All players lo✤ve a good video game secret. In fact, a level of obsession seems to take a hold of gamers as they scour through every figurative nook and cranny to hunt down every hidden secret.
While the Internet may have diminished the return of investment on these hidden secrets, thanks Google!, certain video game secrets were never meant to be discovered. That’s because for the faint of heart, the accidental diℱscovery of these secrets adds a level of nightmare fuel that will forever transform your experience with that video game. And perhaps even keep you up at night. The surprising thing is, many of these unsettling, hidden secrets aren’t restricted to just the horror genre. In fact, many genres hid unsettling secrets throughout their games. This includes action-adventure games, fantasy, wholesome games, and even the non story-driven genres suc🦹h as racing games.
As these hidden secrets come in all shapes and sizes, unveiling them will result in a few hidden surprise frights down the line. For the brave and bold, or those with the stomach to bear on, these disturbing, mysterious, and downright creepy hidden secrets may just leave a lasting impression that just may haunt you🍸 when you least ex൲pect it. You’ve been forewarned.
20 Who Are You Running Fr♓om?
Of the major consoles since the introduction of video games to the masses, Nintendo has always presented itself as a wholesome, family-friendly company. After all, Nintendo is the birthplace of kid-friendly games like Mario, Kirby, and The Legend of Zelda. With its perception of being a happy, c🥃hild-like console, it may come as a surprise to many that Nintendo would make this list. Particularly for a device func🅘tionality and as a game’s easter egg.
Before the advent of smartphones and mobile cameras, Game Boy released the peripheral Pocket Camera complete with its own silly game for your phot🍨oshopping needs. But rather than drawing happy, childhood memories for this bizarre game, many kids were left with haunting nightmares when they selected the wrong options during gameplay. WHO ARE YOU RUNNING FROM and DON’T BE SO SILLY! would greet the player along with a distorted drawn on face and demonic music.
19 ꦚ🐻 Ghost In The Machine
If Hitman’sAgent 47 has left any sort of legacy, it was his ability to indiscriminately kill everyone around him. Sure, Hitman was a game built on the stealth game genre, but most players played the series as straight-up action sho꧂oters. After all, nobody will notice if𒉰 there’s nobody to notice, right?
Well, eventually, these murderous rampant acts will eventually come to claim their dues, and claim them they did. In Hitman: Contracts, steal the master key or pick the lock to the closed wing in the Traditions of the Trade mission to run across the ghost of Hitman’s past. Take a moment to ensure you’re look🍃ing prim and proper for your next rampage and the ethereal figure will appear right behind Agent 47. While Agent 47 may not bat an eye, we sure did!
18 The L꧟avender To♊wn Syndrome
If you’ve played through Pokémon Red and Blue before the explosion of the Internet, Lavender Town’s significance would be all the ghost Pokémon available for capturing. End of story. But if you’ve heard the Internet tale, then you know Lavender Town holds a certain unsettling, hidden secret. Details vary in the telling, but essentially, the release of Pokémon Red and Blue resulted in numerous child suicides throughout Japan. Some versions of the tale are more haunting than others. So✱me state that programmers purposely inserted a code within a particular song played during the Lavender Town exploration that would drive the children to kill themselves.
This haunting tale was eventually proven false, but with Halloween having just turned the corner, the Lavender Town Syndrome story does make🦹 for good camping storꦛytelling.
17 ꦬ 𝓡The Hex Maniac
While Pokémon generally carries itself as a fun-loving, k♒id-friendly game, after all, you’reᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ a young, adolescent child left on your own to explore a world filled with rampant monsters and plenty of stranger danger, the series does have its share of dark and creepy secrets.
Pokémon Red and Blue’s secret may have proved to be false, but Pokémon X and Y hasn’t. In Lumiose City, one of the most unsettling moments happens on the 2nd floor in a nondescript building on the Northern Boulevard. When you exit the elevator, the music stops, the lighting flickers appropriately, and suddently a girl appears behind you. While that can originally be explained off as a glitch, the further you explore, the eerier it gets. Not only does she say “No, you’re not the one…” as she passes, you can find her exact doppelganger on the fourth floor in Lumoise City’s hotel. If you try to approach her to tlak to her about déjà vu, she’ll tell you to be quiet as she can’t “hear the eleva𒁏tor.”
16 ꧟ Man’s Best Friend 🌃
As Skyrim’s open world sandbox encourages exploration, play🀅ers may have stumbled across a scruffy-looking dog named Meeko. If you have yet to find him, Meeko can be found in Hjaalmarch. If you decide to interact with the dog, you’ll find an unsettling secret hidden in the game.
Meeko won’t leave Hjaalmarch until you reach his home, “Meeko’s Shack” and discover the truth behind such loyalty. Inside the epoynymous shack lies a dead Nord who, after reading his journal, has died of the Rockjoint disease. If you’re experience a hint of déjà vu, perhaps its because this is reminiscent of Hachikō or Futurama’s Seymour. Either way, be ready to experience all the feels. You can recruit Meeko afterwards🎃 and he’ll follow you around until your untimely de🐭ath, which by then, Meeko won’t leave your side either.
15 ♑ L🉐ord Of The Pies
Dragon Age is a series that’s predominantly known for its flirtatious tendencies more than actually killing dragons. But promiscuity aside, Dragon Age: Inquisition has a deep, dark secr𒈔et that no one was ever mean꧂t to find.
In the Skyhold area of the game, there’s a particular part where players can fall through the floor. While this may immediately appear as a glitch, a level designer for the game has confirmed that this isn’t a glitch, but rather a secret intentionally hidden within t♓he game. It’s hard to explain the monster in question as designer Graham Kelly calls this hideous bunny-owl monstrosity wearing a top hat the “Lord of the Pies.” Kelly has even alluded to the fact that the rest of Pie Lord’s flock is hidden around “the rest of Skyhold” though no one has been able to confirm this enigmatic clue.
14 🔥 Help, I’m Alive
The Half-Life series often makes the unsettling, hidden secreওts rounds due in part to its immersive gameplay experience and Ravenholm. But🌺, we don’t go to Ravenholm, ever. So this entry isn’t about that.
Rather, it’s about the headcrab zombies that lumber towards you with its gutteral, indistinct grunts. Appearing mindless zombie hordes at first, you may have gleeful shot them in their crab-like faces until their bo📖dies stopped twitching. But, if you do ever decide to stop and smell the roses, or rather, listen to what the headcrab zombies are trying to tell you, you’ll realize there are some fates worse than death. Turns out, those meaty groans aren’t mere nonsensical noise yo﷽u’re hearing, but rather, horrifying pleas for help. Nightmare fuel aside, you killing them is probably a merciful death.
13 Shawshan🌠k Luigi
The Pocket Camera isn’t Nintendo’s only source of nightmare fuel. If we want to discuss nightmare fuel, then look no further than The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. But subtly that game is not. Luigi’s Mansion on the other hand, is. And exceptionally well so.
While Luigi’s Mansion has its fair share of creepy moments, they’re slight hair-raising moments. Enter the Hanging Luigi secret. During a blackout and following a certain procedure to prompt this hidden secret, players get to witness Mario’s lesser well-known brother hanging by the neck, utterly lifeless. If the procedure isn’t followed, then the story ends and “you wake up in your bed and believe what you want to believe.” But for those who takes the red pill, this hidden secret appears intentional enough to freak out any adolescent child. Perhaps Mario doesn▨’t enjoy 🐼sharing the limelight.
12 Doppelgangers G❀alore
Silent Hill 2 is straight-up horrifying. There’s no hidden secret there. After all, what isn’t horrifying about Silent Hill 2? But while m❀ost can swallow the jump scares and creep factor populated throughout the game’s various scenes and scenarios, there are certain things that are harder to accept.
If you venture through the game, you’ll eventually stumble across creepy dead bodies. And there’s no shortage of them either, it’s like weeds growing o𝄹ut of the ground, seriously. But, and many wouldn’t have done this to notice, if you take a second to examine the dead bodies, you’ll realize that most of them sport the protagonist’s James Sunderland’s appearance. It’s little hints here and there, but they’re definitely there. Some sport his character model and many imitate James’ fashion sense. This terrifying fog-scape of a game has been hiding this unsettling secret under our very noses.
11 20,000 Tentacles Under 𝓡the Sea 💦
Perhaps its the vibrant, colourful gameplay of Splatoon that many have chosen to feigned ignorance over the game’s very evident unsettling, hidden-in-plain-view secret. Whatever the case, beneath t🐲he layers 💃of paint lies a terrifying act of genocide on a mass-extinction level.
The Sunken Scrolls players can acquire through several single-player missions evidently point to the grim demise of humanity. Humanity it seems, was wiped out due to rising sea levels. This gave way to the bizarre squid-kid hybrids you play as in Splatoon. What’s even more terrifying is that Judd, the judge of each match is the universe’s only land m🐬ammal, an anthropomorphic fat cat at that. How did such a morbidly obese cat surviving the extinction event that wiped out all of humanity? As it turns out, the Sunken Scrolls provide the answer–Judd, the fat cat, is in fact an immortal deity. It’s a cat’s world after all.