New Game Design/Gameplay needed for dealing with Enemies in future games

[EnDash]

this reminds me of this youtube video talking about designing cthulhu for video games:




TL;DR:
cthulhu is the embodiment of madness, human minds can't handle his existence let alone fight it. the reason he is so scary to so many people is because there is nothing that can "beat" him. you can only run away.

the moment you introduce combat, all that changes to "dangerous but manageable". suddenly you are not running for your life, but trying to figure out a way to kill that creature. it becomes a game of cat and mouse and not fragile men facing alien monstrosities.

this is why alexander in amnesia is not scary, because 10 minutes into the game you are told he is "old and weak" and that you should go and "kill him". there is nothing scary in that.

compare that with clarence from black plague, he can read your memories, subvert your reality, make you forget stuff and see things that re not there. he is a virus invading your body but also a personality spawned from your mind. how do you even begin to deal with something like that?

making enemies is hard, and making them scary is hardest. the best horror enemy in any game i ever played was the water lurker from amnesia and i think many would agree with me. it wasn't perfect but it came the closest.