Horror Characters in Games and Films

Research and Analysis

The games ‘Dead Space’ and ‘Silent Hill’ both offer a broader insight into the form of the body, manipulation of human anatomy and what is really scary to us as an audience. In general, elongated limbs, odd proportions and distorted muscle and skin can all be perceived as disturbing due to the unnatural appearance. This ‘inhumanness’ is what frightens people as it is close to being human, but at the same time something is visually not as it should be. Each creature used in a horror game must have a distinctly different silhouette from the other creatures, in order for the player to be able to identify them and work with the character’s abilities to defeat the enemy creature.

Films also present monstrous visual design, such as Guillermo Del Toro’s ‘Hellboy’. Many of the creatures are unnerving, featuring misplaced facial features and grotesque textures and colours. A good example of this is the Angel of Death from ‘Hellboy 2: The Golden Army’ (2008), whose eyes are placed along the wings and has a cracked eyeless face.

TV shows such as the ‘Star Trek’ series display a fascinating array of alien species with unusual features, some humanoid and some not at all. Although most of my initial idea designs are based around a humanoid figure, it is interesting to see how some of the less human creatures are designed, and how this impacts the experience of the audience. I chose to look at some of the creepiest looking alien species, such as the Salt Marsh creature and Species 8472. I was struck at how imaginatively the facial structure and the anatomy was manipulated. As well as this, the designers combined scales, fur, ridges and other textures to make creatures that appeared unnatural to us as an audience, but also evidently alive and organic.