When it comes to horror, monsters make the fear palpable when executed correctly. Video games are in no short supply of evil monsters that set their sights on devouring human beings or taking over the planet. There are droves of cosmic horror entities of unimaginable design that exist within the contained universes of video games.
Some serve as specters, serving a higher power, while others are the main threat that the player must face head-on. On rare occasions, these monsters can envelop an eldritch theme, making for a truly terrifying and gruesome beast that will raise the hairs on the back of the necks of players and backseat gamers alike. These are some of the most terrifying eldritch horror monsters in games.
7 Rat King - The Last Of Us Part 2
The Rat King made its first appearance in The Last Of Us Part 2. It is a festering pile of decomposition, fungus, and flesh that exudes toxic fumes and the wails of the monster that make up its body. The Rat King is the result of several superorganisms melding together in a mix-matched chimera-like monstrosity composed of clickers, a bloater, and stalkers.
The Rat King possesses incredible strength and durability, able to shrug off most damage, even fire. Truly a monster created to test players, the Rat King has several instant kill abilities for players who don't keep their distance. In addition, the Rat King can split into halves, becoming a bloater and a stalker, making it the most dangerous infected in The Last Of Us 2.
6 The Leviathan - Dead Space
Dead Space is a king of horror in the gaming community. The sci-fi element mixes well with horror when it is up to the player to investigate an unknown threat infesting a food storage station in space. The gruesome discovery is a hoard of misshaped monstrosities called Necromorphs.
The source of the infestation is the Leviathan, a massive collection of evolution and mutation that had been drifting through space and collided with the USG ship by chance. The Leviathan festered and overtook the entire ship. Players have to take it out to rid the station of the ungodly monsters that had made it their breeding ground. The Leviathan is a conjoined mass of tentacles, toxic fumes, and a snarling, endless mouth created for the single purpose of devouring.
5 The Gaping Dragon - Dark Souls
Out of all the optional bosses within Dark Souls, the mangled appearance of the Gaping Dragon has to be one of the most terrifying. Visually, the Gaping Dragon is mostly torso, split down the middle, exposing an inner layer of jagged fangs and oozing digestive fluid. It is a mass of organic matter that has become so corrupted that there is no head to speak of.
However, players will be in for a challenge as the monster is quick and able to achieve moderate height by using its tattered wings that protrude from both parts of its body. The Gaping Dragon dwells in the Depths near Blighttown for those brave enough to face it.
4 Dagon - Call Of Cthulhu: Dark Corners Of The Earth
In eldritch horror, the cosmic gods, known as the Deep Ones, reign supreme. The existence of these entities can not be fathomed, and being in their presence alone is enough to make one go completely mad. Dagon is a deity within its esoteric order. In origin and birth, he is much like Cthulhu and one of the “Old Ones.”
Dagon has the body of a man-like creature, with arms and legs covered in thick scales. Its body resembles features accustomed to deep-sea organisms, such as fins and webbed hands. However, where Dagon’s appearance is truly felt is in his size. While most Old Gods have complete manipulation over how they are perceived, Dagon portrays himself large enough to stand straight up in the ocean where the waves barely reach his mid-section.
3 The Brain Sucker - Bloodborne
Bloodborne is filled with creepy crawly monstrosities that haunt the game’s world, seeking to devour, dismember, and decimate the player. Strolling down the wrong alley or turning the wrong corner can lead to fatal encounters against vicious beasts and cryptids.
One of the most fearsome creatures to inhabit the world of Bloodborne is the Brainsucker, highly inspired by the Mind Flails of Dungeons and Dragons, along with striking similarities with the Old Ones of the H.P. Lovecraft tales. The Brainsucker is a magic-using leech that can rob the players of their insight stat through a vicious grab that drives a tentacle into their head and feast on their brains.
2 Lady Dimitrescu - Resident Evil Village
Resident Evil Village was released with polarizing popularity, which stemmed from one of its main antagonists, a large-statured vampire madam by the name of Lady Dimitrescu. However, while the gaudy-dressed mistress is portrayed as an elegant temptress, in reality, she has a much more terrifying appearance.
Towards the end of the game, Lady Dimitrescu reveals her true colors, transforming into a gnawing behemoth resembling a mix between a dragon and a chimera, with the former humanoid torso of Lady Dimitrescu protruding from the spine of the beast. With a mouth filled with razor-sharp fangs and several jaws that reach out like tendrils, the Lady of Dimitrescu manor is truly the thing of nightmares.
1 The Presence Of The Moon - Bloodborne
Bloodborne shows various inspirations and embodiments of eldritch horror and Lovecraftian themes. More than just a handful of the creatures that hunt the player in the game are living vessels of many of the monsters that originated from old stories such as the Dunwich Horror and the Call of Cthulhu.
A hidden boss in Bloodborne takes in all the brilliant and vile aspects of eldritch horror in the shape of a hideous, tendriled mass of aggression and unspeakable power. The Presence of the Moon is a faceless being made of bone and flesh with a mass of tentacles growing out of its body. No sound comes from the Presence of the Moon, which only seeks to slaughter its prey with visceral precision.