Horror shooters and action horror Cosmic and Lovecraftian horror PS1 horror

Shrine

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A skinless monster with a shotgun against the eldritch horde.

Platforms: PC, Linux
Stores: Steam, itch.io
Price: Free
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (92% of 967 reviews); rated 4.5 of 5 by 81 players on itch.io; 9/10 for Shrine and Shrine II together at NewRetroWave
Players: 1
Made by: Scumhead
Released: 2020

Get it on Steam itch.io (name your own price)

What frightens You play Tusk, a skinless monstrosity, battling a nightmarish eldritch horde through a retro Gothic Lovecraftian world. The screenshots show a chapel hung with bloody crucified shapes and stained glass, a flesh-patterned hall of horned green monsters and pale growths, and a dark graveyard among pines, all drawn in grotesque pixel art.
Content: gore, violence.

Shrine is a free retro first-person shooter by Scumhead, made in the Doom engine. As Tusk, a skinless monstrosity, you blast through 16 levels of a Gothic Lovecraftian world full of grotesque eldritch enemies. It began as a total conversion mod for Doom II.

About Shrine

Shrine was made by the solo developer Scumhead as a Lovecraftian total conversion for Doom II, and became a standalone game, free on Steam since April 2020 and on itch.io where you can name your own price. A larger sequel, Shrine II, followed.

You play Tusk, a skinless monstrosity, fighting a nightmarish eldritch horde across a retro Gothic Lovecraftian world the game calls the Elder World. There are 8 weapons, 13 kinds of enemy and 16 levels that the maker calls challenging but fair.

It plays like the shooters of the 1990s: fast movement, secrets, and a crowd of monsters to blast into giblets. What sets it apart is the look: hand-pixelled textures in limited palettes, a chapel hung with bloody crucified shapes, flesh-patterned walls, a snowy pine forest and a graveyard at night. NewRetroWave praised its palette and lighting for making the game an exercise in tension, and called its sound effects gross or eerie.

It suits players who like Dusk or Cultic and want a free, grotesque and strange shooter rather than a quiet, frightening one. Players on itch.io also call it hard.

How to play Shrine

Download it free from Steam, or from itch.io for whatever you choose to pay.
Move and aim like a classic Doom game, and shoot the eldritch enemies before they reach you.
Pick up the new weapons as you find them and switch to whichever suits the monster in front of you.
Work your way through each of the 16 levels to its exit, looking around for the way on.

Screenshots

Shrine screenshot: a shotgun aimed at horned green monsters and a hunched grinning creature in a purple flesh-patterned hall

Shrine screenshot: a fleshy hand weapon raised in a chapel with stained glass windows and bloody crucified shapes on the walls

Shrine screenshot: a fleshy weapon held over a pixel-art snowfield with pine trees and stone walls

Tips

Keep moving; standing still against a crowd of monsters gets you killed quickly.
Explore corners and side rooms; old-style shooters often hide health and ammunition off the main path.
Save your strongest ammunition for the bigger monsters.