Horror games have been chasing the high that Hideo Kojima and Guillermo del Toro’s P.T. gave players since it launched on August 12, 2014, and Perceptum could finally be the game to not only accomplish that, but also exceed it in terms of how scary it’ll be. P.T. would go on to inspire endless ‘clones’ that emulate its same walking simulator horror gimmick, typically in a single corridor or claustrophobic house interior, and Perceptum is using a brilliant mechanic to give it an edge in a sea of similar experiences.

According to its Steam store page, Perceptum centers on “discomfort, uncertainty, and the feeling that something is always just out of sight.” To achieve this, the psychological horror game is forcing players to confront psychological horrors as a medium who wields a pocket watch mirror, and it is this mirror that could make Perceptum one of the scariest horror games in recent memory.

Perceptum Makes A Simple Gimmick Horrifying

One of the scariest things a horror game can do is ensure that players are deliberately seeking out the nightmares that they don’t want to see. To be fair, anyone playing a horror game probably understands that they’re hurling themselves into a position to be terrified, but layering that with gameplay mechanics intended to have players look where they may not want to is tremendously smart horror game design.

In the case of Perceptum, it can be horrifying just to see the player character peering back at the player every time the mirror is drawn because the game is played from a first-person perspective, and players may not immediately associate the medium as being the character they’re playing as. Plus, this horror game’s jump scares are not exclusive to the mirror, meaning that players will always be caught with their guard down because they may anticipate scares to come purely from when they are intently staring into the mirror’s reflection.

Can It Be Scarier Than P.T.?

As a literal and free ‘playable teaser’ that was exclusive to PlayStation 4, P.T. came out of nowhere, and is considered one of the scariest horror games ever to this day. This is doubly impressive, as its playtime is about half-an-hour to an hour long, give or take.

Perceptum is apparently expected to last about three hours, which means its story will hopefully be much more substantial with players taking on a cold case and investigating a family’s mysterious disappearance. It also means that there is likely to be far more frights, as well as heightened dread and anticipation every time players produce the mirror and peer into its reflection.