Horror cinema has a rich history of last-ditch heroines and scream queens, and horror games tend to have prominent female leads. Not to the extent of the movies, but there are still plenty of great female heroes in horror games, many of whom are the best horror game heroes regardless of gender.
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Given that the genre has a very significant female fan base, the presence of female protagonists can make them uniquely relatable. Not to mention the addition of specific female themes that can really transform a title and make it different from anything else.
8 Ray Kurosawa
Deadly Frame 3: Tortured
Sometimes, a character or plot point gives you a negative feeling at first, but they can end up winning you over. Ray Kurosawa, the protagonist of Fatal Frame 3: The Tormented, is a great example of this. Her backstory is tragic, as she is still dealing with the loss of her fiancé to a car wreck.
As the in-game notes say, at first it seems blatantly sexist, “in an accident caused by my careless driving.” However, it ends in execution, and in the end, Ray's journey to come to terms with his lost love and come to terms with it is a more powerful story than any other in the series.
7 Regina
Dino Crisis
Of all the fan-favorite Capcom series that have been shelved, Dino Crisis is one of the biggest. A survival horror series dating back to the PS1 days, the main female character, Regina, had a lot of appeal to them.
He was a red-headed badass with iconic looks and a great personality that stood out in these games. In Dino Crisis 2, you played as both Regina and Dylan, and a lot of people just wanted to play Regina the whole time. Dylan was very boring, although he is more important.
6 Fiona Yes
uninhabited land
If you have a female lead in a horror game, you can use different female-centric fears and themes. The best example of this, probably in the entire medium, is Haunting Ground. Fiona Belli is an 18-year-old young woman who is constantly being followed and watched throughout the game, a common female fear.
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She has been given sexual clothing by her captors, and again, sexual objectification is another female fear. All of this is beautifully and uniquely executed, making Fiona's eventual triumph over the odds all the more triumphant. You've also got to love her relationship with her best bud, Huey, an amazing canine companion.
5 Is it for
Eve's parasite
In the original Parasite Eve, Aya Bra was a great female lead. A 25-year-old NYPD cop who doesn't mess around, he had the perfect balance of being a badass and lovable and sympathetic. His relationship with Daniel and his son is a good example of this.
Many games in the late 90s only focused on the bad part of the game, which made him stand out at the time. Unfortunately, when 3rd Birthday was released, Aya was severely weakened and sexually objectified. However, in the original game, she was a classy PS1-era female character.
4 Jill Valentine
Resident Oil
You can tell that Jill Valentine is one of the top three female video game characters because of her importance in the PS1 days. Sure, you had Lara Croft, but Jill Valentine was one of two playable characters in Resident Evil 1, and pretty much everyone preferred to play her. Jill's campaign was easier, but the difficulty was on no-brainer rather than true easy mode.
He had two more inventory slots, could pick locks, grab a grenade launcher, and all that stuff is pretty important if you've never played RE1. The original RE3 is when Jill catapulted into legendary status as a horror gaming icon, defying all odds, with a final Nemesis kill punch line that still resonates to this day.
3 Claire Redfield
Resident Oil
Another great female character in the Resident Evil series has to be Claire Redfield. Debuting in Resident Evil 2, she was much younger than Jill in the first game and had a lovable youthful attitude that was brought out beautifully by Alison Court's performance in the original titles.
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Most of the best lines in the original RE2 and Code Veronica come from Claire. He eventually came of age as the series continued, which can be seen in the animated films and Resident Evil: Revelations 2, and he's well placed as a veteran in the story alongside other established series heroes.
2 Heather Mason
Silent Hill 3
For a show with such a female fanbase, it's strange that Heather Mason was the only female protagonist for the longest time. Heather is a lot like Claire Redfield, with that wild teenage attitude, but lead voice actress Heather Morris did a great job of not only delivering that, but making her likable.
The character could have easily come off as an insufferable clown, but Heather Morris brilliantly portrayed youth and innocence throughout the performance, especially in the emotional scenes. This aspect brings you to him. Not to mention, he has a lot of depth and charm to the world of Silent Hill, and there's a lot of great insight you can get by exploring different things in the game world.
1 Clementine
Telltale's The Walking Dead
Without a doubt, Clementine, along with Ellie and Alvi, are the top three female characters in video games of the modern era. While he wasn't the protagonist of the first season of The Walking Dead, after the emotional ending of that season, he is the protagonist of the story going forward. Clementine's journey through all four seasons is one of the best narrative-driven experiences in all of gaming, right up there with the Mass Effect trilogy.
The seasonal format is perhaps why Clementine connects with so many more people than other horror female protagonists, who aren't usually the face of the entire series. Yes, The Walking Dead is based on a comic, but Clementine was made for a Telltale series, so that counts.
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