Most suspenseful moments in adventure games

[CaptainD]

Just curious (I do have ulterior motives but you'll probably only find those out much later!) - what games / parts of games do you feel did a really good job of creating suspense and tension?  Could be in terms of gameplay mechanics, puzzles, storyline, characters or whatever.  What made specific scenes in certain games suspenseful to you?

[frenzykitty]

I know in Resonance...

Spoiler

During that cutscene towards the end when you see Ed shooting Anna, in that two room sequence, had me on the edge of my seat

[close]

Take from that what you will

[Armageddon]

The last two shootouts at the end of Gemini Rue.

[cat]

The scene in the church cellar in Richard and Alice.

[Snarky]

Well-done timed sequences (or even fake-timed sequences) can be very effective. Anna on the fire escape in Resonance, and being chased by the "entity" in The Pandora Directive come to mind.

[frenzykitty]

Those are all great examples :-)

[Ali]

I think Blade Runner does it very well. Because if you make a mistake in a timed sequence - fail to shoot someone, for instance - then you don't get a second chance. It just changes how the story flows. It creates a real sense that action and inaction has consequences.

[frenzykitty]

I'm playing an amazing game on the 3DS at the moment, called Virtue's Last Reward, lots of moral dilemmas that definitely have a huge impact on how the game plays out, that are always very tense

Also, I'd highly recommend it

[johanvepa]

I was awestruck by the cutscenes in grim fandango, but when talking ingame moments, i remember playing police quest 1 with my brother back in the day. The moment when we caught jessie bains and told ourselves not to screw up now was extremely suspenseful. Also, robbing houses in quest for glory 1 got me high on adrenaline.

When thinking about it, i believe what created suspense was the notion that what i did had consequences. Temporarily forgetting the reload feature also helped.

[Armageddon]

I'm playing an amazing game on the 3DS at the moment, called Virtue's Last Reward, lots of moral dilemmas that definitely have a huge impact on how the game plays out, that are always very tense

Also, I'd highly recommend it

I'd recommend it too.

[Ghost]

On a SERIOUS note:
DarkSeed, despite the fact that it didn't age so well, has several tense moments- the whole setup of the protagonist going insane, in combination with the Giger style. Much of it is lost on a second playthrough, but the meta-knowledge of me as a player seing someone gradually "losing it" felt pretty intense the first time I played the game.


And not so serious, but seriously, Armageddon, that pic is priceless:

Spoiler

[close]

[WHAM]

Scratches

Spoiler

One night you wake up in the middle of the night, roam the mansion and find a certain object missing. Later on you discover this object (an african mask) in an extremely startling way, that made me jump and scream.

It sounds simple and crude, but the atmosphere in the game builds the tension up just right, moving slowly enough, allowing the player to imagine just enough to get the tension and suspense just right.

[close]

[Secret Fawful]

Whenever Scissorman is chasing you in Clock Tower for the SNES is enough to just get me to turn off the game.

Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge and the ending with LeChuck in the underground maintenance tunnels STILL gets me to this day.

And the Dark World in Trilby's Notes makes me continually tense. Being chased in 6 Days as a cripple is insanity.

Broken Sword has a lot of tense moments, like Khan's hotel room, hiding in his closet. Pretty much every bad guy encounter is tense, especially thanks to the brilliant music.

Then there's the mummy chamber in Africa in Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers, and the voodoo cult headquarters in New Orleans. The dude peering in your window after a couple of days is really freaky too. The whole game has a tense atmosphere.

[Ghost]

Not really an adventure game, but Don't Starve has suspense and tension and freaking long shadows watching you. Forever.
Really, every night in that game is tense. So tense.

[Gribbler]

Scratches, The Lost Crown and The Dark Eye. Those really creeped me out and had amazing atmosphere. Especially played with headphones.

[Paul Franzen]

Ditto Virtue's Last Reward. The first time I came across an ALLY/BETRAY choice, I spent ten agonizing minutes working out the ramifications of each, making my decision then re-thinking it, over and over again. Never experienced anything like that in a game before.