Nightmare Fuel / Siren 1

There's a reason why the dead should stay dead...

General

• "Siren" is quite possibly the creepiest game ever, where out of 10 distinct characters you play as, Harumi Yomoda is the only character to actually escape from Hanuda alive.
• Sightjacking in general, is a strange phenomenon that allows living people to see through the eyes of anyone within their vicinity, even the Shibito. In fact, inhabiting a Shibito's mind gives you a faint idea of what it is like to be a shambling corpse, endlessly mumbling to yourself with a voice that doesn't sound remotely human.
  • Even worse: while you're sightjacking, you cannot move. The one thing you do not want to see when you're looking through their eyes is yourself. Worse is that there's no real way to avoid doing so, either. When you're discovered you see a flash of their viewpoint with you within their sight. When you die, you even get to watch your character's last moments from the perspective of the one that killed them.
• The Shibito themselves. In their first form, they look like deranged people, constantly smiling blissfully with blood seeping from their eyes. Then they mutate. Either into half-dogs, half-spiders, half-flies, or worse, retain their humanoid forms, but with horrible growths emerging from their faces.
• The endless horrific sounds (beware of spoilers) the Shibito makes when the player uses Sightjack to inhabit their vision is sure to unnerve players. No matter who you Sightjack, you'll always hear the deep, distorted breathing, maniacal laughers, bitter sobs, and unintelligible murmurs. And should you Sightjack them while they are looking for you? You can hear the excitement in their voices as they hunt you down.
• The "death" animation for the Shibito in itself, as it perfectly demonstrates their primary gimmick over other forms of undead. You smack them around with a lead pipe or pump enough bullets into them that they keel over, screaming out in pain with their muddled and indecipherable voices as they fall to the ground and stop moving... for about one second, after which despite supposedly being dead, they immediately shift into a low bow, very clearly still breathing as they slowly recuperate.
• The music itself is frightening at times. Special mentions goes to the Hanuda Elementary School, the Miyata Clinic, Karuwari, and Janokubi Valley.
• Only a few characters have access to weapons, which will allow the player to use brute force to take out a particular enemy that is in the way. However, no matter how many times a Shibito is knocked out, it'll get back up again. Self-defense is basically next to useless against the Shibito. If you want to stay alive, you need to avoid confrontation and hide at all costs.
• More fear is added due to game mechanics; Siren is very vague about what is needed to unlock later levels or to get through the ones you're in. This means you have to go everywhere and check everything - so you ''have'' to go into that dark scary shack you don't want to because if you don't, then you might not be able to beat the game. Your map only identifies landmarks which you will need to find; there is no "you are here" marker. Have fun exploring...
• Whenever Harumi Yomoda, a ten-year-old girl, is caught by a Shibito. The screen suddenly pans to a terrified child cowering in fear as the Shibito ominously watches her, especially when the screen darkens until the Game Over screen is displayed. The fact that you don't get to see what happens to the poor girl once she is caught makes it all the more terrifying.
• One advert for the game had to be pulled off Japanese TV for being too frightening. The scene in question is Tomoko who having turned into a Shibito ends up screaming for her parents with tears of blood on her face while banging on the window of the church.

Story Events

• Shiro Miyata is introduced as the twin brother of Kei Makino, who begins his story having woken up in the middle of the woods next to an unearthed gravesite. His behaviour is notably odd and distant as he meets Risa Onda, and reunites with his twin inside the hospital he works for, while on the lookout for the missing Mina Onda, Risa's own twin. Then it's revealed that Shiro was responsible for Mina's disappearance, or rather, her murder. He had strangled her to death and then taken her corpse to the woods to bury her, only for his plans to go awry due to a curse. He then proceeds to kill Risa Onda during her trance (due to Mina Onda's influence), resulting in her reanimation as a Shibito, and both undead twins hunting down Shiro for his crimes.
  • Shiro then proceeds to capture the two and operate on and mutilate them to learn more about the Shibito's biology, and we then learn of the reason why Shiro killed Mina in the first place: she was pregnant with his child. That squiggling thing on the ground Shiro stomps on? That was a fetus.
• Datatsushi, the final boss, and essentially the one being responsible for the curse that befell Hanuda. Its appearance is outright bizarre and alien, even by the standards of the Shibito. It is also invisible to the human eye, forcing you to use Sightjack and figure out where it is from the direction you're facing in its view.
  • Upon completing the game, the player is rewarded with a movie event that shows the 7th Century villagers devouring a crucified Datatsushi during a famine, where you can hear its cries of pain until it angrily howls to the sky and curses the villagers for their sins. It also shows Hisako Yao convulsing in pain as she is inflicted by its curse, thus setting the entire story in motion.
• The location deteriorates and changes as time goes on. Infamous mentions are the school gymnasium suddenly transforming from a barren and dark hall into a spider's nest specifically built for the Spider Shibito having made the gymnasium their home.
• Akira Shimura wakes up as a Shibito after committing suicide out of desperation to escape the nightmare he was in, only to discover that his efforts to escape were in vain.
  Akira: So... nobody can get away... eheh, eheheheh.... hahahahah!

Memorable Stages

• Harumi Yomoda's first level, where she finds herself trapped in an abandoned house occupied by fourteen-year-old Tomoko Maeda and her family, all having recently turned into Shibito. Not only is Harumi Yomoda completely defenceless after the death of her beloved teacher, Reiko Takato, but the player is also required to study all of the Shibito's patrol routes, find blindspots, steal the key from the kitchen room with the Mother Shibito occupying it, and leave through the second floor... all without making a single mistake. And if the player does manage to escape through the exit? Reiko Takato, now a Shibito, is waiting for you. Your only option at that point is to simply run, never stopping, never looking back, never knowing just how close Takato is to catching you, until you've circled around the house to clear the way out.
  Reiko: Don't go off by yourself anymore...
• Risa Onda is reunited with her twin sister Mina in the hospital, having now become a Shibito. As soon as the cutscene ends with Risa screaming in horror, the level starts with Mina standing a few feet away in front of you and the camera suddenly flashing red and shifting to Mina's perspective, who has now seen Risa. Because this is likely the first time the player ventured through the hospital in the game, it is difficult to run from Mina in a narrow corridor and not knowing which doors behind you can be opened. Chances are, Mina will have strangled you to death a few times before you can get your bearings on what to do and where to escape.

Unique Shibito Characters

• Shibito Naoko Mihama during Tomoko Maeda's second stage is very unsettling. First is the factor that she behaves very unusually for a Shibito by not attacking the player, but rather following her around and constantly begging to be looked at, occasionally interrupted by her cackling madly; leaving you to dread the moment of her suddenly turning aggressive and attack without warning. Special mention goes to her facial expressions and the way she shifts between them, combined with the blood on her face. And then there's her constant "Won't you look at me? Please? Tell me I'm beautiful!" cries whenever she meets Tomoko.
• Principal Eiji's constant calling out for Harumi during the school section with Reiko Takato. He continues to obsess over finding the child throughout the story, even upon becoming a Brain Shibito with blue and yellow tentacles sprouting across his head.
• Mina Onda is widely considered to be the most unsettling Shibito of them all, mainly due to her blood-red tendrils across her face and mouth, along with her dirt and blood-soaked nurse's attire. Her vocals during Sightjack mode are also incredibly unsettling and alien, which is also accompanied by her humming a lullaby on occasion.
• While they are never seen evolved, the Maeda family are unsettling due to their seemingly mundane attempt to return to their lifestyle as Shibito in Tabori House, all while the terrified and still-living Harumi Yomoda hides inside the house to avoid being seen. Mother Maeda is notable for her unsettling facial expressions, while Tomoko Maeda's skin has turned blue due to decay.

Others

• The advertising. One of the trailers for the first game featured insanely laughing shibito, as well as some gruesome environments and Gross-Up Close-Up used to full effect.