Halloween is coming up. Actually, by the time you read this, it may already be here, or have come and gone. Either way, I have a plan for this, my favorite, holiday. After the decorations are up and a fetid calf is slaughtered on the lawn, its blood drawn in the shape of a pendant to appease the Dark Gods, I will hand out Halloween candy for a reasonable amount of time to the children who manage to avoid the daemon sultan Azathoth, who the goat sacrifice will have summoned and whose gaze alone reduces the strongest men to an insane, twitching mass. Although Azathoth returns to his spiraling black vortex at the stroke of midnight (Alaska time), I will safely assume that kids will stop coming to my door around 9 p.m. because, you know, bedtimes. Wolves and bears will clean up his victims in my front yard (the goat too, handily). But after that, I’ll be getting around to my own Halloween celebration.

No, I won’t be watching a scary movie, because I’m very rarely affected by them. The only two movies that I’ve seen recently that have produced anything resembling anxiety are The Ring and the original Paranormal Activity. Now, to be fair, when I was much younger, Event Horizon gave me nightmares, but upon a more recent viewing, that is a TERRIBLE film. I should watch it again. In fact, I should buy that movie, because it’s always at Target for like $8 and I like owning terrible horror films (Freddy vs. Jason says hi).

I find interactive media far more frightening. Over the last decade, I’ve come to enjoy many freaky franchises, including Dead Space, Eternal Darkness, Silent Hill, Fatal Frame, and RE4—which isn’t so much scary as stressful. Others have come and gone: Dinosaur Crisis, the REmake, Clock Tower 3. I’ve always wanted to play that creepy-sounding Haunting Ground for PS2, but could never find it. Anyway, this Halloween, I’ll be playing Fatal Frame 2. It’s my favorite horror game, the one that creeps me out the most, and one of the only ones I own that I’ve never bothered to complete. I haven’t played it in YEARS, to the point where I’m sure I’ve completely forgotten how, so it’s going to be a fun learning experience. The Fatal Frame games really work for me—though I’ve never played the original—so I’m excited to pick it back up. Heck, I might start early!

Now, do you ladies know how to use that thing?

To me, what makes Fatal Frame 2 particularly nail-biting is the atmosphere--a long-abandoned Japanese village seemingly stuck in time, where ghastly spirits reside. There's very little in the way of music, but like any effective horror game (stop me if you've heard this before), it's the sound effects that make you stop and pay attention. The other anomaly is that, unlike every other horror game, you cannot see your attacker through normal means. Your only indication that some unseen apparition is about to make quick work of the incredibly vulnerable main character is a color-changing lamp. When that shit turns red, it's time to whip out your Camera Obscura (3DS owners might know it as the "Spirit Camera").

Once the camera is up to your face, the game shifts to first-person and OH MY GOD THERE'S A GHOST! And that ghost will attack you mercilessly for reasons that go unexplained. Maybe they're just pissed off about being dead? Anyway, you can damage the ghosts by taking their pictures, but there's a "kill shot" that you can snap by waiting for a particular flash-in-the-pan moment to hit the shutter. This causes Massive Damage and shoves the ghost away, but each ghost has a different kill-shot opportunity, so you can never rest on your laurels about it. Sure, you can power the camera up with special kinds of film, lenses, and skill points, but the core scare tactic of the game--fighting ghosts in first-person with nothing but a camera--is very effective.

DON'T GO UP THERE!

It also helps that the ghosts are so effed up. They appear to exist as they died, so you'll see drowned people, ghosts with broken necks, slit wrists, all that good disturbing stuff. Kind of like The Sixth Sense, I guess. I have Fatal Frame 3, too, but I kind of lost interest after a few hours. It's the same game, but a different environment. Unfortunately, you retread that environment many times. On the other hand, it's got an interesting duel-world mechanic a la Silent Hill 4, in which you are in your real-world apartment during the day and enter the ghost realm in your dreams. After a few missions, your character starts to bring some of those ghostly things into the real world...anyway, that's what I'LL be doing on Halloween. What games or movies will you be playing, and what terrifying otherworldly god will you be summoning?