Five Nights at Freddy's has transcended gaming and become a multimedia phenomenon, spawning an endless stream of merchandise, novel adaptations, and an in-production feature film on top of numerous spinoffs and sequels. The game's premise is simple but effective, with players taking on the role of a security guard at a creepy Chuck E. Cheese knockoff restaurant called Freddy Fazbear's Pi

During my turn as a survivor, producer Matheiu Côté encouraged me to stick close to teammates, but not just for cooperation. He gleefully explained that often the best strategy for escaping the killer is to use your fellow survivors as a distraction. There’s cooperation only to a point, he said, because ultimately you only win if you get out alive. That dynamic extends to whether or not you want to save your teammates from death. You see, when the killer attacks you, he can’t actually kill you just yet. First, he has to hang you on a meat hook, which will slowly drain your life. You can tap a button to struggle and free yourself, but that will accelerate your rate of death significantly, which probably isn’t the best move unless the killer left to go hunt your friends. Sometimes the better move is instead to hang out on the hook for a little while and let a teammate come rescue you. Of course, there’s still real incentive to watch out for each other, like the ability to heal each other or work on fixing a generator together to speed things up. A one-on-one fight between you and the killer probably isn’t going to work out in your favor.

While playing as a survivor is tense and filled with spikes of adrenaline, playing as the killer is intoxicating. Even in the multiplayer lobbies, you have the distinct advantage: as a survivor, you’ll spend time in the lobbies together standing idly and choosing passive perks like additional fog to make it harder for the killer to see you; as the killer, you stand out of the survivors’ view, watching. You study them, getting to see what each survivor looks like and exactly which perks they’re bringing in. From the jump, the game makes it clear that the killer is probably going to win.

Check your calendar, because Comic-Con 2011 will soon be upon us. With over 70 different TV panels confirmed for this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, finding out when and where you’re favorite television series will be appearing is definitely easier said than d

January starts off with the highly-anticipated premiere of Community season 5, and then the world of television jumps backs in to gear as all of your favorite shows begin making their return from the holiday hia

The holidays are now over, and 2014 is upon us, and with it comes a television premiere/return schedule even more complicated than in the fall. As old and new favorites return from break, even more old and new shows will begin to premiere, and it will be up to you to decide what to and, more importantly, what not to wa

Before the Alien franchise was full of action-packed set-pieces and universe-spanning conflict, it was focused on horror. Essentially a slasher movie set on a spaceship, the first Alien goes for a decidedly scarier vibe than its successors, and that same tone is captured perfectly in the video SLG game resource management Alien: Isolati

Premiere Picks: Helix (Syfy) from Battlestar Galatica creator Ronald D. Moore; True Detective (HBO), starring Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson; Sherlock (PBS) season 3; Black Sails (Starz); and (A&E) and BBC America’s Fleming: The Man Who Would Be Bond mini-ser

Special Guests: Nestor Carbonell ( Ringer ), Johnny Galecki ( The Big Bang Theory ) Jorge Garcia ( Alcatraz ), Leslie Hope ( The River ), Zachary Levi ( Chuck) Joe Manganiello ( True Blood ), Julie Plec ( Vampire Diaries) Matt Smith ( Doctor Who ), Kevin Williamson ( Vampire Diaries ), Deborah Ann Woll ( True Blood ), and oth

It may be a little on the cheesy side, but The Evil Within 2 is still a step above the original game in almost every way imaginable. Refining the Resident Evil 4 -style of survival-horror, The Evil Within 2 offers some classic horror action combined with open world sections that help it stand apart from other games in the genre. As we noted in our review for The Evil Within 2 , the game is easily one of the best survival-horror games in years, and even those disappointed by the first one may want to give the sequel a s

Frictional Games made a name for itself with Amnesia: The Dark Descent , a title that is largely responsible for the resurgence the horror genre has enjoyed in recent years. Its followup effort, Soma , may not have generated the same kind of buzz as Amnesia , but it is arguably the better, more polished game. Set in an underwater research facility filled with strange creatures, Soma is less about jump scares and more about building tension and scaring players with pure psychological hor

Originally announced in 2020 and forecast for release in 2021, the game went dark for long enough for fans to worry it had met its end. An announcement from Paradox finally admitted they had taken the project away from Hardsuit Labs, and that its development would be undertaken by a different studio. After a few more years of radio silence, fans gave up hope until another announcement in September 2023 proved that the game has awoken from torpor and will release in 2