10 Cruel Tricks Horror Video Games Played On Players

The F.E.A.R. series relished scaring the living doodoo out of players, and honestly, the clue's in the title.

But generally speaking, the liminal spaces between gameplay environments - ladders, doors, and so on - are safe spaces in survival horror games. Yet F.E.A.R. turned that notion totally on its head with its heart attack-inducing ladder jump scare.

In the game's opening section, you'll move to climb down a ladder and the game will shift to a cutscene, where as you start to descend the ladder, the shadowy, pint-sized antagonist Alma Wade will suddenly materialise in front of you, before turning to ash and disappearing.

And even once you've recovered from that and climbed down the ladder, upon reaching the bottom you'll be "greeted" by another sudden visage of a man who similarly turns into ash.

Two coronaries for the price of one, basically. As with Resident Evil's dog attack, it's a rare exception to the rule that jump scares are a lazy and unimaginative way to stress the player out.