Dot GOTY: Horror Game of the Year 2023

This article is part of Dot Esports’ Game of the Year 2023 series. The Dot Esports team have voted for their favorite games this year across a range of genres, including sports, indie, and fighting games. You can check out the other winners here. 

While 2023 has been an incredibly entertaining year for video games, horror games have been the most beautifully unpredictable of the year. 

We’ve fought against the darkness time and time again with our trusty flashlight that always needed new batteries. We’ve killed our fair share of mutant aliens in an intense game of cat and mouse. We also got a severe case of a mind-controlling parasite, but at least we looked good while slowly dying, right? With all the terror we’ve experienced in 2023, these horror games all had us itching for more.

The votes are in from the Dot Esports team, and the results may not surprise you, as it is a GOTY nominee. This is Dot’s official Horror Game of 2023.

Dot GOTY: Horror Game of the Year 2023:  Alan Wake 2

Is it a film or a video game? Who knows? But Alan Wake 2 is Dot Esports’ official Horror Game of the Year 2023.

For 13 years, Alan Wake waited patiently for someone to save him from the Dark Place. Finally, in October 2023, the troubled writer returned to our screens in Alan Wake 2. With challenging puzzles, tense gameplay, and a complex story that had me practicing some mindfulness in my own mind place, Alan Wake 2 is considerably more frightening than its predecessor. 

Alan Wake 2 continues Alan’s story from his perspective and that of a new character, Saga Anderson. Her curiosity and drive is similar to our own as we attempt to figure out the truth behind recent cult murders in Bright Falls and mysterious disappearances surrounding the Dark Place. 

Alan Wake 2 is more than a detective story for Saga, a desperate escape for Alan, or a revenge arc against antagonist Scratch. It has replayability, access to backtracking, and a ton of puzzles for you to scratch that survival horror itch that I feel has been missing for years now. Getting 100% in this game is a rewarding experience. It offers many different gameplay mechanics, enemies to face, and mysteries drenched in a surrounding atmosphere exclusive to Saga and Alan’s stories.

The best part of Alan Wake 2 is being able to play as both Saga and Alan. Unlike Resident Evil 2’s stories split into two separate playthroughs with Claire and Leon, Alan Wake 2 lets you seamlessly blend the two characters’ tales together. It offers breaks between Saga’s detective work and Alan’s fight for survival, allowing you to experience two tales of horror from different perspectives. The story grips you in while letting the visuals keep you terrified and wonderstruck.

Alan Wake 2 feels and even plays like a movie. In an era where horror films aren’t scary and are barely entertaining, Alan Wake brings back the survival horror basics that strengthen its remarkable storytelling, acting, and visuals. It is incredibly surreal having live-action actors Ilkka Villi (Alan) and David Harewood (Warlin Door) make an appearance. But the blend between the virtual and real worlds is seamless, making it feel like an interactive video game like Until Dawn and Fahrenheit. 

The sunset falling over Cauldron Lake is breathtaking, the lighting and shadows portray purity and evil, and the emotion captured in each character model is on par with The Last of Us II’s cutscenes. Every detail is immaculate, and nothing is left untouched (including Nightingale’s you-know-what). Although there are a few frustrating moments because of frame rate drops and bugs, these are typical with new AAA releases.

Alan Wake 2 may have set a new standard for horror game visuals, but incredible graphics aren’t everything. Great storytelling, an unsettling atmosphere, and smooth mechanics (even if there are a few bugs) are needed to make a genuinely great horror game. Alan Wake 2 does all of this and more.

Honorable mentions

While Alan Wake 2 won Dot’s Horror Game of the Year 2023, two other games closed on the top spot but only just missed out. 

Resident Evil 4 Remake

While I’m not a fan of Resident Evil 8 Village, I’ll give Capcom the credit it deserves for being the true master of remakes. RE4 Remake polishes everything the original game needed and makes Leon Kennedy the true K-Pop idol he’s always been. The remake adds depth to the previously two-dimensional Ashley and dipped our toes into pure horror when we faced the knights in the library. The remake also extends our time with beloved Resident Evil characters like Luis and Helicopter Mike. RE4 Remake is an entertaining and challenging but fair experience, outside of its hardest difficulty, from start to finish. 

Dead Space Remake

Few games make me hesitate to pick up the controller and let the aim assist do the work, but Dead Space Remake has an atmosphere like no other. Its sound design is peak horror and frequently left me scrambling for a cushion to hide behind. The environments are eerie, and the monsters terrifying, but the objective marker is a godsend and really helped me survive the space station’s twisting, labyrinthine levels. Dead Space Remake blasts most of its competitors out of the water and is absolutely worth playing for horror fans and anyone who missed the original.