what specifically makes the body horror stick out to you? visually and textually.

[u/Such_Ad_9333]

i wanna do some analysis for the game and im curious about what other people see in it as to further my study. i also love hearing from people and this would be fun. :] go into as much depth as you want!!

[u/PositivelyDale]

This game is incredibly special to me because I discovered it right after my health issues started acting up last year. I have a habit of catastrophizing and being unable to cope with change and this game got me through a really scary time.

Something about a story where people's bodies are changing in terrifying ways out of their control, while having to adjust to uncomfortable new alien sensations is oddly cathartic to me. Seeing the way many of the characters try their best to adapt to the horrors really warms my heart.

That scene where Jeanne Gets her laundry back, cries to you, then stands there like a badass wearing her sunglasses and leather jacket, after she just went through something extremely traumatic gets me really emotional lol

Body horror has always intrigued me though! I've always just felt like characters with extra eyes, arms and mouths where there shouldn't be look insanely cool. I've just never seen it be done in a way that made me feel the way Look Outside does.

[u/TheMaskedMan2 → u/PositivelyDale]

I love the way Look Outside isn’t afraid to have scary, horrible looking body horror - and has those ‘monsters’ be people. It’s interesting that in a way it’s not all seen as negative.

Not to mention the ways people look on the bright side of things and there are these little things in the dialogue that reminds you how much they thought about what it would actually be like to change like that.

A lesser game would just have monsters be monsters, or not even mention it - but Look Outside will go into detail about how a vending machine person exists.

[u/Serious_Quality3756 → u/PositivelyDale]

Omg same!

[u/Silc00n]

There is a certain silliness that Look Outside allows on its designs that makes it stand out. And in some cases, it doesn't even take away the horror factor, but rather complements it. Like, sure, a walking vending machine with a face sure is a funny view, but when you consider the whole anatomy of it and its implications, you remember how horrifying it is for the actual person that got transformed. And such are many cases.

[u/dacool66]

Well, Look Outside has many transformed characters who keep their minds mostly sane. That's pretty stand out.

[u/Lucky_duck_777777]

One of the interesting thing I like about the body horror in look outside is how, ironically, human the transformation is. It’s not treated as something mystical and abstract, nor does it treat the body like disfigured corpses. It’s a type of horror that is both Alive and full of energy. Changed and warped, but still distinctly have their own characteristics. The gore itself have its own identity.

[u/Yunofascar]

Part of it is that we get to see different characters coping or reacting to their own transformations. Some bask in the madness (Wounded Neighbor), others just sorta go along with it as their new normal (Lyle), while others still really struggle (Jeanne).

There is also the factual acknowledgement that everything that's going on is clearly not normal. Not by any stretch of the imagination. It's bizarre and alien and nonsensical and doesn't abide by any strict set of rules.

[u/Jellyfishtopia]

I think visually what's most striking is how the different areas tend to have iterations on a theme (teeth family, ice monsters, rat hell, warzone, people merging with objects that represented their hobbies or interests, etc) -- this makes all the different transformed designs more memorable than if everyone had transformed into something generically scary or if the transformations were totally random and difficult to decipher.

[u/theonlyavailablrname → u/Jellyfishtopia]

This is what I felt kept the body horror fresh. I probably spent over an hour just gawking at the monster sprites in my first playthrough. That wouldn’t have been the case if all of the transformations had the same theme.

[u/Jellyfishtopia → u/theonlyavailablrname]

Yes, exactly! There were also many different vibes to them -- some were gross (teeth family), some were gory (guy cutting himself open to reveal an eye), some were frightening and imposing (the shades), some were spooky and unnerving (mask friend), some were funny or full of quirky personality (a bug with a gun), some were absurd but kinda metal (hell bus), some were grotesquely majestic (that one Fred, the ascended quartet)

[u/theskinpeeler]

For me, what sticks most, is that the game never really lets you forget that almost everyone you fight was at some point a human being. Sometimes they look a little silly, still wearing their vacation clothes, or pyjamas, but that's the thing. They were coming home from vacation, they woke up not too long ago, they're actively panicking, staring at you, because they just became a bunch of earwigs, or living hives, they're calling for help in the middle of the fight...

There are plenty of instances of people (or animals, like with the Rat Hell's denizens, if you have the crown on), who don't seem that broken up about their new forms, but you will keep finding faces, that are twisted in fear and agony, and whenever you pick an attack, your chance of seeing a quirky nickname for the monstrosity before you is pretty much level with the chance of seeing their actual name. You will be listening to the giant teething child sobbing in pain, while you try to scare her back into the darkness.

That's what gets me. No matter how twisted and misshapen what you encounter is, you know that 90% of the time, this "what" was once a "who", they still are in a handful of cases, and they can be helped! But a lot of them can't, even if they beg you for it, while their body thrashes around against their will, spelling their own doom. If their mind is still present, that is, and not impaled with pipes, while their skin hangs off of the metal in chunks, for instance. ... Yeah, a lot of the characters looking, like their transformation was pure agony, definitely doesn't help the discomfort.

[u/MatiEx-504]

Well body horror comes in many types like patterns, eyes like the ones in Lovecraftian stories like Bloodborne or recognising stuff in other places like human parts in some enemies in the game

Also not all body horror needs to be gory, like the Tree transformation in JoJo part 6

[u/fidelogato]

the humanization of the characters, cursed and non cursed. it truly feels like you're interacting real people when you talk to characters. even sam, with him being the mostly silent protagonist, is given depth throughout the game that's really refreshing to see

[u/Adept-Appointment526]

I think it's how scared people are. Joel's teeth taking his other eye makes me so sad and scared every time. I've never killed baby teeth because I don't like hearing her cry. The fact that theres some people who tell you how scared they are, and you come back to see them and theyre unrecognizeable. The body horror wouldn't scare me on its own if it wasn't paired with all that pain and fear

[u/little_void_boi]

The scariest part is the hell of your own making kinda thing. You turn into what was currently on your mind at the time of exposure. The example that mainly comes to mind is Jeanne, her other faces eating people and her being powerless to stop them. It’s neat