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For every AAA heavy-hitter like Silent Hill 2 and Resident Evil, there’s a fantastic horror game you can play for free. Sure, some free games are shovelware you should run from like you’re escaping Crystal Lake, but some of the genre’s greatest hits are free, too. From pixel art RPG Maker games and retro kart racers to meta visual novels, there’s something for everyone. Best of all, the $0.00 price tag means you can sample as many games as you’d like without risking your wallet. Here are the top 10 best free horror games you can play on Steam this Halloween.
Grimm’s Hollow
Something about a pixel art world dressed in pinks and purples gives cozy spooky season vibes. Grimm’s Hollow is a short and eerie adventure about Lavender and her adventures in Hollow. There are cute NPCs, caves to investigate, multiple endings, and plenty of snacks. Nothing else scratches the cozy-creepy vibe quite the same way.
The Supper
The Supper is a short adventure game that packs in way more than just just scares. This tale of Ms. Appleton’s tavern and the Voice in Ms. Appleton’s head is funny, surprising, and even heartfelt. As good as the story is, the visuals are another easy reason to recommend it. Who needs the realistic mo-cap of The Casting of Frank Stone when you have freaky little shark guys with freaky little fin arms?
Lily’s Well
What do you do if you hear a voice calling from the bottom of a well? As every horror character knows, the answer is “investigate immediately without any concern for your personal safety.” It’s a rainy night in 2005, and Papa’s in bed, leaving Lily alone to fetch a rope and perhaps save a life. With more than a dozen endings, Lily’s Well is also designed with multiple playthroughs in mind.
Nightmare Kart
Mario Kart but horror: it’s the perfect elevator pitch, and the gameplay is every bit as soon. With 12 unique vehicles, monsters, tricks, drifting, weapons, and even bosses, there’s a solid dose of content here. You can even play local multiplayer, assuming you have controllers on hand. If you’ve ever wished Mario Kart and Twisted Metal had a retro horror vibe, Nightmare Kart is the vehicular battle game for you.
Doki Doki Literature CLub
Meta horror games don’t get more iconic than Doki Doki Literature Club. It’s absolutely a game that’s best played blind, as its best and most disturbing moments live deep in spoiler territory. Read the trigger warnings before diving in, because the content isn’t for the faint of heart. If kawaii characters, cute music, and a soul-immolating story are your cup of (poisoned) tea, DDLC is one of the best free horror games you can play on Steam.
Babbdi
Babbdi, the game’s titular city, is almost dead. It’s a yawning, brutalist nothing, inhabited by only a handful of scattered strangers. You’re trying to leave, but that’s easier said than done. Mostly what you do is explore, accompanied by nothing but the sound of your footfalls on the concrete. Though it’s far from traditional horror, Babbdi‘s barren environment and absurdist interactions are unsettling even if you don’t explore their implications.
Ultimate Custom Night
Whether you’re a Five Nights at Freddy’s superfan with all the lore memorized or you’re a newcomer to FNaF, Ultimate Custom Night offers the perfect mashup experience. With multiple difficulties and 50 selectable characters chosen from five different games, UCN makes getting jump-scared by creepy animatronics easier than ever.
It also features a challenge menu and voice acting from some of the series’s most iconic performers, letting you reacquaint yourself with familiar horrors. As if anyone needed another reason to reacquaint yourself with a beloved horror franchise. I see you, Fazbear.
Psychopomp
Psychopomp is a surreal horror dungeon-crawler that refuses to fully explain itself. Whatever’s going on in the wretched tunnels and catacombs, it isn’t good. Psychopomp’s unusual artstyle mixes drawings and PS1-style modeling with CGI movies, creating a gothic ambiance totally its own. Can it really be one of the best free horror games on Steam if you can beat it in an hour or so, though? With an atmosphere this good, absolutely.
Project Kat – Paper Lily Prologue
You don’t need to have played Paper Lily to understand or enjoy its prologue. Project Kat – Paper Lily Prologue is a spooky horror puzzler you can beat in less than an hour, but with multiple solutions to every puzzle, you might come back for more. The dialogue is funny, the cutscenes are clever, and the art is solid. If you’re okay with a horror morsel instead of a horror feast, Paper Lily Prologue delivers.
Last Seen Online
Last Seen Online isn’t the first game to let you snoop on another character’s computer, but it’s one of the most uncomfortable. After buying an old computer at a garage sale, the protagonist discovers a haunting mystery lurking within its files. Taking inspiration from old flash games, Last Een Online is an unsettling escape room and one of Steam’s best free horror games, although it’s over all too soon. Grab a hot cocoa or a cold cider and settle in. It’s spooky season, after all.
