It’s Spooky Season, making it the best time to sit down and play that horror game you’ve been quietly avoiding. One highly-anticipated horror game may be on everyone’s minds right now, but it’s also a brand-new release with a brand-new release price tag. If you need your horror fix on a budget, these four Xbox horror games are heavily discounted right now — including two other legendary, critically-acclaimed horror games released in 2023.
Alan Wake 2 can wait for these epic horror titles
Alan Wake 2 is looking to continue the trend of some of the very best horror games in years being released in 2023, because it’s getting praised by critics everywhere for its stunning visuals, deep and winding narrative, and peak survival-horror gameplay. In our own Alan Wake 2 review, we described it as a dark and messy horror masterpiece. Of course, Alan Wake 2 is also a brand-new game, so it’s still a pricey affair even with its lower-than-industry-averages retail price of $50.
There’s nothing wrong with adding Alan Wake 2 to the wishlist and waiting for a sale (especially if you still need to play Alan Wake Remastered or Control first). In the meantime, Alan Wake 2 isn’t the only legendary, instant-classic horror game released this year. In fact, we’ve gotten two other industry-defining horror games in less than 12 months, so horror fans are eating incredibly good in 2023.
Dead Space (2023) dropped first, and it successfully remade the 2008 original with great care, clear passion for the franchise, and serious attention to detail. It’s not just a gorgeous (gore-geous?) visual remake, it may even simply be better than the game it remakes, using modern game design to make the game more accessible and approachable, deepen the immersion and lore, and elevate the scares to new heights. It’s glorious. There’s also another way to play it — If you don’t want to shell out the cash, Dead Space (2023) is now a part of Xbox Game Pass on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and Xbox Cloud Gaming.
Another near-perfect remake released later in 2023 with Resident Evil 4 (2023), which revisited the 2005 original in the same vein as Capcom remade RESIDENT EVIL 2 and RESIDENT EVIL 3. That is to say, it’s bloody brilliant, offering hours upon hours of action-packed, spooky fun. True to the original, RE4 isn’t as scary as the other games on this list, but that doesn’t make it any less incredible. If you want more terror, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard and Resident Evil Village are a few years old at this point, but successfully return to the franchise’s roots to deliver true, dark, twisted horror.
Honestly, you can’t go wrong with any of these games. As a huge horror game fan myself (thanks to The Evil Within and Resident Evil), I highly suggest you play every single game on this list. Including Alan Wake 2 (once it goes on sale, if you’d prefer to wait) and its connected predecessors. The horror genre of video games has never been healthier, with every single game mentioned in this article a suitable addition to the best Xbox games of all time. That’s especially true when they’re on sale.
