How I Accidentally Made The Day Scarier Than The Night In My Game
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- Опубликовано: 8 фев 2025
- The Day time was meant to be the safe time, but not anymore
This is my solo made horror game, Silent Mourning.
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There's one thing you might also add, and that would be birds at night. Usually birds are silent when there's a predator that's much superior than them, but when it's just other birds, they are singing (aka yelling at each other). This could add a sense of life while the night is up, and dangerous ambient when the day is up!
Or if they didn't sound anything like birds.
Frogs could fill that niche, they're deafening until something disturbs them.
Even better, keep bird sounds during the day and have them fade out when danger's nearby (or randomly to mess with people)
Ooh and cicadas during the day. It would be so creepy for them to all suddenly be silent after screeching
Suddenly switch to a different region of birds
Nothing is more terrifying for the average gamer than daylight, so it makes perfect sense
and walking on grass.. *outside* .....
@@LilythathappenstobeinaValley AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
@@LilythathappenstobeinaValleyAHHHHHHH 😱😱😱😱😱😰😰😰
dead by daylight players being dead by daylight:
@@LilythathappenstobeinaValley I almost have a heart attack… I hope you. Know. What you. Did😥😥😥😥
Idk if you’ll read this but, having crickets or birds sounds suddenly go quiet means a predator is near by and is very freaky to experience. Would be cool to see that implemented in your game.
def a good idea
Or the Birds *are* the Predators. Birds are more dependent on Vision than Humans are.
This has happened to me a few times in my life. I'm out in nature and all of a sudden, a deafening silence. Puts your hair on ends immediately and you know something isn't right. Never encountered any predators though, luckily. Rather see them through binoculars personally 😅
Can confirm, I commute by bicycle and any time there's a pond of frogs nearby the road, they all go quiet right as I pass by them, no matter how many.
Experienced this in Minecraft a few times, exploring, kinda lost in thought and vibing to the music.. then the music ends, and I only noticed after a few minutes. I stopped, and it was complete silence. It was then that I really started to understand where the stories about Herobrine came from, the whole situation felt so *wrong*
I think the most powerful element to making daytime scary is the sense of being exposed. If you know you're surrounded by hostile entities, the last thing you want is to be standing out in broad daylight where everything can see you for a mile around. Darkness blinds you, but can offer concealment from predators.
This is used to good effect in Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead, where (in an inversion of the usual trope) zombies and monsters don't usually have any better night vision than you do, and thus going out at night is an order of magnitude safer than going out during the day, when you can draw a horde to your position just by stepping outside.
i played a demo for a simple horror game that surprisingly ended up playing off this. there's two rooms one being a well lit "dev room" and the other being a dark and creepy basement. there were no hiding places in either room, just shadowy corners. but just stand in shadowy corners and the monster hunting you will walk right past and not notice. but in any well lit area and there was no getting away from the monster. the dev room was definitely the harder map because of this.
Oh hey, it’s neat seeing Cataclysm mentioned somewhere. I was just playing it a couple hours ago.
I think that sense of being exposed is worse when it's night and you have a flashlight on
Having darker shadows would really help with this, it would make you feel both like you're exposed and like there could be monsters near you at any time.
I am of the opinion military vibes are an untapped well of style for horror games! lots of what creates the tension goes against the usual horror game consensus, eg:
-negative space is scary. open fields, bright lighting, even a _lack_ of things happening builds tension to the point combat is a release from it
-you can have entire belts of ammo and weapons that can vaporize whatever they hit, it still won’t feel like enough
-the enemy actively hides from you, and combat can occur without either of you seeing each other
-a big band of friends makes it _more_ scary when they start going radio silent
I would argue that making the enemies darken the screen as they approach, and distort the screen when the player gets vision on them, would actually be *less* disturbing than having them just arrive and vanish with no fanfare. Because the darkening and screen distortion would signal to the player that something Wrong definitely just happened, validating their confusion. It would also teach them to associate the screen distortion with safety, because once it's happened, they now know that the immediate threat is gone.
If you want players to question their own perception, if you want to gaslight them, then you need to avoid validating their fears. You must not say, "yes, something weird DID just happen!" One idea I've had for a while, is making "ghost" versions of enemies that are invisible and intangible, and cannot harm the player. But they would still pursue the player and make noise while doing so. The noise would become silent when they got within a certain distance of the player, or if the player got line-of-sight on the enemy (that is, they "saw" the enemy's invisible physics collider).
So the player would hear the sound cues of enemies approaching, consistent with actual enemies. But when they looked for the threat they would never find it. You could have these same enemies then move/teleport away when they got close enough, and begin their approach again. Or stop in place when the player looked at them, so it felt like the player really did catch them in the act, but just didn't notice where they were. And you could also mix them in with real enemies, or have them randomly toggle into "real" mode whenever they began an approach, so the player would never know if the sounds represented a real or fake threat.
Another idea I had was mixing these ghost enemies with some kind of shader or post-processing effect, so they would occasionally be visible out of the corner of the player's eye. Something like rendering the invisible enemies visible, only in a narrow band of pixels around the edge of the screen. You could make it a low random chance of an enemy being visible like that. And make it so that if the enemies moved off-screen, or into the centre of the screen where they're invisible, they would instantly turn fully invisible again. So the player would occasionally catch glimpses of things that resembled enemies, moving in their periphery. But as soon as they looked away or looked towards the thing, it would disappear.
That's how you gaslight a player. By actively lying to them, and not letting on that you're lying.
A beautiful idea.
You're an evil genius. Bless you.
This is absolutely evil!
I LOVE IT!!!
actual scary game design, holy jumpscare
We need a daytime gaslighting game so bad
You don't need extra footsteps, your own footsteps are scary enough.
Make one or two echo at random
@@RollerBalleragreed. I think it could also be cool to have footsteps seemingly right after yours, and then when you stop, they make one more step and then also stop. Higurashi taught me that this is a terrifying concept lol
@@takimi_nadayeah it feels like someone is followi g you and stops moving right after you
Just make foot prints lag in front of you or speed up so as you walk there is a patter of footsteps that lead down the path you are walking before you
make it rng based
finally a farming horror game, I knew it was possible
You'll like pumpkin panic then lmao.
& it’s not a dream or a collective Mandela effect.
And Uncle Panko's Terrible Little Farm
@@snowflakeserpert6834 That's where they harvest the breadcrumbs
@@shawnbay2211Sounds familiar...
The reason night is scary is because the darkness obscures information. The thing people forget is that you can do that in the daytime too.
Yes, but sometimes the spookiest things are when you can see clearly, and yet something feels wrong.
@@seigeengine Cutting ambient sounds can make any situation feel wrong. Sudden silence is terrifying because, why did the birds stop chirping? What scared them? And is it after me? It can send you into a spiral of panic
@@thesurvivor6430 100%.
Also scary: when random animals start making a lot of noise all of a sudden when they were silent just before.
I experienced both with the recent total solar eclipse. Very unsettling.
The darkness can be just as much a boon to you if you know how to use it to your advantage.
A horror game/movie mainly taking place during the day is something I really wanted to see. The night is scary because we can't see well, and there's unknown lurking in the shadows. But I think the day is great at creating the sense of loneliness, that vast space around you devoid of people. And the illusions making you question yourself are a nice addition. Reminds me of the times I got chills walking around abandoned buildings during the day, just because of how eerily quiet it was.
Good luck with your project, I hope it takes off!
Midsommar 💐
Midsommar is the movie for you
imagine lively forest ambience suddenly goes dead quiet
The day is also a great time to hunt, and a terrible time to be hunted.
Maybe I'm just pretentious but I dislike horror that obligatorily takes place at night because it, to me, indicates either an inability to make it scary without cheap spooky atmosphere, or a lack of creative thinking letting you realize that night time and darkness are not actually hallmarks of the genre. There are so many ways to make things scary without it being dark, foggy, and full of creaky boards and cobwebs. Having to rely on those things for fear, to me, indicates a lack of real substance.
One important way to make the day infinitely more scarier is when a creature is near, the birds and ambiance goes silent.
This reflects real life behavior and its a built in signal for us to start panicking when everything suddenly goes quiet.
Ive experienced this before in real life and it made me load a bullet into the chamber as the hair on my arms stood up.
lol this is what i just commented. It makes walking in the woods 10 times scarier when things suddenly go quiet
The birds can also go silent because they think you are a dangerous predator.
I've never felt this feeling. Then again, my people and I are all from the forest, so we are used to it.
Not to say that everyone is from some sort of forest, so it would have to be a biological reaction, which for some reason doesn't happen to me or my pals.
@@mleszzor6866 Im European my people literally look the way they do because of the cold dark forests of our continent. We all come from the forest.
@@zephyrna6249 And I am from Finland.
I think all Europeans come from the forests, unlike people from the middle east, as they live in a desert.
I got nothing else to add right now 😅
@@mleszzor6866
The point is that sudden quiet in a forest or any environmental usually filled with animals is unnatural and to an instinctual level humans react to it as a treath. Because it's normal that maybe birds or rodents near you react to you by hiding or staying quiet, but EVERYTHING going quiet means that something is "wrong". Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, thousands of years of survival instincts said better safe than sorry and make you feel uneasy and alert.
Same reason why we get startled by sudden, loud noises. It's not only the sudden assault on our senses that is annoying, is that in nature loud noises generally mean bad news. Be it from a predator roaring to a non predator but still aggressive animal warning you not to get closer to a lightning striking near you to a tree falling onto you. Loud sudden noise = bad.
This is one of those rare scenarios where I can try to catch a dev BEFORE they add it but please don't keep that tinnitus sound effect for scares. Like you have a bunch of good concepts and what not but that sound isn't scary, it's annoying. I cannot express the sheer amount of rage I've felt from games that were pretty damn good constantly making my ears ring with that crap.
THIS.
Same.
100% this.
As someone who has to LIVE with tinnitus, ...YES, it severely pisses me off when I have to hear it in games because it makes my OWN tinnitus go off loudly - like a microphone pointed at a speaker - it's like the waveform amplifies like feedback, causing actual pain. I have uninstalled games because of it.
at least make it a toggle
My brain LOVES to flashbang me with simulated tinnitus later after hearing that fucking sound.
Plot twist there’s no enemies, and you stay paranoid throughout the whole game. Expecting the worst jump scare that’ll never be. That’s the true horror.
how do i like a comment twice
The thing is, I think you have to strike a balance. Once you realize nothing's coming, it gets boring.
Jim’s computer is a good example of that.
@@EddieNoonor.
you end the game early, before the player realises nothing's after em.
(cough cough jim's computer cough cough)
@@EddieNoon That's an excellent point. It's like those Fallout New Vegas ARGs where the player goes out of bounds and goes into some secret room. Because there is no threat, it becomes tedious because you're just walking around and seeing "creepy" things.
Mixing twigs and leaves into the exterior footstep effects at a much sparser frequency could be pretty fun.
One of the things that terrifies me in situations like these, are any tasks that produce a sufficient amount of noice to inhibit my hearing. Thinking you’re hearing something only to stop your task and hear dead silence is terrifying. I’d suggest some sort of task like using a pull-saw, or something similar that creates a long droning noise, and if the player at any time interrupts that activity, silence all audio cues that the monster might’ve been playing, so you get that sweet sweet questioning of sanity
ooooh thats a good idea, seconding this!! not to mention the stress of knowing youre creating a lot of noise and probably drawing something closer
Basically light and sound adaption. When you enter a dark area you have to get used to the light level.
Same goes to sound, if you experience lots of noise, if you stop it abruptly you don't instantly regain sensitivity to quiet sounds.
Yeah, this sounds cool
this is a good idea
yes.
I'm not even a horror game fan, and have no idea why YT recommended me this, but this is fascinating! Best of luck on your project!
night holds you in its embrace, shrouding you from danger. the sun reveals you, in its brilliant grace, to all who would like to see.
damn, okay poetic preacher
AI generated turd
PREACH!!
more the opposite, the sun reveals all, allowing for Information and choices of escape. while the nice only shrouds your vision, at night, the only things really out, are the things looking to use their superior night focused vision to find you first.
Not in "The Forest" lol
I’ve grown up in the Oregon woods and I would say you should add 2 things to help the night feel more alive,
1. Add bird/owls sounds, birds tend to be pretty active in the night if there isn’t any predators around.
2. Make the sky light up, during night the sky is full of bright objects (as long as there is no clouds) and tends to be really bright compared to the surrounding trees/terrane especially when the moon is out, this will make everything such as trees, mountains, and houses that arnt lid up look like a silhouette infront of a bright sky.
Anyways the game looks awesome so far, these are just suggestions and you should definitely add what looks/feels best for your game 👍
The sky is 100% not full of bright objects at night, aside from the Moon. And you're not going to silhouette a cabin against the Moon. The Moon is tiny in the sky.
Away from light pollution you'll see other stuff in the sky, stars obviously, some planets, milky way, but they're not bright by any stretch of the word. You'll obviously notice a black silhouette in front of them, but to describe them as bright is misleading.
@@seigeengine it is bright 😭 my man, have you been to an actual deep forest.
@@seigeengine the stars are bright, after certain amounts of time with your eyes adjusted to the light (pupils adjustment) often after long enough, or if your staying out past sunset (which gives your eyes time to adjust while it becomes darker) you can see the bright sky along with the Milky Way, and yea it’s bright, not bright enough to light anything up, but still bright enough to see the sky which then creates the silhouette.
During times of full moon it can also bright up some of the trees, the moon is bright enough to light stuff up, if your in the middle of nowhere and not using a lamp.
During full moons, and if your eyes are adjusted, the sky never reaches a true black, with help from stars and the Milky Way, it reaches more of a very dark navy blue, which is not black, once you put all the stars along there it’s no longer black and you have the silhouette.
@@samuelspace101 Yes. Unless you're confusing light pollution for the sky in "deep forest," the sky isn't bright.
@@samuelspace101 You don't need something to be bright to see a silhouette, mate.
0:01 "...my name is markiplier"
And welcome to Five Nights at Freddy's...
@@sammy_slammyan indie horror game that you guys suggested, in mass
@@sammy_slammy an indie horror game that you guys suggested en mass
"Portuguese..."
"So the first night isn't usually that bad-"
No, it's the fog. The fog is what makes most of those effects work.
I was thinking the same thing. Night time is scary because the darkness obscures areas and the things within them. Fog is another well-known, well-used path to the same effect. This isn't unique at all.
the fog is coming the fog is coming
The fog helps, but it's only helping. The fog isn't nearly as obscuring as the dark of night.
@@seigeengine when that game comes out use unity commands to disable the fog and see how much less scary the game becomes
@@duckduck4073 Wow, I love when troglodytes don't actually respond to what I say.
Game dev discovers fog.
The task focus thing is a neat mechanic
^ Would make for a more honest title
task focus is single player among us 😞
Uncertainty and isolation is two of humanities greatest fears
voices of the void has random pinecones that fall from the trees sometimes and I gotta say they do help build that sense of "am I crazy". also adding the snaping of twigs every once in a while from the monster might help but also make sure it goes dead silent after that because the instinct there is to stop and listen
didnt think i would see that game here, love it!!
just, not the explosive pinecones..
Literally minor spoiler that might have been a bug
Went to bed once and it kept shoving me out. I had played the very same version multiple times before that- no update- but THIS time it wouldn’t let me sleep. I tried again and it said “I can’t sleep, I sense something” or something along the lines of that so what the hell?
Still don’t know what it was.
@@bobbybobby325 if it happens again, check the big mountain with the tree, and if theres nothing there check the entity radar
VotV has an INCREDIBLE atmosphere
@@poodible I know about that goober- I have played quite a lot actually, but I never got further than drone because game kept updating. And recently just haven't played it as often, not since the base change.
1:58 - Yeah, this is *TRUE* horror: working 💀
Somewhat related but in The Witcher 3 there's this monster called a Noonwraith which is like a ghost that appears only during noon. It kinda made me appreciate the concept of daytime horrors in general. I like the idea of adding danger to a time when you're supposed to feel safe. Also I think there could be some fun to be had with shadows in the day time to play even more tricks on the player. Keep up the good work!
I’ve never really followed that franchise, but I’m pretty sure that creature is actually based on the poludnitsa, a female demon from Slavic folklore who goes around fields in the middle of the day asking people who happen to be out there at they time questions and beheading them with a sickle or some other agricultural cutting implement if they don’t answer. Apparently the myth is actually based on the real-life phenomenon of sunstroke, which can indeed cause neck pains in people afflicted with it and is generally a good reason to not work in the fields when the sun is highest in the sky.
@@eeyorehaferbock7870yeah the writer of the books is polish and the whole schtick of the Witcher is basically darker versions of fairy tales along with Slavic folk lore
"In the Witcher 3" They've had Noonwraiths in the first game. Nightwraiths too granted
Yo, in myl village in Ukraine my grandgrandmother never work at noon or be outside and one of the reasons she told her sons was the noon spirit
@@gomogay972 yeah, that’s the one.
Jump scares make me jump, sure, but the unnerving and slow progress is way scarier and way more exciting.
The slow burn makes the high all the more intense, and way more long-lasting. It can even work through multiple reruns. STALKER is a primo example of how effective it is.
@@DinnerForkTongue Never played STALKER, but Alien Isolation does this well. If you're playing the game, you've heard about the franchise and you KNOW what's going to happen, so they don't waste any time letting you hear the Xenomorphs' very distant shrieks, noises in the vents and etc... But it only actually shows up and becomes a threat a lot later, and it shows up in a completely unexpected area! It has you go through multiple hallways with security cameras and Androids trying to kill you which you need to avoid because you're not equipped to fight them yet. You reach your objective after that high stakes sneaking section with androids, BOOM the Xenomorph shows up! It is always sooooo terrifying and thrilling!
I recommend adding situations where a jumpscare is expected but instead providing no jumpscare and no sound. This creates a lot of tension because the player feels like something could happen at any moment. Wish you good luck with your game!
Right, like suddenly hearing footsteps running towards you, faster and closer, and as soon as you look around, there's nothing there
@@Ali3cook Exactly. Something to keep you on edge. I would also add jumpscares and monsters that don't just outright end your game when they catch you but instead wound you severely, steal your stuff, make you sick, or start hunting you after discovering your existence. That would make the game incredibly terrifying.
It's really unnerving when a game hits you with a jumpscare or two and then starts pulling punches and doing setups for jumpscares without anything happening or having subtle scares that hit you off-guard. It's probably good to still have jumpscares sprinkled in too to keep people on their toes.
There was a horror map for a game that I watched someone play recently that did that pretty well.
The scares (jump- and subtle) were scarcely ever where they could be expected, and it rarely-if-ever paid off scare setups with actual jumpscares, just letting the player scare themselves with the tension.
It was a non-linear and pretty short experience, so it managed to keep itself from getting too predictable with its pulled punches. A longer experience probably would've needed to pay off scare setups more.
Oh, and having some scattered downtime is important, too. Too many scares or too much built-up tension can numb the player.
Gotta have that balance.
@@Trad.I like that last suggestion. Like a Pandoras box, sky turns dark purple, plants wilt, black sun comes out suddenly, and have to face entirely different type of enemy, another unknown factor, musical tone becomes more disconcordant. Something to that effect.
Bro really said "tell don't show"
I think another reason why the day is scary in this scenario is because we expect it to be safe. It is our safeheaven like our own house/room, which is why stalkers are so terrifying. When you realise the place you thought was safe has been intruded upon, that you are never truly safe even when you thought you were. THAT is terrefying to the core. A primal fear
Yess I was thinking the same thing! It makes the fear sting more, maybe even because your subconscious is trying to rationalize the scary thing away while you KNOW there actually is something there - it makes you doubt everything you perceive while at night you will be wary naturally
and that's where comfort will get you, anytime you are not absolutely certain of your surroundings you can never be sure, which is why honestly this never works past your first time experiencing the mechanic. Horrible things go on under the daylight precisely because you can use the logic of people believing it to being safe to hide in plain sight or to be caught off guard.
Looks like someone already mentioned something to do with the birdsong, but I've got a slightly different idea. Pick some events, some occasions, spaced out rarely, where ALL of that daytime ambience just DISAPPEARS. As the other comment said, birds go quiet in response to danger. And even before looking at the comments, I was just telling my girlfriend, "If everything went quiet, that'd be great, I would be shitting bricks." I honestly can't think of anything much scarier than being in the middle of the woods, hearing the birds singing, and then after a bit more hiking, fishing, whatever outdoors activity you're engaging in, you realize you don't hear birds anymore. You don't hear ANY life anymore. Like everything just hid, and you're starting to feel like you should too!
They should stop singing when there is a threat nearby, but there is a small chance they dont, and there is a small chance they stop while the player is safe
Ah, yes, our old friend the Silence. Talk about an unsettling hair-raising sensation.
Ooo, and maybe when the birds stop singing, very quietly in the distance there could be an unnerving tune whistling, or trees start quietly creaking
Sounds to make someone's hair stand on end
@@KatDoesCrime Absolutely, those are amazing ideas! Subtle creepy things have always been what elevate horror to an artform for me. Jumpscares are easy, but keeping an audience on the edge through atmosphere alone is incredible when done well.
@@butlazgazempropan-butan11k87I think it should be one or the other. You can’t have inconsistent game mechanics. That can lead to frustration and frustration is the bane to all horror games more so than bravery.
I agree with ambience, sorry to have just found your video, I admire your work and I think an important factor is that the story have to plant "Anxiety and Fear" and "Helplessness" slowly but surely first in the mind of the victim (player) by leaving subtle unsettling clues...
Something like
1. "normal-normal-normal-not normal?"
2. "normal-normal-huh, is that thing supposed to be like that?"
3. "normal-I think something is really wrong here"
4. "something is here with us"
5. "I chopped their head they are still moving, I have to run, where"
6. "I don't want to die"
7. "I'm going to die"
So pacing is always crescendos and also one of the more important thing. One of the example could be Midsommar, where there are no darkness whatsoever in it, yet still peak horror for me. Cheers ❤
If you truly want to make a contrast, you could make the night sound mundane since well, animals could potentially be noisy, a mixture of deer migrating around, moose or elk screaming, owls hooting or screeching.
Though the biggest take away I can say, do not have jump scares. More so, have scares one walks into.
One of the many things I enjoy about sitting quietly in a thick forest is the occasional snapping of wood, a) because it's not always clear what caused the sound. could be the wind. could be a cougar. could be a murderer. and b) there's a certain acoustics in the woods, so it can be really hard to figure out WHERE the sound came from. I'm a wildlife biologist so I'm pretty used to it. What does freak me out, though, is the occasional and abrupt silences because, 9 times out of 10, I know that's not about me.
Weird things I've found in the deep woods before you might be inspired by, sans my explanations for them:
1. bare human footprints where they have no business being
2. several nooses
3. a satanic circle with appropriate artifacts
4. like 6 bleeding elk carcasses hanging from trees (hunting season)
5. eviscerated tents and abandoned campsites (of various ages) also in places they have no business being
6. my favorite, weird and fucked up-looking logs, trees, branches and so on. Called out to what i swore was a naked woman once while it was raining. in my dim defense it was also getting dark.
Ooooh good job! Every now and then when I’m walking around, I’ll find the daytime a bit creepy (for various reasons), so I’ve always wanted to know what a scary daytime situation would look like in a game.
Thanks 😁 I’ve definitely had the same, I wanted to try and capture that feeling in my game
liminal spaces? heck yeah they sure make u feel uneasy
the self-complimenting is off the charts but you know what, it got me. wishlisted!
this doesn't sound very "accidental" to me
agreed. Kind of sounds like they just wanted to make day scary.
@@jessicadragonare7993 while it's prolly just worded like that to sound more interesting, it could be the second half of the sentence that makes it acidental. it may not have meant to have been scarier than night at the start. he did say that night exists in the game, so he perhaps didnt plan on it being scarier than the night part.
i dont think they executed this concept very well
What made it accidental was probably making these features for nighttime but realized it works better in day time
None of these factors are unique to the day. It might as well be night and nothing would change. The night's main horror feature is the lack of visibility and with all that fog you've simply used the same effect during daytime.
Exactly, which is why I suggested to make it clear and by contrast very visible and open space. Also to ruin expectations change the environment to something odd or unnatural every day change for another factor of tension.
This kinda reminds me of the scariest part (in my opinion) of slender the arrival, the part after the 8 pages section where you are just in this vast open field in board daylight yet you feel so unsafe as know no one is around and you feel like something is watching .
I think it is a massively underutilized thing in horror so cool seeing it explored.
I remember reading the Metro 2033 book, when they go outside the do so at night. They go at night because while it's scary it's "safer" than daytime due to what other things also come out during the day. The implication that humans are now nocturnal due to survival reasons always made me uneasy.
SCP-001 - When Day Breaks:
*Allow me to introduce myself*
Can I give you one more idea? Play more with sound. I was excited when you mentioned footsteps, but there is more to that. When you walk in your forest, there are birds that are singing. I suppose what you should do is that all the animals should react to the danger. I have seen such video somewhere on youtube and it was creepy. So these birds are singing, having fun and stuff... The player is also happily walking through the forest. Even though sometimes he has this paranoia of somebody following him, he still feels okay, because the world sounds relaxed... then suddenly birds stop singing one by one... only one lone bird is singing and suddenly crickets stop kricketing. Dead silence. Everyone are hiding.... Only your footsteps are heard... (There you add the changes into a dusk or make a scene a bit darker). And you are paraoid or you see somewhere behind the tree a frozen silouette... or maybe its just your imagination. Usually games use intense music on jumpscares but here is the opposite... silence... desperation of being disposed and alone in the mist.
I do love when day time is the focus for horror over night time. With night it's expected, with the day it isn't. Adding to that uncertainty of one never feeling safe no matter what time it is.
As for suggestions, I think you could ditch the glitching effect. Instead you opt in for blurry vision or your character's vision getting wonky in some way like sun spots, dizziness, etc.
I personally find it odd when games have glitching for monsters that aren't digital beings. Plus the wonky vision can be something the player has to be careful of as it can interfere with survival. After all you may have caught one monster but there may be another you can't spot yet.
The vibes of this are impeccable, it's giving me darkwood vibes
It's the fog, the end.
Maybe its because of the added commentary, but I personally don't see what makes daytime that much scarier than night here
Admittedly, fog and distant footsteps, as well as the monsters messing with the player, can certainly make it somewhat unnerving, but I'm not sure I'd say that that makes it necessarily "scary".
For all the fog and monster tricks, I think what's missing is something that truly causes the player to feel dread; for example low droning, occasionally broken up by a dense quiet. I'd imagine that suddenly noticing that all the birds stopped chirping and that the player is surrounded by nothing but deafening silence, could certainly help make it even scarier than footsteps and distant movements.
IMO to make daytime scary, I'd argue you'd have to rely on taking the player out of their comfort zone and causing a slight "uncanny valley" effect with the environment. Something that's familiar, but just slightly off, so that the edge is never quite gone
to add to it, the fact that you can see around you makes the space feel bigger, and thus the emptiness stands out more
in the dark there’s a blanket of darkness that sort of shrinks your world, adding chlostrophobia but there’s something exposing about that day setting
I would look into how the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies use bright daylight like a spotlight that makes you feel like you can't hide anywhere. Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Game even recycled this part of the movie into the "In Shadows" mechanic, where when you are crouching in a bush or dark place your character's palette becomes desaturated and harder to notice. In the broad daylight out in the open is where the family can spot you and make life hell for you, so victims find safety in shadows and must use them to their advantage to avoid danger. Victims are even encouraged to turn OFF lamps and other light sources so they can hide better and family members are encouraged to turn them on. Some maps can also randomly roll a "night" variant that actually makes it easier for victims to hide and eventually escape.
Oh that sounds awesome. I love the fact that there are tasks that take a lot of focus. Definitely wishlisting and checking the demo out. Great work!
Interesting premise, though I don't quite understand what about these aspects makes them uniquely scary during the day time. These things could be just as effective if they happened during night time, no?
it's the betrayal of trust.
I just wanted to say your trees look absolutely gorgeous! Incredible work on the ambient lighting as well!
Idk as I watch this I just think how all of the things going on during the day would just be worse at night since I just can’t see where anything is. What you made sounds like the survival forest experience in general. Daytime can definitely be scary when you are alone and predators lurk, but it’s so much worse when it’s dark out cuz they will still be lurking but you can’t see them coming
I love this idea, its always been interesting to me, staying away from the light because while you may be able to see yourself other things can also see you
See, daytime could always be scarier than night. Day is when most things are awake. In a forest, that means critters and creatures walking around, flying between trees, chittering along. Just because you can see, it doesn't mean something can't sneak up on you. It's remarkably easy to camouflage yourself in a forest. There's a lot of color between leaves, dirt, bark, and shadows on top of other various bits and bobs. If a creature holds still enough and ducks down into some grass, it'd be easy to be missed, or better if they're lanky and can dodge behind a tree. There's so much sound in a forest, another pair of footsteps nearby is inevitable. At night, most creatures are asleep, and more dangerous predators tend to stalk about. So you *know* those loud footsteps are likely to be dangerous. Scary, sure, but you at least know which direction to run. During the day, when you're hearing broken twigs and shuffling of leaves from every direction, you don't know if that sound was something hostile or just a squirrel, if that thing you saw dart behind a tree was a monster or a deer. What if you hear something thump, but it turns out to be a weakened branch snapping and hitting the floor, only to sprint around a tree and bump into the real monster? When you can't trust your senses is when things get truly scary. That's what makes the dark so terrifying in the first place, it make it hard to see so you have difficulty trusting your eyes to determine the location of danger. Just because it's light out, it doesn't mean you can fully trust what you see or hear, at the least not when there's a mythical monstrocity nearby...
This actually sounds like a really great horror concept to experiment with.
I think i already have a general sense of what the dread being watched/followed thanks to another game, Firewatch, featuring rustling bushes after a point in the game as someone is following the main character.
If the main character is a vampire the day time is automatically scarier
I love it when RUclips blesses me with an underated gem of a video in my recommended! It's so fascinating seeing how you managed to make daylight scary! Great video and good luck with your game!
You’ve captured this SO WELLL I live in the woods and Ive always been paranoid , this is exactly how it feels to be in the woods in the day TO THE T
I really like the idea of making the day scarier. Perhaps you could make the night feel safer with bright moonlight and fireflies, with owls hooting and crickets chirping the background.
I just got an idea for a worldbuilding project. We're diurnal creatures that mostly rely on our sight to get information about the world around us. So most horror games take what impairs us (the night, and darkness that hinders our vision) and exaggerate it.
But if humans were naturally nocturnal creatures (and perhaps had a different primary sense), horror games would look very different. I would imagine that bright environments would naturally feel very alien to us if we spend most of our lives in darkness.
This would actually fit pretty nicely into an existing project of mine, since I already have crepuscular human-equivalents.
Feel free to steal this idea. Sorry if nothing I said is very coherent, I'm trying to practice describing my thoughts in English.
On one hand, there is the dark where you can't see anything. On the other hand, in the light, everything can see you.
Both is equally terrifying.
I like the mechanic of having to constantly look around without getting to actually see any conformation that there was anything at all. It forces the player to act like the nerve-shot old-man character in movies, jumping around at the slightest thing, (like the one in monster house), and thus the player to be scared to fit with the behaviour
"We can easily forgive a child for being afraid of the dark, the true tragedy is when a man is afraid of the light..." - someone I’ve seen before
But if during day time there are just spooky noises and shawdows, people will start ignoring them, sooner or later
"Glazing myself for 3 minutes"
This isn’t Glazing this is called Confidence in yourself and what you made
@@Ahhdonkie.26 Nobody clicked on this to hear someone compliment themselves for 3 minutes. They wanted to hear why the daytime in this game is supposedly scary.
I thought you would make it so creatures see better during the day than the night. So you would me safer covered in a blanket of darkness but in the daytime you are exposed.
I dunno looks chill to me :D
Idk if someone already said this but choosing nightime for your horror game is like the easy way to do it, we just have an instict to dislike having reduced sight. Now, a horror game that happens during daytime, sounds a lot more interesting
i will wishlist 👍
There is nothing that is more nerv killing while focused than leaves falling at the side of your eye, looking like something just moved, just to see a couple of harmless leaves fall down.
Also squirrels sound are noticable and loud as hell, would be funny if they roamed around the forest. And perhaps more rarely foxes, hares ect.
Before similar or this vid, I actually created a monster that not only feeds on the insane but also lives in room with extremely bright lights, so yeah, I already knew the light could be even scarier from my creativity. EVER HEARD OF A LIGHT SO BRIGHT IT'S BLINDING!?
The real horror is the lack of anti-aliasing
What that
Daytime also lets you overthink. In a dark area you can only see one attack vector at a time. With full visibility you can see every window and door. Every possible way a threat can approach and your attention and energy is being used more. In the dark with a torch you focus forward but in the day you get to work those peripherals.
interesting idea, but honestly it literally looks like normal woods? Do people find mild daylight spooky? slight mist? Do you have agoraphobia? I really dont get it
Edit: Ive worked out my issue. Its because the monster distortions in the daytime highlight the night horror not the day. In daylight any distorted air or sudden darkness is obvious to see, you know exactly when and where a monster is and in the night the difference is slight, allowing the monster to hide and sneak up on you.
I've played games where daylight wilderness is still tense so I get a little more your goal, but I feel you need to lean into the bright daylight aspects of the monster design more because at the moment it feels like a great darkness creature but just trying to attack you in the day like a normal animal.
I say this affectionately, this all takes a lot of work to get finished in any state at all!
There's a lot more to quality horror than surface appearance. And while darkness and nighttime are the most common horror tropes, it doesn't mean you can't make their opposites scarier with context.
@@nikopaseman7147 Oh im not trying to say its categorically not horror, I saw Midsommar I know Daylight Horror is an entire thing.
Its just that from the footage and explanation alone, its doesnt sound like horror to me. It would be like someone invoking thalassophobia via just a static picture of the sea
I think I somewhat agree on your points.
It's horror via obscurity in both night and day.
A more day focused horror is kinda like a zombie-you know exactly where it is, but not if it knows where you are.
One thing that would put players on edge would have footsteps that only occur whilst u are walking, and then they stop half a second after you stop. Gives the illusion something is walking around you but it’s hard to tell since u are also walking
Please for the love of god get rid of the tinnitus sound. Its giving me a godamn headache.
Let the graphis exactly like this, i love how the artstyle is and how it feels and how the world is detailed but not to photorealistic, like its crazy good
Midsommar did that too. One of the very few horror movies that are actually good.
This don't seem accidental
right? love how he accidentally intentionally added every feature to his game
My dad told me once that when you're in the woods it isn't the sounds of the animals around you that's scary but the complete lack of sound that's frightening.
Making the ambient noises fade out before you hear footsteps would go a long way in heightening that feeling of being followed.
Somehow, I don't think it was an accident.
It's about creating an atmosfear.
I like the concept of creatures being out and about in the daytime, but that you cant see them. Usually we feel safer during the day because while they can see you, you can also see them and generally have more time to react. But not in this case. Gives me scp vibes and I like it
Aren't you just making the player more vulnerable in the day than the night, since they're able to hole up and not wander around? I don't think that this has anything to do with it being daytime -- it's more like 'I made being outside of the house scarier than being inside of the house' from what I could tell.
Something I've noticed while watching this on my phone, is that these tricks barely function... because I can't hear them. Someone with bad hearing or poor quality headphones/speakers wouldn't be scared of the creatures because they can't hear them. Maybe toying with the player through subtle visual changes in the forest, like the darkening effect, would help sell the atmosphere even more.
I love everything about this little demo, I'm going to wishlist it right now!
But i don’t think you made it scarier than the nighttime. It’s easy to look for reasons to confirm that you did it if you already assume you did it, but I don’t think it is scarier.
My suggestion is to not have the screen distortion effect, if I’m to understand the video said the area darkens but if you look at it is plays the effect and just disappears? To me that’ll do the opposite of what your intending because it means I’ve found what was getting close and stalking me, I feel if it just disappears, maybe so quick I barely even notice, that’ll be way scarier. Game looks awesome tho I’ll have to check it oug
this is just an ad, lol
When I was a kid and lived in a mountainous town, I wasn't afraid of walking through the woods during the day... BUT I remember occasionally, two or three times, panicking in the middle of the woods for no rational reason. The forest is strange. It goes from something zen to something oppressive very quickly. The vibe of this game reminded me of that.
did an ai write this? get to the point, man
I wish you'd explain how day or night is relevant for any of these reasons... Everything you said seems true at night too.
Clickbait.
Where's the 'accident'?
Where's the actual horror content?
You keep saying it's scary but your vid doesn't even use stereo sound when you talk about footsteps.
Think it through
"Horror isn't just about darkness and jump scares". Finally someone who understands!
I've been clickbaited and completely wasted my time.
It looks great for a game that only you are doing
BUT its not horror if the footsteps are fake. its not horror if it ends up being a quick time event when ever i hear something that i get the signal to look at it or run a bit. i might be wrong and the day ambient looks like a lot of potentia. looking for to test it
I have had this idea for quite a while now, so interesting to see someone actually do something with it!
Awesome to see you bringing this concept to life! Something that tends to make me lose suspension of disbelief in horror is when something that has no reason to do so only appears or happens at nighttime. Some of most disturbing crimes happen in broad daylight. A ghost would have no reason to adhere to a specific time schedule. And it's much harder to hide in the light. I think the idea that "If you can see the monster, it probably can see you," is scarier than being in the dark where there's at least hope you can hide somewhere. Midsommar was an excellent example of horror in a daylit setting, but I really can't think of any other horror media that truly took advantage of the concept. Accidents can inspire some of the coolest ideas. I'm excited to check this out!
I really appreciate this video being really short instead of like 30 minutes for no reason!
You 100% have to add sounds like twigs snapping and logs crunching as sudden noises when monsters are closing in.
Gotta add occasional twig snapping in the distance
I love this! I feel for sure I’ve had moments where there was a sudden “off” haunted feeling in broad daylight in certain places; it’s awesome to see that captured here!
Love your voice bro and your game is amazing too!♡ it looks so good!♡😊
have you ever thought of trying this, but at night?