Once again, it's Halloween, and over the past two weeks, I haven't run out of some great recommendations if horror games are your kind of experience. You could prefer co-op horror games, single-player, nerve-wracking experiences, or even if horror isn't your cup of tea, you could just stick to thrill-leaning games. Or you could just play one single game that offers all three of these in one neat offering.

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The game in question, and the absolute perfect recommendation for Halloween, is The Outlast Trials. The single-player Outlast games have always been some of the scariest, most terrifying, and well-paced linear horror experiences. The Outlast Trials, on paper, is built around co-op gameplay, and yet, it manages to be everything, all at once, and succeeds at it gloriously, becoming perhaps the only horror game you need this Halloween.

The Outlast Trials does co-op horror absolutely right

The tension, the panic, the lack of co-ordination

There's a very special kind of horror that comes from watching your entire squad crumble under pressure, and I've rarely seen a game nail that chaos quite like The Outlast Trials does. The game's horror co-op structure is built around completing objectives with your friends, and it's not an exaggeration or general 'game-speak' to say that it requires genuine communication, resource-sharing, and trust. You can't brute-force your way through this — believe me, I've tried.

One of my most memorable moments came during the final trials of the first stage. The goal was simple: power up a machine to electrocute a prisoner. The only problem, however, was that we were being hounded by the 'prime asset' or the boss of that level while we did it, and as he descended upon us, the four of us descended into unbridled panic at the same time. Desperately rushing around the level and hiding in barrels and inside lockers, we decided that one player would lure the boss away by taking its aggro, while the other would set traps, and the remaining two would race to complete the objective. This was an on-the-fly plan; it was rudimentary, but it worked, and after fifteen minutes of playing hot potato with the boss, we all screamed — both in triumph and relief.

The chaos is never frustrating, because it is the whole experience.

These are the kinds of moments that define The Outlast Trials. The next stage had a similar situation, not in gameplay, but in the panic we had as we tried working together. You'll split up to scavenge faster, but separation leads to paranoia, especially when other enemies spawn with your friends' names and a knife with yours on it. One teammate might succumb to psychosis, another might end up taking damage from a floor trap, and before you know it, the 'split-up' plan is scrapped to regroup so that you can go revive a friend who was being just a little too brave. All of this is rarely frustrating, because this chaos is the experience.

Single-player runs in The Outlast Trials are genuinely terrifying, too

The game is more than accommodating of lone wolves

There's a reason I call The Outlast Trials 'the only game' you need this Halloween. That's because even if you prefer your horror experiences to be lonesome, this game provides a fantastic experience there, too. It transforms when you play alone, and solo runs in the game strip away all sense of comfort. What you're left with is nothing but your wits, a few tools in your extremely-limited inventory, and a feeling of dread at the back of your neck that keeps your head on a swivel every single moment. With no coordinated efforts to help scour through stages faster, no teammates to share resources with, and no one to watch your back, solo runs in this game are terrifying.

The Outlast Trials is available on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC. It also supports crossplay across these platforms.

Every sound feels amplified, because you know there's nobody on the map that is an ally. You could spend an eternity hiding under a bed while playing alone because there's nobody to tell you when to come out, or lure an enemy away from your hiding place. Plus, the inventory space, that would otherwise have been three slots multiplied by the number of players in the team, becomes just three while playing solo. Resource management on-the-fly becomes key, and the entire experience shines as the perfect example of adaptive horror design. Regardless of whether you're in a squad, a duo, or playing solo, The Outlast Trials reshapes itself to match your experience. The tension, the paranoia, the resources, and the entire experience adjusts to your lobby size, but the one thing that never lets up is the fear factor.

Two years after launch, The Outlast Trials is a content behemoth

It took a while to get going, but the content is endless now

When The Outlast Trials first launched, I'll admit it didn't have enough content to keep us around for long. My squad and I loved it, but after finishing the handful of available trials, we drifted away. What followed was two years of trying (and failing) to convince them to reinstall the game every time new content dropped. Now, however, things couldn't be more different, with the game having an incredible amount of trials, stages, and modifiers that you simply won't run out of.

The 2025 Halloween update, Project Geister, is the perfect example of it. It's one of the absolute best Halloween Events in any live service game today, barring my personal favorite, owing to the amount of care and detail (and content) that the developers have provided with one big event. With new Prime Assets, new enemy types, and an insane new game mode where you can invade other players' games while donning the identity of their friends, Project Geister alone is a content add-on that could sell the game on its own merits.

It took its while, but The Outlast Trials has finally grown into one of the most complete, replayable, and content-rich co-op horror games ever made.

The 2025 Halloween event alone could sell the game

A new impostor invasion mode has me losing my mind

2024's Halloween event introduced Project Geister into The Outlast Trials — a brutal limited-time event that ramped up everything brutal and terrifying that the game had to offer. In 2025, the project is back, and this time, it isn't alone. There's a new Invasion mode, which is just mind-boggling levels of brilliant. The idea of player-controller Impostors blending in with your squad before suddenly turning on you mid-trial? Chef's kiss. We had to switch off Discord and stick to in-game voice chat for the Invasions to really be effective, since your teammate suddenly goes dark out of the blue, and now you can't think straight.

There were more than a few times when I questioned if the person next to me was a friend or a foe, and with the proximity Shock Therapy modifier that punished me if I went away, I couldn't run away too far, either. This is one Halloween event that is deliciously evil, so much so that arguments among the squad have broken out about keeping invasions on or turning them off.

Normally, this sort of gameplay mechanic alone could sell an indie horror game, but for The Outlast Trials, it is merely a drop in its rapidly-growing content ocean.

The game's variators can keep you playing till Christmas

Every stage and trial is endlessly replayable

Over two years of adding content, maps, bosses, and trials, The Outlast Trials has also gone hard with their variators. These are modifiers that completely change the rules of play, and are just as sadistic as they are fun. Some remove your map and objective intel, so you better know what a particular map requires of you and your team. Other modifiers punish you if you stray too far away from your teammates with "shock therapy". Sometimes, your already-limited inventory gets even smaller, and the map itself bends over itself to make things even more hellish for you with faster, more dangerous enemies, and limited item spawns. The last time I had this much fun with a game's modifiers was with the No Return mode in The Last of Us Part II.

There are some even crueler ones that I just ran into, like CCTV cameras all over the map that shock you if they spot you, or one-shot enemies that rip through your heart in a second if they find you. This is what makes The Outlast Trials endlessly replayable. You can turn every session into a new nightmare, even while revisiting maps you've already seen. The stress of having to adapt and rethink everything you know to survive is relentless, and so is the reward of finally seeing things through.

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The Outlast Trials
Survival Horror
Systems
Top Critic Avg: 73/100 Critics Rec: 60%
Released
May 18, 2023
ESRB
M For Mature 17+ Due TO Intense Violence, Blood and Gore, Sexual Themes, Nudity, Drug Reference, Strong Language
Developer(s)
Red Barrels
Publisher(s)
Red Barrels
Engine
Unreal Engine 4
Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer
Cross-Platform Play
PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series

WHERE TO PLAY

DIGITAL

Red Barrels invites you to experience mind-numbing terror, this time with friends. Whether you go through the trials alone or in teams, if you survive long enough and complete the therapy, Murkoff will happily let you leave… but will you be the same?

Set in the era of the Cold War, human guinea pigs are involuntarily recruited by the good folks at the Murkoff Corporation to test advanced methods of brainwashing and mind control. In a world of distrust, fear, and violence, your morals will be challenged, your endurance tested, and your sanity crushed. All in the name of progress, science, and profit.

Ultimately, your goal is to complete Murkoff's therapy and earn the right to be released back into society. In order to do so, you must complete the Trials and the MK-Challenges.
Trials are immersive story driven therapies that take a certain time to complete. Mk-Challenges are shorter therapies occurring in modified or redesigned section of an existing map.

Genre(s)
Survival Horror

The only game you need this Halloween

Calling The Outlast Trials a great horror game is an understatement.

At this point, calling The Outlast Trials just "a great horror game" feels like underselling it. It's a fully-realized, ever-evolving experience that has managed to stay fresh and relevant two years after launch, and honestly, it caters to both veterans of the genre and newcomers, solo players and team players alike.

You may buy it for Halloween with its $12 price tag and 70% discount, but its content library and strong dev support could keep you playing till next Halloween, and by that time, there would have been so many more horrors to face, and trials to get through.