History Main / HellHotel

* ''Hotell'' is a mini-series by John Lees (Of ComicBook/Sink and ComicBook/AndThenEmilyWasGone fame) centered around the "Pierrot Courts Hotel", a motel by the side of Road 66 where every guest is forced to confront their demons - figurative or literal, when not both. Creepy nightmares, serial killers, ghosts, hallucinations and a Pierrot painting that moves when you're not looking are among the many treats awaiting the lost souls that end up in this bizarre place. And no need trying to look for it, because no motel by the name of Pierrot Courts actually exists on Road 66... Guests don't find the hotel, the hotel ''finds them''. [[spoiler: And then arrives the eclipse, when the real owner of the motel makes a visit...]]

* ''Film/{{The Boy|2015}}'' (2015) has this kind of hotel as its main setting, though the murders are not the fault of anything supernatural. The titular boy is responsible for them.
* The eponymous B&B from ''Film/DeadAndBreakfast'': home to SealedEvilInACan that touches off a ZombieApocalypse.

* Exactly where Barbara goes to look for help in ''Film/{{Dagon}}''.
* The horror movie ''Followed (2018'' is a found-footage movie covering the disappearance of the horror podcaster ''Drop The Mike'' while filming a Halloween vlog at the haunted Lennox Hotel. The Lennox Hotel itself is an Expy of the real-life Cecil Hotel, with its own versions of the cases of Richard Ramirez and Elisa Lam. Except here the haunts and devil-worship are real... And things get worse when the Korean UrbanLegend of the "Elevator Game Ritual" gets involved.

* The Three Cousins Motel in ''[[Literature/FeliksNetAndNika Feliks, Net & Nika and the Third Cousin]]''. It's a creepy place in the middle of nowhere with paintings that paint themselves and rooms that change their dimensions a la ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves''. And the owners are ''two'' cousins that are creepy, old women [[spoiler:(Actually witches. And the third one is the witch too.) that kidnap young women to have new bodies]]. ''Third Cousin'' is easily the scariest book in the series.

* The Gilman House, in Creator/HPLovecraft's ''Literature/TheShadowOverInnsmouth''.

* OlderThanTelevision: The sub-trope of "only one room" being haunted goes back to F. Marion Crawford's short story "The Upper Berth" (1894) where the haunting is not just in just one cabin on a ship, but mostly confined to the upper berth, leaving the person in the lower berth alone.

* And there's the Dowerton Station Hotel in ''VideoGame/DarkFall'' that's really haunted and disturbingly clean, so much that 2 ghost hunters came down to find out.
** Its sequel version in ''Lost Souls'', though, fits this trope to a T.

* In ''VideoGame/EarthBound1994'', the Threed hotel briefly becomes one of these when it is overrun by zombies.
** In ''VideoGame/MOTHER1'', the hotel in Spookane is similarly run by a Starman who attacks if the party tries to stay the night there. Unlike the above example, the Spookane hotel never returns to "normal" and is abandoned for the rest of the game.
* In ''VideoGame/Fallout3'', the Statesman Hotel. It is filled to the brim with Super Mutants, Centaurs, and mines. You can come here for an optional sidequest to save the Riley's Rangers.
** The Homestead Motel from ''Point Lookout'' is closer to the trope. There are three explorable rooms. 1D holds a dead Chinese spy killed before he could start his mission. 1G holds the skeletons of two bank robbers who died in a gunfight with each over about how to split the cash. Finally, [[RoomFullOfCrazy 1K holds]] a [[MonsterClown Clown Masked serial killer's]] [[BlackMagic bloody satanic altar]]… made of body parts.
* ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' brings us the El Rey Motel. Every bit as ramshackle as the Statesman, but populated with angry drug addicts instead of Super Mutants.
** Also in ''New Vegas'', the Lucky 38 casino is a milder example. While not actually dangerous (unless you betray the Mr. House and he sicks his robots on you), it has a very strong Hell Hotel atmosphere, being a once-popular and successful casino that no living being has entered in over 200 years. It's mostly unlit and eerily silent, but otherwise completely untouched by anything except time. The place would probably become ''[[NothingIsScarier less creepy]]'' if there were any actual dangerous critters living there. Also, the player ''lives there'' for the later half of the game. And no, you can't redecorate to make it a bit more inviting.
** Of course, perhaps the ultimate example of a Hell Hotel in ''New Vegas'' is the Sierra Madre, the centerpiece of the Dead Money expansion. A sprawling, labyrinthine villa, the Sierra Madre exists somewhere in the desert, though no one is quite sure where it is. A red, poisonous fog permeates the area. Ghostly figures wander the streets, attacking anyone who comes their way. Radios murmur to no one and put out signals that might interfere with your ExplosiveLeash. And, of course, there are lots and lots of ApocalypticLogs to find (including ones that are hologram recordings of many guests' final moments when the bombs fell, doomed to repeat for eternity...).
** There's also a minor example in the Mesquite Mountain Crater, an isolated and heavily irradiated crater in the far west of the map, guarded by several [[EliteMooks Feral Ghoul Reavers]]. Around the crater, there's a small building which, upon entering, you can find a dead [[OurZombiesAreDifferent ghoul]] named Dr. Rotson and a hostile robot. What it has to do with this trope? Well, the interior of the building is literally named ''Hell's Motel''.

* ''Videogame/FurFighters'' has a literal hotel inside of Hell itself. While inside Hell, the player will be forced to play through every character's personal hell including: climbing back into a nest that the character likely fell out of as a baby and is significantly larger in memory, running through the streets naked while attacked by the military, dealing with undead alligators in a quarry, navigating a maze in which you can see all of the enemies, but none of the walls, shooting insane children trying to kill you at a dinner party, and reliving old war memories. Despite how silly some of these may seem, the game treats every single one with a sinister tone.
** Throughout the hotel, besides the six rooms you are forced to enter just to clear the stage, you can see dozens and dozens of doors with bear motifs above them implying that each room is made for each bear in Hell. Additionally, while waltzing about the hallway, you'll be shot at by bears who seemingly appear from nowhere.

* ''VideoGame/TheJackboxPartyPack'': ''Trivia Murder Party 2'' takes place in [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the Murder Hotel]], where the poor souls that book a night are held hostage by a SerialKiller and forced to play a DeadlyGame... [[MundaneMadeAwesome of trivia]].

* The venerable, historic [[AC:HOTEL]] in ''VideoGame/MaxPayne''. Okay, so it's a standard film noir dive owned by third-rate mobsters. Max, an undercover cop, has free reign to climb all the way to the penthouse suite; however, once his cover is blown, the fire escapes are locked and the hopeless elevators aren't buzzing to life anytime soon. Max has to blast his way back to the lobby. The hotel itself is falling apart, as the only customers are drug dealers and johns.
* ''[[VideoGame/MysteryCaseFiles Mystery Case Files: Rewind]]'' begins with The Master Detective being trapped in the weird and very creepy Hotel Victory with many characters from his past (and we mean that ''literally'', as they all have been brought here from the past via TimeTravel).

* The very aptly named Hotel Horror from ''VideoGame/WarioLand4'', complete with AxCrazy ghosts.

[[folder:Webcomics]]

* Inverted in ''WebAnimation/HazbinHotel'', which is a literal [[HellOfATime hell hotel]] meant to [[AscendedDemon reform the damned.]]

* The WebVideo/{{Cultaholic}} team have inflicted this upon each other as part of forfeits for failing inter-office challenges. In particular, Adam was sent to spend the night in the lowest-rated hotel in Britain; he found used no2 canisters in the bedside table, blood (and more...) on the mattress, his bedroom door had no catch OR lock, and he was awoken at 1am by a couple loudly fornicating in a nearby room.

* ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'' once had one with a possessed family that Jack wandered into.
* Every hotel ever visited by the ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo'' gang. All of them were scary but for twenty-plus years none of them had real monsters. [[TakeThat Unless Sonny and Cher count]].
** The ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooAndGuessWho'' episode "Too Many Dummies" has such a motel that's actually set up as an intentional reference to ''Film/{{Psycho}}''!

** There's only one luxury hotel on ''VideoGame/SuperMarioSunshine'''s Isle Delfino, and it's haunted. Great.
** In ''VideoGame/MarioParty 5'', the "Hotel Goomba" mini-game involves the players trying to make it to the top floor of a hotel populated by Goombas. As the Goombas block the paths, the player needs to punch them to move them. The first player to make it to the top floor wins.

* In ''VideoGame/TimeSplittersFuturePerfect'', there's an arcade-mode map that's set in a creepy, run-down hotel with flickering lights, a misty outside 'arena', and the recommended AI-controlled characters are mostly zombies. And [[HellIsThatNoise the music makes it so much worse…]]

-->-- '''Foxglove''', ''Death: The Time of Your Life''

-->'''Host:''' This is your wake up call! ''Prepare to die!''

* An episode of ''Series/{{Newhart}}'' had Dick and Joanna traveling through a very rural area, only to stop at a small motel. [[SignsOfDisrepair The M in the Motel sign had burned out]], prompting Dick to call it "Otel Hell".

* ''Roleplay/NanQuest'' features a HellHotel that's both a TimeyWimeyBall and an EldritchLocation, trapping unsuspecting guests into a PocketDimension that's also home to a number of {{Eldritch Abomination}}s known as the "Uninvited Things" which, apparently, aren't all on the same side. [[spoiler:The hotel ''itself'', built from a holy place, is actually on the side of good, but can't do much to help.]]

** Also in ''New Vegas'', the Lucky 38 casino is a milder example. While not actually dangerous (unless you betray the Mr. House and he sicks his robots on you), it has a very strong HellHotel atmosphere, being a once-popular and successful casino that no living being has entered in over 200 years. It's mostly unlit and eerily silent, but otherwise completely untouched by anything except time. The place would probably become ''[[NothingIsScarier less creepy]]'' if there were any actual dangerous critters living there. Also, the player ''lives there'' for the later half of the game. And no, you can't redecorate to make it a bit more inviting.
** Of course, perhaps the ultimate example of a HellHotel in ''New Vegas'' is the Sierra Madre, the centerpiece of the Dead Money expansion. A sprawling, labyrinthine villa, the Sierra Madre exists somewhere in the desert, though no one is quite sure where it is. A red, poisonous fog permeates through the area. Ghostly figures wander the streets, attacking anyone who comes their way. Radios murmur to no one and put out signals that might interfere with your ExplosiveLeash. And, of course, there's lots and lots of ApocalypticLogs to find (including ones that are hologram recordings of many guests' final moments when the bombs fell, doomed to repeat for eternity...).

* In ''VideoGame/EarthBound'', the Threed hotel briefly becomes one of these when it is overrun by zombies.

* "Home By The Sea" by {{Music/Genesis}}, complete with inhuman spectres wandering around. Although unclear whether the building in question is really a hotel -- it may be a retirement home.

* ''Manga/UruseiYatsura'' has a few instances with scary but harmless ones, and then the Tomibiki High kids encounter a real one when Mendo, Ataru and Ten get love messages in a bottle asking them to rendezvous at a hotel in Cockle Inlet. Despite being warned by locals that it's haunted by the evil ghosts of an old woman, a giant man and a beautiful girl, the guys still go - dragging Lum and Shinobu along with them. This being ''Urusei Yatsura'' the ghosts were lucky to escape with some of their sanity still intact.

* ''Hotell'' is a mini-series by John Lees ( ComicBook/Sink ; ComicBook/AndThenEmilyWasGone ) centered around the "Pierrot Courts Hotel", a motel by the side of Road 66 where every guest is forced to confront their demons - figurative or literal, when not both. Creepy nightmares, serial killers, ghosts, hallucinations and a Pierrot painting that moves when you're not looking are among the many treats one finds in this bizarre place. And no need trying to look for it, because no motel by the name of Pierrot Courts actually exists on Road 66... Guests don't find the hotel, the hotel ''finds them''. [[spoiler: And then arrives the eclipse, when the real owner of the motel makes a visit...]]

* ''Hotell' is a mini-series by John Lees ( ComicBook/Sink ; ComicBook/AndThenEmilyWasGone ) centered around the "Pierrot Courts Hotel", a motel by the side of Road 66 where every guest is forced to confront their demons - figurative or literal, when not both. Creepy nightmares, serial killers, ghosts, hallucinations and a Pierrot painting that moves when you're not looking are among the many treats one finds in this bizarre place. And no need trying to look for it, because no motel by the name of Pierrot Courts actually exists on Road 66... Guests don't find the hotel, the hotel ''finds them''.

* The ''Hotell'' mini-series take place in the "Pierrot Courts Hotel", a motel by the side of Road 66 where every guest is forced to confront their "demons", be it literal or figurative. Ghosts, demons and serial killers are regular haunts of the place, there's a creepy Pierrot painting that keeps moving when you don't look, a path at the back that leads into a forest filled with wonders and horrors... And then things get worse when you realize that the Pierrot Courts is considered a urban legend due to no building or business of this name actually existing by Road 66...

* Also located in Los Angeles is Stay on Main, more commonly known as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Hotel_(Los_Angeles) Cecil Hotel]], which is notorious for its history of suicides and violent deaths, counting serial killers Richard Ramirez and Jack Unterweger among its guests, being linked to the "Black Dahlia" case, and for the mysterious demise of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Elisa Lam]]. The hotel closed in 2017 but there are plans to renovate the property into a luxury hotel.

* The ''Literature/GiveYourselfGoosebumps'' book "Checkout Time at the Dead-End Hotel". For starters, the mint on your pillow makes you a ghost. [[FridgeLogic Somehow]].

* The abandoned [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coco_Palms_Resort Coco Palms resort]] on Kauai in Hawaii. It's currently in the process of being remodeled and is set to re-open in 2018.

* The ''Right Inn'', where a very set-in-his-routine salesman passes out from the sheer horror. [[spoiler:It turns out that the inn's sign was on the fritz and it's actually The ''Fright'' Inn, a theme motel for horror buffs.]]

* The ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians'' series has the Lotus Hotel and Casino, a modernized version of [[LotusEaterMachine the Island of the Lotus Eaters]] from ''Literature/TheOdyssey''. People go in, get sucked into the awesome food and activities, and lose all track of time[[note]][[TVTropesWillRuinYourLife Sound familiar?]][[/note]] - when Percy, Annabeth, and Grover finally escape, they discover that [[YearOutsideHourInside what seemed like a few hours to them was in fact five days outside.]] Most people aren't that lucky, and they end up trapped for years.

* The horror movie ''Followed (2018'' is a found-footage movie covering the disappearance of the unfamous and controversial horror podcaster DropTheMike while filming a Halloween vlog at the haunted Lennox Hotel. The Lennox Hotel itself is an Expy of the real-life Cecil Hotel, with its own versions of the cases of Richard Ramirez and Elisa Lam. Except here the haunts and devil-worship are real...

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* {{Inverted|Trope}} in the film ''Film/HotelRwanda'', where the hotel is the relatively safe place, and Hell is outside.

* ''Horror Hotel'' from the lesser-known Plot-Your-Own Horror Stories series, is, unsurprisingly, all about this.

* Shake, Rattle and Roll, a segment of 1977's ''WesternAnimation/CBBears'', were three ghosts that ran a hotel for ghouls, ghosts, and monsters. Seeking to eliminate them was ghost exterminator Sidney Merciless.

** The ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooAndGuessWho'' episode "Too Many Dummies" has such a motel that's actually set up as an intentional reference to ''Psycho''!

* ''[[Ride/TheTwilightZoneTowerOfTerror The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror]]'' at [[Ride/DisneyThemeParks Disney's various theme parks]] is built on this theme. "The Hollywood Tower Hotel" allegedly lost a lot of business after a bolt of lighting removed two or three whole "wings" from the front of the building and sent an elevator (plus its five occupants) to another dimension in 1939. That tends to look bad on any hotel's record. It's gotten an "Attractionistas" souvenir doll, Holly, a creepy bellhop.
* A real example, the "Legendary Years" wing of the Pop Century Resort at Walt Disney World was abandoned in 2002 due to 9/11 related tourism dips. Since then, the economy roared and now once again whimpers, and in all that time the structures remained left behind, the only thing complete being the parking lot. In 2012, the empty resort finally opened as Disney's Art of Animation Resort, making this a subversion of the trope.

* [[https://www.history.com/topics/murder-castle H. H. Holmes' "Castle".]] Custom-designed by one of America's first {{Serial Killer}}s, it came complete with secret passages and a TortureCellar. It's not clear how many people he actually killed, since when he was caught, he just ran with it and started making victims up, including several people he claimed to have murdered that were still alive or who died in completely different circumstances. He claimed 200 and confessed to 27, but only nine were ever anything like confirmed (and four of those were after he left Chicago). The "hotel" part of the building was never actually completed, it was just a small apartment complex with storefronts on the first floor (making the higher numbers extremely unlikely). When he was executed a vigilante set the place on fire, but the damage was limited enough that the building was repaired and stayed in use for another forty years before being replaced by a Post Office branch.
* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambassador_Hotel_(Los_Angeles) The Ambassador Hotel]] in Los Angeles was like this for many years, as it went out of business after Robert Kennedy's assassination there. It was often used as a police training ground, as depicted in ''S.W.A.T.'', and as a filming location and backdrop for movies and television programs (e.g. Music/RoyOrbison chose it to film a TV special in 1988). It was ultimately demolished in 2005, and a complex of public schools were built in its place.
* Also located in Los Angeles is Stay on Main, more commonly known as as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Hotel_(Los_Angeles) Cecil Hotel]], which is notorious for its history of suicides and violent deaths, counting serial killers Richard Ramirez and Jack Unterweger among its guests, being linked to the "Black Dahlia" case, and for the mysterious demise of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Elisa Lam]]. The hotel closed in 2017 but there are plans to renovate the property into a luxury hotel.

* ''ComicBook/{{Superlopez}}'': The aptly named "Hotel Pánico". López, Luisa and Jaime have to spend a night there when surprised by a storm on the road, and plenty of scary things happen to them. [[spoiler:Eventually, Superlópez discovers that the whole thing was an idea of the owner, who wanted to spread the rumor of the weird incidents in the hotel to attract thrill-seeking customers, so this results in [[NiceJobBreakingItHero the closure of the hotel]], [[DownerEnding which leaves all its staff jobless]].]]

* ''Film/{{Hostel}}'' has a backpacker hostel in Eastern Europe that is the front for a secret criminal organisation which allows wealthy international sadists to rape, torture, and murder the guests.

* The Bramford Apartment Complex in ''Film/RosemarysBaby'', is not particularly frightening on it's own. It does become scary when you learn that [[spoiler: almost every one of its residents worship Satan and the Antichrist.]]
* The hotel in ''Film/SeeNoEvil,'' inhabited by an AxCrazy serial killer with a penchant for ripping out people's eyes.

* The Three Cousins Motel in ''[[Literature/FeliksNetAndNika Feliks, Net & Nika and the Third Cousin]]''. It's creepy place in the middle of nowhere with paintings that paint themselves and rooms that change their dimensions a la ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves''. And the owners are ''two'' cousins that are creepy, old women [[spoiler:(Actually witches. And the third one is the witch too.) that kidnap young woman to have new bodies]]. ''Third Cousin'' is easily the scariest book in the series.

* The ''Series/BatesMotel'' is the mysterious motel on the highway where Norman Bates gained his StartOfDarkness and hides his family's screwed up secrets. It naturally has a high number of mysterious disappearances surrounding it as well. It really doesn't help that throughout the series it always appears abandoned despite the vacancy sign reading open for new guests every day.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E11TheGodComplex "The God Complex"]] has the Doctor, Amy and Rory landing in an alien-created duplicate of a tacky '80s hotel where various people have been mysteriously transported as food for an EmotionEater alien minotaur, with their greatest fears in the rooms. [[spoiler:It's a hell for the minotaur, too.]]

* Played with in ''Series/MurderSheWrote''. It's not an actual motel which is the centre of a murder mystery, it's a movie set... of the [[ShoutOut Bates]] [[Film/{{Psycho}} Motel]]. Well, the house overlooking the motel, but it plays both the house and motel for maximum suspense.

** "Hammer of the Gods" featured a hotel that had been taken over by pagan gods as a trap for the Winchesters, and had locked the surviving guests in the larder.

* "Hotel California", by The Music/{{Eagles}}. The "Hotel" is apparently an allegory for the Southern California music industry of the mid-Seventies, or drug addiction, or who knows, just Southern California. On the surface the song describes the tale of a weary traveler who becomes trapped in a nightmarish luxury hotel that, at first, appeared inviting and tempting. This is an example where the hotel [[AmbiguousSituation may or may not actually be Hell.]]

* The trope namer, "Hell Hotel", by Music/TheyMightBeGiants, from their 1985 Demo Tape. Supposedly based off of the episode of ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'', "A Nice Place to Visit", except, about a hotel.

* ''Roleplay/SurvivalOfTheFittest'' version 2 had one of these. It became one of the bloodiest places in the game - no fewer than ''fifteen'' students met their ends somewhere within it. Escapades taking places there included (and were not limited to): murder (duh), castration, evisceration and ''necrophilia''. The V2 hotel was ''not'' a fun place.

* ''VideoGame/{{Control}}'' has the Oceanview Motel & Casino, an EldritchLocation that can only be teleported to by pulling randomly-placed lightswitches three times and can only be exited by solving strange puzzles in its rooms. While [[PlayerCharacter Jesse]] is never in any personal danger in it, there are still creepy things implied to be happening, such as a pool of blood developing from under one of the doors after a scream is heard. It's suggested to be a sort of shared dream, rather than a physical location... but then one time you go to it you can hear a husband and wife outside wondering why the hell this motel is locked up tight in the middle of the day, which complicates things even more.

* The Victory Hotel in ''VideoGame/DreamfallTheLongestJourney'' is particularly jarring if you played the original ''VideoGame/TheLongestJourney'', since it was formerly the friendly, cheerful safe haven for April…

** Also in ''New Vegas'', the Lucky 38 casino is a milder example. While not actually dangerous (unless you betray the Mr. House and he sicks his robots on you), it has a very strong HellHotel atmosphere, being a once-popular and -successful casino that no living being has entered in over 200 years. It's mostly unlit and eerily silent, but otherwise completely untouched by anything except time. The place would probably become ''[[NothingIsScarier less creepy]]'' if there were any actual dangerous critters living there. Also, the player ''lives there'' for the later half of the game. And no, you can't redecorate to make it a bit more inviting.
** Of course, perhaps the ultimate example of a HellHotel in ''New Vegas'' is the Sierra Madre, the centerpiece of the Dead Money expansion. A sprawling, labyrinthine villa, the Sierra Madre exists somewhere in the desert, though no one is quite sure where it is. A red, poisonous fog permeates through the area. Ghostly figures wander the streets, attacking anyone who comes their way. Radios murmur to no one, and put out signals that might interfere with your ExplosiveLeash. And, of course, there's lots and lots of ApocalypticLogs to find (including ones that are hologram recordings of many guests' final moments when the bombs fell, doomed to repeat for eternity...).
** There's also a minor example in the Mesquite Mountain Crater, an isolated and heavily irradiated crater in the far west of the map, guarded by several [[EliteMooks Feral Ghoul Reavers]]. Around the crater there's a small building which, upon entering, you can find a dead [[OurZombiesAreDifferent ghoul]] named Dr. Rotson and an hostile robot. What it has to do with this trope? Well, the interior of the building is literally named ''Hell's Motel''.

* Stage C of ''VideoGame/{{Galerians}}'' is set entirely in the Babylon Hotel, a crumbling, noir-ish place that prostitutes, would-be terrorists and (of course) drug dealers appear to call home. Only two of the characters that turn up in the hotel leave it alive.

* ''VideoGame/{{Lisa}}'' has the Resort Island, an island hotel populated by several non-hostile mutants with deformed faces who seems to idolize an crudely made giant sculpture of a trumpet. While it's not a dangerous place, it's definitely disturbing.
* The venerable, historic [[AC:HOTEL]] in ''VideoGame/MaxPayne''. Okay, so it's a standard film noir dive owned by third-rate mobsters. Max, an undercover cop, has free reign to climb all the way to the penthouse suite; however, once his cover is blown, the fire escapes are locked and the hopeless elevators aren't buzzing to life anytime soon. Max has to blast his way back the lobby. The hotel itself is falling apart, as the only customers are drug dealers and johns.
* ''[[VideoGame/MysteryCaseFiles Mystery Case Files: Rewind]]'' begins with The Master Detective being trapped in the weird and very creepy Hotel Victory with many characters from his past (and we mean that ''literally'', as the all have been brought here from the past via TimeTravel).

* Cairo-Stewart Hotel in ''VideoGame/PharaohRebirth'' should be a normal luxury hotel, but one bad guy turned all of the staff against you, there are falling chandeliers and deadly spikes everywhere, one elevator is haunted and infested with the spirits of the dead, and to top it off the same bad guy is trying to murder us with a KillSat! The bonus level added to the Steam version of the game is another example: Anubis took over the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas, turned the staff into humanoid animals and put even more deadly spikes everywhere.

* Stage 3-3 from ''VideoGame/{{Purple}}'' is a hotel that is riddled with spikes, inhabited by bats, has ''very'' low quality rooms ''and'' it has only one toilet which is the only way to access the second building. Who would be ''[[MalevolentArchitecture this]]'' sadist is a question for anyone.

** ''VideoGame/LuigisMansion3'' takes place in one of these called the [[IDontLikeTheSoundOfThatPlace Last Resort]], with Luigi needing to rescue Mario, Peach and a number of Toads from the ghosts that plague it.

* ''VideoGame/UrbanRivals'' the [[TheBerserker Berzerks]] reside in the Red One Hotel where its occupants are afflicted by some gas that turns them into red-skined, [[{{Series/Firefly}} hyper-aggressive]] people who'll pulverize anyone in arms reach.

** Also, the Los Angeles Sabbat have taken up resident in the abandoned Hallowbrook Hotel, which the player character must also visit close to the end of the game; while most of it is a decrepit ruin used only for sheltering the Sabbat mooks from the sun, the basement has been converted into a slaughterhouse for their leader, Andrei the Tzimisce, filled with mutilated bodies and thick puddles of blood. This is also where [[spoiler:Heather Poe, your ghoul, can meet her unfortunate death, depending on your choices.]]

* Season 2 of ''WebVideo/MarbleHornets'' opens in one, although its creepiness doesn't become apparent till a few episodes later, when Jay realizes that he [[spoiler:and Jessica are the only customers in the hotel.]] Just when he decides to leave, [[spoiler:Masky shows up.]]

* The WebVideo/{{Cultaholic}} team have inflicted this upon each other as part of forfeits for failing inter-office challenges. In particular, Adam was sent to spend the night in the lowest rated hotel in Britain; he found used no2 canisters in the bedside table, blood (and more...) on the mattress, his bedroom door had no catch OR lock, and he was awoken at 1am by a couple loudly fornicating in a nearby room.

* Katz Motel from ''WesternAnimation/CourageTheCowardlyDog''. Staffed by what is the cruelest villain in the series, [[CatsAreMean Katz]] (that is until "Rembrence of Courage's Past" in which The Cruel Vet took that position). You'll be fed to spiders by morning (Oh, and No Dogs Allowed).

* One of Creator/ChuckJones' ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' cartoons, "WesternAnimation/ClawsForAlarm", has WesternAnimation/PorkyPig and his pet cat Sylvester staying at a ghost town hotel populated by murderous mice. Sylvester is aware of the horrors, but being a pet, is mute and can't orally communicate it to his oblivious master.

* Shake, Rattle and Roll, a segment of 1977's ''WesternAnimation/CBBears'', were three ghosts that ran a hotel for ghouls, ghosts and monsters. Seeking to eliminate them was ghost exterminator Sidney Merciless.

** The Elisa Lam incident was notorious for making the hotel hell for ''all of the guests'' for days. In the days after she disappeared under mysterious circumstances, guests complained of problems with the hotel's running water. Namely, the water from the taps and showerheads would come out ''black'' and reportedly ''tasted funny''. Oh, and it also had [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking low pressure]]. When someone finally went to the hotel's water tank to check the problem, they found Lam's body inside. A 2021 docu-series, ''Series/CrimeSceneTheVanishingAtTheCecilHotel'' explored the mythology around the tragic incident, the history of the hotel, and the many online sleuths who became obsessed with the case.
* The abandoned [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coco_Palms_Resort Coco Palms resort]] on Kauai in Hawaii.It's currently in the process of being remodeled, and is set to re-open in 2018.

** ''VideoGame/LuigisMansion3'' takes place in one of these, with Luigi needing to rescue Mario, Peach and a number of Toads from the ghosts that plague it.

* ''Roleplay/NanQuest'' features a HellHotel that's both a TimeyWimeyBall and an EldritchLocation, trapping unsuspecting guests into a PocketDimension that's also home to a number of {{Eldritch Abomination}}s known as the "Uninvited Things" which, apparently, aren't all on the same side.