You have to be willing to turn down the lights, your face lit by the phospor glow of the monitor, perhaps alone in a room with only the game to keep you company. And part of the problem is with the games themselves. On second thought, don't, especially if you're apt to blame me afterwards. The 7th Guest , for all its popularity, made me giggle. It's easy for a horror game to slide into bathos.
Suspension of disbelief is a thin means of support.
If the game fails to keep that task easy, then the player will fall into cynical detachment. It doesn't help that many horror games being produced today have cookie-cutter plot and ideas. Fill up a game with overdone themes and it's likely to have all the tender juciness of burnt bacon. Hm, supernatural forces are terrorizing me in a manner involving lots of blood and gore. You'd think there were no other horrific ideas out there.