Making a trailer for a piece of media has almost become its own art form nowadays. All the big blockbuster Hollywood movies pride themselves on being able to make the most explosive and bombastic sizzle to get fans counting down the days until release.

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Not only is it a matter of pride, but for a lot of media, it's the one chance to sell yourself to an audience who may not even know you exist yet. This makes trailers and commercials imperative for companies, businesses, or studios launching a new IP, and it's the same in the gaming industry. Over the years, fans have been blessed with numerous video game announcement/reveal trailers, television advertisements, and marketing campaigns that would make Tinsel Town executives green with envy.

10 Slay Bells Ring - Dead Rising 4

Dead Rising 4 Christmas Selfie Frank West with Drummer Elves

A very seldom-seen ad released for the UK market, Dead Rising 4 had a handful of humorous Yuletide-themed shorts to promote the game and its Christmas-centric, zombie-eradicating cheer.

While one ad toyed with the usual marketing undertaken by UK-based food retailer Marks & Spencers, another took a different direction but on the same path with their efforts to kick off the Yuletide “slay ride.” The ads very much get across the sense of humor that Dead Rising has always carried with it (just with more tinsel).

9 Monsters Wear Many Faces - Alan Wake 2

Alan Wake 2 Live Action Trailer Still

An example of intrigue and mystique as opposed to laying all your cards on the table, the long-awaited trailer for Remedy’s unique third-person shooter Alan Wake was a great way to tease fans of what was to come.

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Stretching through the decimated and corrupted area of Bright Falls, fans hear narration from a vaguely familiar voice. Talking of stories, monsters, and hope, scenes flit between standard reality and a much darker and twisted version of the surroundings.

8 Sinking Silence - INSIDE

Inside Video Game Child Hiding from Guards and Dog at Roadblock

Some trailers don’t need a big budget. Some trailers don’t need to dazzle an audience with supernova-level explosions or pulse-raising montages. Some merely let fans feel what their game is, transferring that essence through a screen, in less than a minute, and telling everything that needs to be known.

This was exactly the approach taken by developers PlayDead to promote their intriguing puzzle platformer, INSIDE. As the child slowly and ominously sinks into the water, glowing reviews and critical quotes pepper the screen, proclaiming the work of art that INSIDE is. Sometimes the best thing that can be said is nothing at all.

7 I'm The Bomb - Dead Island 2

Dead Island 2 Trailer Jogger running through beachfront

Dead Island had a pretty emotionally impactful trailer for its first game, but it took a very different direction and tone with its sequel.

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In the E3 2014 trailer, fans were treated to a jogger running through town, chaos erupting behind him as zombies attack helpless people, all set to the banging tune of Pigeon John’s "The Bomb."

The trailer signaled a dramatic shift in the attitude of the series and has gained something of a cult level of fame and appreciation after having spent most of its life in development limbo.

6 Ghostface Killer - Dead By Daylight

Dead By Daylight Ghostface with Knife Waving

All of Dead By Daylight’s character reveals are spooky cinematic spectacles. From the coughing, sputtering introduction of the Clown to the iconic throwbacks of movie monsters and slashers like Michael Myers and Leatherface.

Almost all the other character trailers incite fear in the player by showing them the terrifying power of the new menaces. The deception of the Legion, the relentlessness of the Huntress, the fortitude of Nemesis. One character, however, takes a different tact.

Ghostface’s trailer has an element of humor to it that fits with the dark comedy that features in the Scream films. It’s a great example of how juxtaposing themes can contrast in a positive manner to evoke a different kind of horror.

5 Run. Hide. Survive. - Alien Isolation

Alien Isolation Amanda Ripley looking at Scanner

The key aspect (and hardest part) of a trailer of any project, or indeed product, is to establish what to expect from the element being advertised within a very short space of time. To show enough to entice the audience to ignite their own intrigue, but not overplay one's hand and spoil potential surprises. Alien Isolation’s trailer is a prime example of how to do this right.

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Espousing the key tenets of Isolation’s gameplay of “run, hide, survive,” the eponymous isolation is palpable, even in under a minute of footage. Like it or not, the hunt is most certainly on.

4 Your Mom Hates Dead Space 2 - Dead Space 2

Dead Space 2 Marketing Woman in Pink with Glasses Shocked

Rather than search for people with countless good things to say about their game, for the marketing and release of Dead Space 2, Visceral Games and EA looked for the worst possible things that could be proclaimed about their intergalactic gore-fest.

Subjecting various women (who one would assume were also mothers) to the most horrific and gruesome aspects of Isaac Clarke’s latest adventure, the participants were shocked and appalled at what they saw. In a classic play of reverse psychology, these parental reviews of “too graphic”, “too bloody”, and “too violent” were the exact endorsements EA was looking for.

3 Rendezvous With Death - Gears Of War 2

Gears of War 2 Trailer Marcus Fenix holding Locust Drone as Meatshield

While not technically a horror game/series, each of the original three Gears of War games for the Xbox 360 all had cinematic and well-crafted commercials. Gears of War 2 was hotly anticipated after the success of the first game. The trailer did not fail to disappoint.

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After non-stop guerilla encounters in the first game, seeing protagonist Marcus Fenix wandering through the Locust Hollow as he’s narrated by the poem of Alan Seeger hit differently. Poignant, impactful, and intriguing, the trailer showed just enough of Baird and Cole commanding legions of troops in the underground battle to make Gearheads conscript themselves for the next fight in no time.

2 Fight Like Hell - Doom (2016)

DOOM 2016 Doomslayer in Armor looking at Camera

Doom has always had a badass attitude from day one when it was the ambassador of chainsawing aliens into chunky pieces. With the revival of the series in 2016, it crashed back onto the scene with a trailer that was an amalgamation of all of the series' outstanding attributes.

The trailer shows off the morbid faces of the new-look enemies that were to bear the brunt of the Doomslayer’s wrath. The action is serenaded by the crunchy metal musings of Swedish Hardcore Punk band Refused’s “New Noise” track. It did the perfect job of conveying exactly what to expect from the modern iteration of Doom.

1 Tragedy In Reverse - Dead Island

Dead Island 1 Trailer Father reaching hand out to Daughter

Where Dead Island 2’s first trailer was a comical slapstick that signaled a more overt shift in the tone of the game, the trailer for the first Dead Island twanged at many a heartstring as it slowly dawned on fans what was happening.

As the trailer plays in reverse, set to the melancholic tones of the violin and walking piano notes, viewers witness the unfolding (or perhaps refolding) of a family being torn apart, almost literally. As a father valiantly tries to protect his family, his grief turns to physical trauma as he is attacked by his own daughter. Few trailers muster a genuine emotional sadness as Dead Island does.

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