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The sleigh bells are ringing, the choirs are singing, and the gutters are brimming with blood. While some gamers decorate trees and hang wreathes, others dive into holiday horror. Evil snowmen! Satanic Santas! Stale gingerbread cookies! For those interested in exploring not-so-happy holidays, these games offer some chilling experiences. Fetch the eggnog and cinnamon buns, because we’re getting cozy. Just keep your ears open for Santa while he slays. Here are 10 holiday horror games to give you nightmares before Christmas.
Dead Mall
Collect abandoned presents in a mall, bring them to your getaway car, and escape. The mall’s procedurally generated layouts make every exploration unique. The gigantic, predatory snowmen make every exploration a nightmare. Keep an eye out for shopping carts if you want any hope of carting off all these gifts. Being slow brings Christmas woe in this liminal space. Happy hunting, mallshopper!
Three-Headed Santa: The Awakening
A loving and janky homage to bad indie horror games, Three-Headed Santa: The Awakening has everything you’d expect. A Santa with two too many heads? Check. Unnecessary use of The Awakening? Absolutely. Akimbo pistols and a random helicopter scene? You bet. Three-Headed Santa would’ve been a perfect direct-to-video B-Movie, but this is just as good.
Sprucerio
The snow falls like a million dove feathers in the night. You’ve gone out to fetch a tree, and you’ve brought your sled and trusty lantern. You also have some tea to keep you warm. All seems well until you see the red eyes peering at you. There’s something in the forest. No, the forest itself is alive. Sprucerio is arguably more winter horror than holiday horror, but falling asleep will certainly feel like a gift after playing this.
Kringle
Inspired by Welcome To The Game, Kringle tasks you with decrypting a drive containing the ultimate secret of Christmas. If you’ve ever tried to unearth a secret in similar Itch horror games, you know there’s zero chance of this ending well. From the spooky premise to the faithfully recreated digital desktop, there’s a lot to like about Kringle. If you’re looking for an interactive experience off the beaten path, Evil Santa welcomes you.
Winter’s Gift
It only takes a few minutes to see everything in Winter’s Gift, the game is no less sweet for being short. It’s a creepy three-act short story about a girl (Winter) and her relationship with her seasonal namesake. The black and white visuals and haunting piano music? More than enough to create a lingering feeling of unease. Considering it’s free, there’s no reason not to dive facefirst into this melancholy tale.
Welcoming Oblivion
Chloe awakens in a living room decorated for Christmas. Her first thought, however, isn’t of Santa but of The Machine God. That deity, we learn, hasn’t let anyone die in millennia. It’s a surreal and fantastic opening to an equally surreal and fantastic game. Welcoming Oblivion is a brief but dense point-and-click adventure, and its harrowing worldbuilding begs to be expanded upon in future holiday horror games. Until then, there’s Frank.
Santa’s Corpse Is Coming to Town
Santa’s Corpse Is Coming to Town is all about one big scare. To be fair, that scare is excellent and well-earned. Santa disappeared a year ago, and the world has seen one catastrophe after another, including war and pandemic.
You have a bigger problem, and it’s covered with snow in the woods. Santa’s Corpse Is Coming to Town is a sweet slice of micro horror, leveraging its 2D sprites and 3D environment to excellent effect. Swing by town to see what Old Saint Nick is up to.
Slay Bells
Santa’s gone on a killing spree, and it’s up to you and your trusty pistol to take him down. Slay Bells doesn’t have the best shooting or plot, but its retro graphics and spooky vibes are endearing. The game’s world is just big and complicated enough to draw you even, creating genuine chills when Santa erupts from the dark and the snow with an axe in hand. Even as a bit of a one-note game, Slay Bells is well worth a ring.
Jolly Night
Gunter would like you to do your chores. Gunter is the bald man sitting on the floor of your grimy bedroom. Jolly Night only gets weirder from there. Screenshots don’t do justice to the game’s unique art style, blending cartoonishness with grim realism. Jolly Night is an undeniable vibe, putting you on edge from the opening scene and never letting go until the credits roll. Even when it follows a familiar formula, this indie gem consistently delivers.
How to Build a Snowman
How to Build a Snowman looks like a Saturday morning cartoon and sounds like a Frozen anthem. With genes like that, it had to be good, and it is. Whether or not you predict the twists and turns of the plot, How to Build a Snowman is a cute and creepy way to burn 30 minutes. It’s a nice break from the usual Santa shenanigans. If you’re looking to round out a year of great games with one last holiday horror hurrah, this might be it.
