kisses to this amazing comment on the YouTube video I linked:

Hats off to you, commenter.

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