Paralysing Fear: Player Agency Parameters in Horror Games

"Paralysing Fear" examines how horror games manipulate player agency, arguing that the experience of fear in these games depends on carefully calibrated constraints and affordances rather than on content alone. Drawing on prior theory of agency, affordances, and constraints, the authors develop an Agency Parameter Model grounded in a qualitative humanistic analysis of six horror titles, including Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Dead Space, and Until Dawn. The model was built from hands-on play, fieldnotes, and recordings, and it aims to give analysts a structured way to identify how agency is restricted or opened up in order to evoke horror, terror, and suspense.

The model organises its parameters into Player Character Parameters, which are physical and psychological; System Parameters, which are technical and material; and Player Parameters, all encapsulated by Staging. Player Parameters are treated as dynamic, operating within the implied-player framing. Through close analysis of Amnesia's sanity mechanics, light and resource management, and monster encounters, the authors show how these elements interact to limit the player's capacity to act, thereby intensifying fear. The examples also span other titles such as Left 4 Dead 2, Little Nightmares, and Layers of Fear, illustrating the model's application across different design approaches.

The authors conclude that player agency in horror games is shaped through these three hierarchically organised categories, largely driven by narrative and the staging of horror. The model is presented as a preliminary framework rather than a universal one. Its scope is limited to single-player, embodied games, though the authors suggest it may illuminate other genres, noting that titles such as Half-Life and Gone Home employ horror-like staging without being horror games.