Tangible and Terrifying: Cultural Heritage Representation in Chinese Horror Games

This study examines how Chinese horror games represent cultural heritage, organizing its analysis around two dimensions: "Tangible (Perceptible Heritage)" and "Terrifying (Affective Heritage)." Its central argument is that these games act as significant, if largely unintentional, carriers of Chinese cultural heritage in the digital age. The author draws on Xenia Zeiler's classification of heritage-related games and Laurajane Smith's view of heritage as a meaning-making process, while acknowledging that scholars have not yet reached a unified definition of "Chinese-style horror." Chinese horror games are broadly defined here as titles developed in Mandarin, Cantonese, or Hokkien and aimed primarily at Chinese-speaking players.

The analysis centers on three case studies: Paranormal HK, Detention, and Firework. Each is examined for how it reconstructs recognizable material spaces and embeds folk customs, symbols, and rituals to make perceptible heritage tangible. The horror mechanism then uses these elements as triggers that amplify affective heritage. The study identifies three such affective strands: Hong Kong's urban spatial oppression and local ghost lore, Taiwan's historical political trauma and surveillance anxiety, and the rural social reflections and collective melancholy accompanying China's early-2000s modernization.

The findings indicate that these games transform perceptible heritage into interactive experiences, with the horror genre serving as the key link between tangible and affective heritage. They reveal collective memories, anxieties, and reflections rooted in Chinese culture, and they function as unintentional digital archives while offering social commentary on modernization and regional development. The paper also observes that the cultural heritage embedded in Chinese digital games remains underexplored in existing scholarship, positioning Chinese horror games as a valuable addition to research on heritage representation in digital media.