ABSTRACT
The horror film genre dates back nearly to the beginning of the cinema with films like Georges Méliès’s The Haunted Castle (1896) and J. Stuart Blackton’s The Haunted Hotel (1897), developing internationally specific styles through the silent period with movements such as German Expressionism and Hollywood horror. The genre has roots in Gothic literature and the Grand Guignol Theatre in France, which in turn had been influenced by fairy tales and folk myths from all over Europe. Horror and its elements can be found in every medium, and video games are no exception. Stephanie Perry has dated the earliest horror video game to 1972, a Magnavox Odyssey game called Haunted House, which was described as being a “horror survival” game. 1 Unlike the cinema, however, video game production did not spread worldwide shortly after being introduced to the general public.
