Nightmare Fuel / Yu-Gi-Oh! The Falsebound Kingdom

• The beginning of the game has this quote, setting the tone of the story nicely.
  Those who claim to control the gods are in fact controlled by the gods.
• As Yugi, Kaiba and their friends enter the game and the story begins, static sound effects play over the dialogue, before cutting to a black screen saying the safety locks have been engaged and it's beginning transition to Mode-2. If the player doesn't know the story it can make them think something's wrong with the real-life game, and the characters being trapped inside the game is scary as well.
• In a case of unintentional nightmare fuel, Kaiba's meeting with Pegasus is done with a repurposed sprite from Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories. The problem is that Pegasus doesn't blink or move at all, the background glows red intermittently from fire, and it looks like this◊. Scott Irvine's theme playing doesn't help.
• Scott Irvine was a background extra from the manga and anime before appearing in the game as the main villain, making him a case of From Nobody to Nightmare. It's really highlighted in Yugi's side of the game, since they have no idea who he is.
  Joey: Who the heck are you!?
  Scott: Not that it matters much to you, but my name is Scott Irvine. All you need to know is I'm the one holding your life in my hands.
• Letting Tea lose her escort mission results in her crying out for help as the Rare Hunter defeats and kills her, while Yami Yugi looks on helplessly. In most Yu-Gi-Oh games the characters aren't in physical danger, making it surprising and unsettling.
• Scott brainwashing Yugi's friends is done with a horrifying mugshot of his face that fades into static when he's done, complete with glowing eyes, a swirling vortex background, and mind-numbing music. Put together, it's so effective it can make the player feel brainwashed.
• After you defeat him once, Scott brainwashes Yugi's friends and makes them attack him, with Joey saying that only one of them will leave the battlefield alive. The dialogue just before he brainwashes them is very unnerving.
  Scott: Let me share something with you. The human mind is a lot more fragile than you might think. You'd be surprised how few people have a clear and unwavering idea of "self." The only thing tying you to this world right now is your mind. And luckily for me, I can control anything here. So you see, it's quite simple for me to exert my influence on your minds.
• After brainwashing Tea, Scott makes her attempt a forbidden spell that will destroy the world, with herself as the tribute for it. If the mission timer runs out, she succeeds and kills everyone.
  Tea: In the name of all that is dark, I call upon the Dark Winds! Come forth and lay waste to these lands!
  Game: The power of the spell brought forth an incredible storm. The storm laid waste to the world, destroying everything in its path. The resistance, the empire, Yugi and friends were completely destroyed...
• If you win the second brainwashed Joey fight with anyone but Mai, he fails to break free of the mind control. Scott sets Joey up to kill himself via a hypnotic suggestion, and Yugi and friends can't even take revenge on Scott since he appears as a hologram. The music does not help, nor does Scott mockingly offering condolences.
• Your second encounter with Yami Bakura has him threatening to burn Jakhud to the ground. If you fail to stop him from reaching the city, he burns it down in a special cutscene showing the city on fire... and you get a scene of Fizdis crying out for her parents.
  Fizdis: AAAAAAAH! Mom! Dad! NOOOOOOOO!
• In Yugi's storyline, Scott holds Mokuba captive, stealing his soul to force Kaiba to fight and defeat Yugi. Kaiba's campaign adds the detail that Scott threatened to kill Mokuba if Kaiba didn't fight Yugi, making the scenario much more dire; while Mokuba had his soul taken in the manga and anime before, his captors drew the line there.
• In Kaiba's campaign, if you fail to help Yami Yugi in time when he goes to rescue Mokuba, Pegasus reports that something's happened at the city and there's no way Yugi and Mokuba could have survived. The lack of detail leaves it up to the imagination what happened.
• Once the group reaches the computer system controlling the game, Scott mentions that Yugi and Kaiba could have elected to stay in the game forever instead of trying to escape, invoking a Lotus-Eater Machine. He doesn't understand or care why they'd want to get out, saying they should thank him for trapping them in the game.
• The final stretch of the game has the group exploring the computer running the game, which is compared to a body's heart and brain, invoking a Womb Level despite the cybernetic setting.
  Scott: You are all standing on a circuit that's just above the heart of the computer. They're much like nerves in the human body. They both carry electronic signals. The human brain is a collection of electronic signals. You're now closer to that than anyone has ever been.
• Scott Irvine set the entire game up to sacrifice Yugi and friends to DarkNite, who would then devour the world, and explains his plan in horrifying detail. By the end of the game, he's gone insane to the degree that even DarkNite calls him more than a little crazy.
  Scott: It's time for you to give me your souls! It only hurts in the beginning. After that, you'll be at peace.
  [the player defeats him]
  Scott: ...All I wanted to do was offer you as tribute painlessly. The darkness knows no mercy. It will devour your souls ruthlessly. Not even I can guess how painful that will be. You will live... just long enough... to regret the fact that you were not defeated by me...
  • Losing to Irvine before he summons DarkNite has him gloat over Yugi/Kaiba and offer them up as a tribute, implying they should be grateful to him for granting them everlasting life in the darkness.
  Scott: You fought well, I'll give you that, but resistance was futile. Be glad that you were defeated by me. Now you can be offered up as proper tributes to the Dark Spirit. This way you become a part of the darkness. In a sense, I've just given you everlasting life. Now, it's time for you to join with the darkness...
• The secondary function of Scott's virtual world was to be as realistic as possible in order to bring the wicked spirit DarkNite to the real world, which he would devour. He controls at least two Egyptian God monsters, which are extremely dangerous Physical Gods in-universe and very difficult to defeat, and his informal way of speaking from previous games is toned down to make him even more threatening.
• DarkNite refuses to tell Yugi his name as he prepares to eat the group, saying "What good does it do the cow to know the name of the butcher? It's still going to end up as steak."
  • Losing to DarkNite has him taunt you over trying to fight the darkness, then telling Yugi/Kaiba they must be tired, so it's time to "go to sleep."
  • If you're playing the game a second time, DarkNite becomes Nitemare, a skeletal being who wields an even stronger Egyptian God that you can't weaken. He vows that you will spend an eternity in darkness and tormented pain, and losing to Nitemare has him vow to add the heroes to his own form, forcing them to watch as he devours all of humanity.
• After you beat DarkNite/Nitemare, the real-life lab is set on fire and Yugi, Kaiba, and their friends barely escape with their lives.
• The ending says that Scott Irvine disappeared after the fire, with no apparent reason why he went mad or did what he did... but something he said just before leaving KaibaCorp gives clues, acting as a bookend to the quote that began the campaign. Worse, while DarkNite implies he's dead, the game states Scott's body was never found.
  It is inevitable that those who realize the existence of the gods wish eventually to control them.
• Joey's campaign has an NPC version of Marik who eventually turns into Yami Marik. He wields the Winged Dragon of Ra, implied to have been given to him by DarkNite, and rants about sensing the heartbeat of the great one as he prepares to destroy you. Yami Marik in the manga and anime was known for using Ra to temporarily kill Joey and burn anything that opposed him to ash, and had a very high win record, making the prospect of facing him at full power unsettling.
  Yami Marik: See? Can you hear it yet? Do you hear the heartbeat of the great one? We can all look forward to an eternity of never-ending pain now!

---