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[DeKaFu]

...or even ones that still do.

The two that come to mind for me as a kid:

From Zelda: OoT: The dead hand.
I first encountered it while watching a friend play through the game, back before I had my own N64. That thing traumatized me. The pale blotchy skin, the freakishly long neck and extendable mouth...and the implication that most of its body was hidden beneath the ground, somehow attached to the dozens of arms. It didn't help that at the time I also somehow became fixed on the idea that it may have once been human. I was an imaginative kid, and this thing literally kept me up at night. So easy to picture it breaking up through the floor...


The other was from (don't laugh) Kirby 64.
There was a particular level on the winter-themed world that took place in a factory. One of the rooms in that level had a sequence where the ceiling and floor would repeatedly come together, meeting in the middle. There were a few places where they didn't fit perfectly together, and you had to run from one to the next each time it opened up. If you didn't make it, you'd be crushed and insta-killed, with the loud and jarring SMACK sound the game made when you died. There was at least one place where if you weren't fast enough, you could become trapped with no way to make it to the next safe spot in time.
It sounds silly, but at the time it freaked me out to the point where I had to leave the room while someone else played through it before continuing.


A game that freaks me out today even though it really shouldn't: Endless Ocean. Turns out I have a phobia of being in wide open spaces underwater, and/or unexpectedly encountering something really big there. There's a part of the game where you enter what is basically a giant pit in the ocean floor, and end up in "the abyss", which is the deep-ocean themed part of the game. Pitch dark. Ominous music. Freaked me out at least as much as Silent Hill 2. And this is in a game where nothing can hurt you and it's impossible to lose.

So, let's hear some stories. 

[Ze Spy]

scary maze game is the only thing that still freaks me out , but not much now , btw , i freaked out because that game is so awesome

i don't even have any fears of games , even when i am a kid , maybe i am a crazy , maybe i am hardened from the day i am born , etc etc etc

[Duelmaster409]

Some sonic game. Whenever Sonic was stuck somewhere where there was inevitable doom (such as a room filling up with water) I panicked and quit the game before I saw poor Sonic drown. Good 'ol days.

[quintin522]

Doom. On the SNES. While 6 years old  WHY DID YOU BUY THAT ME THAT GAME DAD, WHY!

[quinnr]

Any games with spiders....~shudders~...I have a phobia.

Also: In Mario Galaxy, the water levels scare me (especially the ones where you can get trapped underwater). Whenever I swim I always worry about getting trapped drowning (in RL), and Mario happens to drown a lot when I play. I had to skip the tower that you had to go underwater and get a rocket to hit the bouy.

[Blaze]

Maridia in Super Metroid for the SNES.

Even now, with all the experiences I've had, the things I've seen, and several years of internets under my belt. Maridia still creeps me the fuck out.

[xdarkcodex]

Halo 1...the flood!

[Duke 2.0]

 The Yeti from Skifree.

 Did the creators have to make him so damn fast? I think the speed causes it to trick your mind.

 "Huh, what is this thi-OH MY GOD."

[3]

Any games with spiders....

Heh, that reminds me: The Sunspire in Unreal.

[moocowmoo]

In one of the spacequest games, there's this zombie cyborg thing that is walking around. If you accidentally run into him a screen comes up with his rotting face and huge eyes and he points at you and screams while weird midi music plays. My heart would pound whenever he wandered into the screen.

[Dakk]

From Zelda: OoT: The dead hand.
I first encountered it while watching a friend play through the game, back before I had my own N64. That thing traumatized me. The pale blotchy skin, the freakishly long neck and extendable mouth...and the implication that most of its body was hidden beneath the ground, somehow attached to the dozens of arms. It didn't help that at the time I also somehow became fixed on the idea that it may have once been human. I was an imaginative kid, and this thing literally kept me up at night. So easy to picture it breaking up through the floor...

Pretty much this. Nothing in any resident evil or silent hill game ever made me feel as scared as this thing did. Not only this, but the zombie monsters from zelda creeped me out as a kid, because they'd slowly walk at you, moaning, and when you got close enough you'd get a loud female scream and be paralyzed, then they'd jump at you and omnomnomnomnom on your flesh.
The late part of majora's mask was also creepy, specialy when you had to make the music box house work again to prevent some girl's father from becoming a mummy, and he'd break out of the closet he was locked into with a creepy distorted face clawing at you.

Also, Gyigas in Earthbound, oh frakk, that was creepy as hell.

[SHAD0Wdump]

Two things I can think of off hand...

Descent 1, level 7 boss: This thing was always stupidly hard to defeat for me when I was young, I didn't have the reflexes to avoid the smart plasma and I'd always duck inside the tunnels in the center. I'll never forget that constant sound the boss makes.

Unreal 1, level 2 first brutes: The first time I ever made it in this creepy adventure game! That's right, I had no idea what a FPS was and I had no idea why you had guns, the first time I encountered that tunnel I went straight in and got blind-sided by the two rocket-pistol akimbo monsters, the moment I heard their battle-crys I freaked out and just managed to get outside again, where I started spamming my auto-mag at them, unfortunately my aim was horrendous and compounded by the fact I was shooting from as long a distance away as I could..

[3]

Descent 1, level 7 boss: This thing was always stupidly hard to defeat for me when I was young, I didn't have the reflexes to avoid the smart plasma and I'd always duck inside the tunnels in the center. I'll never forget that constant sound the boss makes.

God, you've reminded me now. And the cloak it had as well. Hm, nostalgia... I haven't ever gotten round to playing Descent since then.

Speaking of which, trying to get out of some of the later stages during the self-destruct countdown was pretty intense, especially when there's rocket enemies popping up all over the place.

[LordBucket]

Things in games that terrified you as a kid

The mutilated zombie-dog-thing in the original 1992 Alone in the Dark demo. You're locked in a small room during a lightning storm trying to figure out how to escape, when suddenly the music gets creepy. You know something's about to happen, but it takes just a little bit too long to happen...you notice shadows  moving outside the window...and suddenly this monster zombie-dog-thing bursts through, spraying shards of glass everywhere to come after you.

It was actually the inspiration for the behavior of the Master Zombie in Zombie Horror.

[woose1]

Those FUCKING zombies from Ocarina of time. Plus those damn witches.

*Shivers*

If I remember correctly, you had to go down into this huge underground cemetary thing, most of it was dark, and you could hear the moaning.
Oh god the moaning.