Enter at your own risk and see what horrors await

What’s lurking in the dark? Can you find the evil before it devours you? There are several great card games and some combination style games that take you on adventures to discover what evil lies beneath. Ranging from cooperative to semi-cooperative to story mode and more. Here are the top ten best horror card games.

10. Xenoshyft: Dreadmire

Enter a battle versus aliens and save the base before it's too late.

In Xenoshyft: Dreadmire, you and your team will battle alien forces to the death, whether that’s your’s or the alien’s. Can you survive until the end?

Xenoshyft: Dreadmire is a cooperative game. Each person will have input into what cards are available to be drawn depending on the division they choose. Then, the adventure begins.

It consists of three rounds, each round has several phases. The first, a draw phase that everyone does at the same time. Second, the purchase phase. You will want to coordinate with the others on what they are buying before getting anything yourself.

In the third phase, or Nortec deployment phase, equip your men and play them on the board. Then comes the enemy deployment phase. Following this, the combat phase starts. Enemies are revealed and the text on the cards followed.

Other players will be able to help during the react phase if they want. If they don’t choose to help, then you begin the fight phase and either your card or the enemies will be damaged/defeated. Should an enemy still stand on your board, he can attack and damage the base.

All players continue around the board in combat. Then two more rounds are played in the same manner.

To win, you must go through all three rounds defeating the alien enemies before your base is destroyed.

9. InBetween

Torn inbetween the dark creature and townspeople, can you sway them to your side?

Ever torn between two worlds? Will the dark or light predominate? InBetween is a back and forth struggle between the creature and town to keep the people under their control.

You will play two-player: One person is the town and the other the creature. The cards are placed in a circle in the center of the table, alternating creature side up and town side up. 

There are four phases each player will go through. The awareness phase which you will only actually carry out one time the entire game. The action phase where you can influence people by playing a card, drawing cards, or gaining energy.

The final two are the activity phase and the movement phase. In the activity phase, you will look at the card that has the activity marker and if there are markers present carry out the effect. The final phase is the movement phase in which you will move the activity marker.

To win, you must secure three townspeople to your side if you’re playing as the town or devour three people if you are the creature. Another way to win is to move your marker to the sixth level of awareness. Finally, if you get down to only five characters left whoever has the majority of their side up wins.

8. Bloody Inn

Guests come for the night, but will they leave in the morning or be in the ground?

Travelers come to the inn for the night. Will they survive or will you kill and bury them before dawn?

The tracker board is placed on the table and traveler cards are placed along the board next to each room. You then can take various actions. You can bribe a guest, build an annex, kill a guest, bury a corpse, or pass.

To complete actions you will have to pay for them with cards from your hand. Killing and burying the guests earns you the greatest rewards. 

Guests in your hand are then paid and players with guests in their rooms get paid. Play continues this way until the deck has been exhausted twice.

To win you want to have the most money at the end of the game.

7. Horrified

Take on the Universal Monsters in an epic cooperative game. Will you defeat the Mummy or Frankenstein and his bride?

Step into the world of the Universal monsters. Trying to defeat the Monster of the Black Lagoon, Dracula, Frankenstein, and His Bride among others all at once brings on the fun in this one.

Horrified is a cooperative game using a board and cards. You will pick a character and start at the assigned location. You’ll also pick two to four monsters to play against.

Once the board is set up, players take turns doing different actions such as moving, helping villagers, picking up items, and going up against the monsters. After the players go, a card is turned from the monster deck and monsters attack!

You will win if you can defeat all the monsters you are playing. But you better get them beaten before the terror counter reaches zero or the monster deck runs out.

6. Betrayal at House on the Hill

Someone's going to turn on the group. Will it be you?

Set out on an adventure to discover what’s going on in the house, but be careful because someone can turn on you.

You will pick a player. Each player has four different attributes and markers to track them.

The house will be different each time you play as you will randomly be placing the room cards as you go. You will then be moving through those rooms completing actions. Some cards will have a haunt symbol.

If you roll fewer pips than the number of haunt cards on the board, the haunt begins. You will then refer to the booklet. A traitor is identified. The survivors and traitor read each of their roles based on the storyline chosen. 

To win, complete your objective in the story whether you were the survivor or traitor. 

5. Fury of Dracula

The most famous of all vampires. Can you evade the hunters long enough to win?

Dracula remains a notorious vampire to this day. Can you evade the hunters long enough to beat them?

Fury of Dracula is a one versus all game. One player plays as Dracula while the others are the four hunters. 

Dracula plays a card location in the spots along the side of the board. On your next turn, you will move to another location and play that down, sliding the first card over a spot. Some cards may be small vampires you are trying to get through which raises your influence.

Hunters move about the board and can complete a variety of other actions. If they go to a location Dracula has been the card is flipped over and you battle. Battles are fought by each player picking a card from their hand and turning it over at the same time.

To win as Dracula, you will need to gain 13 influence by evading the hunters and getting smaller vampires through. The hunters win by finding and battling Dracula and killing him.

4. Zombicide: Black Plague

Enter the world of Vikings and battle zombies to complete your quest.

Take on a quest in the medieval period to combat zombies. Can good triumph over evil?

You will pick a character to play your adventure as. During your turn, you will be able to take a number of actions. Up to nine to be exact.

You will be able to explore a room if no zombies are there which allows you to draw an inventory card. You can also move one space, take or activate an objective, make noise, attack zombies, and do nothing. Once finished, the other players take their turn.

After all player turns, the zombies activate. They move the number of spaces depending on the type of zombie they are or they attack players in the same room. Then more zombies spawn.

To win you must complete your quest.

3. Ghost Stories

Ghosts torment and taunt your team, do you have what it takes to defeat them?

Ever want to go on ghost chases? Join others and take on a haunted world defeating spirits from another realm. Do you have what it takes to beat the ghosts?

Ghost Stories is a cooperative game where you work to kill ghosts before they kill you or get overpopulated on your board. You will pick a color and then decide which side of your player board you want to use.

You will start in the middle of the board and ghosts will begin appearing and be played to the player boards depending on which color the ghost is. However, if you ever have three ghosts on your board at once you will lose a turn and a key. Run out of keys and you’re dead.

The ghosts have special abilities and can move forward, haunting the area you move in. When that happens that space becomes unavailable. Attacking and keeping the ghosts at bay is key, but more difficult than you may think.

To win, you must get through the ghost deck and defeat the end boss.

2. Dead of Winter

Survival is paramount. Do you have what it takes to make it to the end?

Can you survive ‘til the end? Or will the Zombies and elements drop your morale or kill you before you can meet your objective? Find out by playing Dead of Winter.

You will be playing as a number of people in Dead of Winter and completing a number of actions. You may have to roll a die depending on what you decide to do.

Moving to a new location along with a few other actions results in you rolling a special die. That roll can have no consequence or it can cause serious damage to you. 

You can also contribute to a crisis or even exchange cards with others. There are many different aspects and things that can be done in this game.

Everyone is going to be trying to complete one of many scenarios. In addition, everyone will get a secret objective and if they complete it, they win.

1. Arkham Horror

Enter at your own risk. Take an adventure in Arkham to discover the truth of what's going on before you die or go insane.

Set in the Mythos realm, embark on an adventure to discover the strange happenings in Arkham. Arkham Horror is a hit living card game with a great storyline. 

You will adventure out on a campaign to discover what is going on in Arkham. Taking on one of several roles, you will go through phases and actions to advance the story. As the story advances, more enemy forces enter the realm, hindering your progress.

Your objective is to get through the story. The act deck will move it along while the agenda and encounter decks will slow you down. Finish the story, win the game. Go insane or die and you lose.

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• Top 50 Fantasy Board Games for Adults 
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• 7 Reasons Why We Love Horror Games