There’s a genre of games we don’t have a name for, but everyone will recognize as soon as I start listing titles: the Little Nightmares series, Limbo and its spiritual sequel Inside, Bramble: The Mountain King, After Us, White Shadows. All of them are more alike than they are different, but they aren’t otherwise linked the way, say, Hollow Knight and Blasphemous are by being metroidvanias.
With both Little Nightmares III and Reanimal on the horizons, I thought it was time to give this type of game an easy to remember moniker. My personal name for this sub-genre is drearios, a portmanteau of “dreary” and “Mario” that I think captures the core essence of the games under its umbrella. What makes a dreario? Having most but not necessarily all of the following six criteria.
1. The setting must be horrific or at least unsettling, if not outright scary. After Us and White Shadows are more grim dystopias than haunted houses, but they are definitely not bright and colorful. The rest are outright horror stories. Segments can be beautiful or peaceful, but the core moments of play take place in the dark. Major themes usually include death, exploitation, suicide, environmental collapse, critiques of capitalism, and/or grief. Art styles almost always include a lot of focus on shadows.
2. Basic linear progression. Drawing on what we used to call Mario games back in the 1980s and ‘90s, drearios are not open world experiences that favor exploration. This is what differentiates them from the expansive maps of the metroidvanias or sandbox survival horror where exploration is a key component. Usually, drearios have no accessible map at all. Most games are 2D or 2.5D, though some are fully 3D. Players are rewarded for progress through the story, not exploration and collectible hunting.
3. Little to no combat outside of boss fights. No guns, swords, or other empowerment tools. What few weapons may exist are temporary and in short supply. The primary gameplay loop may be puzzles or stealth, but most of the time the player character should feel helpless. In fact…
4. Player character is childlike. They may be a literal child (Little Nightmares) or simply childlike (After Us), but the point is that they are by design mostly helpless in the world they inhabit. This is usually offset by enemies that are far larger than the player character. Most of the time, the enemies attack by eating or consuming you. When you play a dreario, you are small and beset by nightmares.
5. Environmental storytelling is the priority. Drearios typically have little to no spoken dialogue, leaving events up to player interpretation. There’s a reason games like Limbo have entire libraries of game theory videos on YouTube. In practice, most drearios are basically impressionist mechanical poems that prioritize vibe over narrative.
6. Soundtracks tends to be droning and atonal rather than melodic. Music may swell during major story moments or boss battles (Bramble’s soaring rendition of “Hall of the Mountain King” for instance), but most of the time the player navigates in silence or dreadful ambience.
Dreario is not a very prolific sub-genre. There are probably less than 20 well-known titles. However, games in this sub-genre seem to be building off of each other and reacting to the evolution of the style in a way that solidifies them as the gaming equivalent of a musical scene. With more and more games following the style, it will be interesting to see where the sub-genre goes next.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.
