What I mean by classical horror I mean the old fashioned horror things and monsters such as:

Vampires, Werewolves, Ghosts, Witches, Undead.

Haunted Mansions, Gothic Castles, Spooky Graveyards and Dark Forests etc.

Not something like Amnesia because I see it as Psychological Horror similar to Silent Hill.

I know they mabye way too old fashioned, but could it be possible to make them very scary in a movie or game today?

(Note I made this thread because I was playing Castlevania)

You know, my problem with today horror is, that it seems to be solely made of "A lot of gore and violence". And if I think of vampires, werewolves and othe rmonsters, the first thing which comes to mind is, sadly, splatter.
Wild beast goes around and kills everything it sees.
Well, not for vampires. The first thing that comes to mind for this is "overrated".

Now personal, I'm a big fan of haunted houses, but it seems there isn't that much of them in todays era. I read "Haunting of Hill House" two years ago and loved it. I enjoyed King's movie Rose Red and made it through "House of Leaves". Despite not liking Johnny's notes.
Another good example is a series valled... uhm... "American Horror Story", saw some episodes a little time ago. I think it the right atmosphere and was plenty scary, with all the ghosts haunting the house. At least to me.
The worst book about a haunted house was Ashby House, though. The main idea was good, but the execution... not. Lots of product placements, gossip about hollywood stars and some terrible sex scenes. And an ending that came out of nowhere.

But as I said, I'm afraid horror games will become more like splatter.
Dead Space would be a good example. The paranoia and claustrophobia the first game generated made it scary, despite not being new in any regards. Then came the sequel and I felt like playing a third person shooter.
Now, both games had emphasis on action, but the first rounded this up with its decent scaryness, while part 2 doesn't have it.

There is a haunted house (well, hotel) level in Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines that is really nicely scary.

For starters it would help if we didn't have people like Stephenie Meyers discrediting them (vampires and werewolves). Give someone a pen who can bring them back to their original portrayal, I think part of the problem with is the writers may not be aware of or disregard what the backstory is to the original myths.

I can't help but think that the main reason why the horror has gone away is because these creatures are overused and abused. Sort of like the direction the Slenderman is going, once something goes into the mainstream the horror is sapped away. While the concept is still rather horrifying when one thinks about it, but those monsters provide a face to the fear.

The fear of being stalked. The fear of being hunted. The fear of a stranger not being what they appear. The fear of science going wrong and humanity dabbling in what they shouldn't. Those creatures become the personification of those fears, and having a face to the horror in a way perhaps brings some comfort to the horror. Especially, with increasing familiarity with the personification. People start to think that maybe those creatures are not so bad. In other words, maybe there is some light in the darkness.

Yes, I firmly believe that it's possible, But it requires good story-telling and an understanding of the uncanny. It won't suffice to just present the viewer or player with a random choice of "spooky" creatures and expect them to be spooked by it. It's all about the way they are presented and how the story leads up to the encounter. Also, it's not uncanny if they act exactly like you expect them to act. And IMO the most terrifying aspect of these creatures shouldn't just be the threat of death (because that wouldn't make them any more "scary" than a truck racing towards you or someone aiming a gun at your head).

Horror is always "Psychological", dude... I don't get all these distinctions of horror we get these days.

That's the only reason you don't get scared with old horror movies. If it was "physical" or whatever is the opposite you could bet it would still be scary.

I agree with horror being psychological, since fear is just an emotion, your mind is actually responding to the prediction of any given situation outcome that goes against your safe zone.
Though, I don´t agree that people doesn´t get scared with old horror movies (by old I guess movies like "The mist (original)" or along those lines?), actually among old horror movies are the pinnacles of horror, then came all the nonsense killing movies, that had no horror at all, you were just anticipating a disgusting feeling, rather than feeling nerve wrecking anxiety of what was about to happen.
To me, good horror is more about what you can´t see, than what you actually see, building up suspense and fear by the unknown ("The Thing"). But some movies just rely on mindless killing as a focus to get you afraid, but it becomes boring and disgusting and maybe when you loose all sensitivity towards that, maybe, not even disgusting. So I can´t speak for everyone but at least to me, "physical" means "boring, uninteresting and repetitive". But again it may be more something of a "beholder affinity" thing, maybe some people react more to "physical, visual things" and others react more with "insinuation and hinting". I´m not saying that if someones gets killed (maybe even brutally) it´s not horror, but it has to count so to speak, it has to add to the context, what I´m against is when it´s just "ok, let´s see how many are going to get an axe to their heads in the span of an hour....in your marks....go!....kinda thing), that´s totally wrong, makes you feel exhausted by the repetition of disgust, than, by the thrill of the suspense, and that, to me, is no horror.

Amnesia is the perfect example of 'scary catle' stereotype done right. What on earth do you consider a non-psychological horror, bloody FEAR 3? :D

the original FEAR gave me some great scares,but the horror in the series are like screamers,the first time you have a mini heart attack,then it's somewhat sad.

I know, that's why I gave FEAR 3, or F3AR to be more precise (Fenixp shrugs) as an example. It's a horror-themed shooter, nothing more.

I was explaining it as best as I can because I see a difference between something like amnesia and classic horrors like Nosferatu or that famous frankenstein from the 1930s.

I am saying is it possible to make something like Nosferatu scary now and better than the old ones.
Did you see The Woman in Black? The whole movie is practically an homage to old school gothic horror.

The remake of Resident Evil on the gamecube was awesome and was genuinely spooky, the fixed camera angles and prerendered lighting effects captured the mood very well. Also I loved how if you "killed" a zombie and didn't burn the corpse, it would come back to life later in the game as a super-fast bloodhead thing. And in hard mode the gasoline bottles were rare so you had to "ration" which zombies to burn and which to leave...

Don't forget about the music and ambiance :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvPc06j9K2M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUsVYeMhkJc

There's a game coming up called Among the Sleep which does the whole haunted house thing, but uses a different perspective, having the player control a toddler. Remains to be seen of course how it'll play out but I guess one way of upping the tension is to put the player in control of a character who is potentially more vunerable, either due to who the character is or what they have as defence. So you don't feel you can rest on your laurels comfortably headshotting everything.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YWDQN_X5b-M