5 Best Backrooms Video Games You Can Play Right Now

Published Oct 14, 2026, 8:00 PM EDT Sharmila is an engineer-turned-gaming hardware journalist and freelance contributor at ScreenRant who has been covering the gaming and tech industry since 2021. While she first built her expertise writing about video games, she has since pivoted towards gaming hardware, with a focus on PC components, peripherals, handhelds, and performance-driven tech. When she’s not testing gear or writing about the latest hardware trends, she can usually be found diving into competitive shooters or keeping up with the evolving esports scene. Imagine walking through an empty office corridor with no idea where it leads. Deeply unsettling, right? The lights buzz overhead, the carpet smells faintly of dampness, and every door opens into another stretch of the same yellow walls. You know you should be somewhere else, but somehow, you can’t find your way out. And that’s exactly the kind of creeps a Backrooms game is built to give you. The Backrooms started as an internet horror story—a series of viral found-footage shorts created by Kane Parsons—about accidentally slipping out of reality and ending up in a seemingly endless maze of empty rooms. At first glance, everything might look… normal, but it’s not what it looks like. There are no haunted castles or abandoned hospitals here, just familiar spaces that feel wrong in ways you can’t quite explain. And the longer you wander, the harder it becomes to shake the feeling that something is watching you. Of course, video game developers didn’t miss the opportunity to take advantage of this weird genre. There are a bunch of Backrooms games that throw you into dark corridors with creatures lurking around corners, as well as make you rely on your own instincts to find an exit. Playing with friends doesn’t necessarily make things easier or less spooky, either. For this list, I’ll be talking about the Backrooms games that are already available to play, but there’s a new upcoming title that you may want to keep an eye on too. 5 Escape the Backrooms If you want to experience the best of the Backrooms genre but not alone, Escape the Backrooms is a good place to start. This first-person horror game takes you through more than 30 levels inspired by the original creepypasta, with each area presenting its own dangers and ways to escape. You can explore alone or team up with up to three other players, but having company doesn’t mean you'll feel safe. The game mixes exploration with puzzles and encounters with hostile entities. You’ll need to pay attention to your surroundings, figure out how each threat behaves, and work out how to reach the exit. Some creatures can hear you through proximity voice chat, meaning a careless conversation could give away your position. So, you better learn the significance of being stealthy. Its familiar yellow corridors are only the beginning. As you progress, the environments change, and so do the challenges waiting inside them. The game also expects everyone in a group to make it out alive, so leaving a teammate behind isn’t an option if you don’t want to face an unfavorable consequence. Escape the Backrooms is worth checking out if you want a mix of exploration, teamwork, puzzles, and tense encounters rather than a horror game built around jump scares alone. 4 Inside the Backrooms If you want a bit of brain-storming in your horror game, Inside the Backrooms is a great choice. This one sends players through different Backrooms locations, where solving puzzles, collecting useful items, and avoiding dangerous entities are all part of finding a way out. You can play with friends, making communication an important part of the experience. One of its more interesting mechanics is the anxiety system. Coming across certain entities can increase your character’s anxiety, affecting visibility and making it harder to stay calm when danger is nearby. Stamina also matters when you need to escape, while limited inventory space forces you to think about which items are worth carrying. Supplies such as flashlights, radios, and Almond Water can prove useful as you explore. Like Escape the Backrooms, there’s a proximity voice chat system, which adds another layer of tension. You can talk to nearby teammates, but making noise around certain enemies may attract unwanted attention. This turns even a simple conversation into something you need to think twice about. Besides this, Inside the Backrooms has several environments to explore, including dark rooms, caves, and other unsettling locations. Each brings different puzzles and threats, so you can't rely on the same approach throughout. If you enjoy working through problems with friends and want that experience coupled with some horror, Inside the Backrooms is the game for you. 3 The Backrooms 1998 The Backrooms 1998 takes a more personal approach to horror. Set in 1998, the game follows a teenager who accidentally ends up trapped in the Backrooms. Presented as found footage, it puts you in the middle of a disturbing situation where losing track of your location is probably one of the simplest problems you’d encounter. Noise plays a major role in survival: Running, stepping on broken glass, or knocking objects over can alert nearby threats. You’ll need to move carefully, hide when necessary, and decide when it’s worth risking a dash through an unfamiliar corridor. Some areas offer hiding spots beneath tables, inside lockers, or through crawl spaces, giving you options when an enemy gets too close. Exploration also requires a bit of planning. You can use a spray gun to mark paths you’ve already visited, while collecting supplies, clues, and useful tools helps you work towards an escape. Your inventory has limited space, so you’ll need to manage resources rather than grab everything you find. The game also limits how often you can save, making progress feel more precarious. Unlike the multiplayer-focused experiences I’ve mentioned so far, The Backrooms 1998 is a solo experience, which makes the challenge harder but not impossible to crack. Its emphasis on sound, hiding, and resource management makes it a strong pick for players who want to feel genuinely vulnerable while exploring the maze. 2 Backrooms: Escape Together Just like the name suggests, Backrooms: Escape Together is all about escaping the Backrooms together, although you can choose to do all of it alone. This first-person survival horror game lets you explore solo or team up with as many as five other players. Together, you'll venture through 11 procedurally generated levels, each with its own environment, puzzles, items, and threats. The layouts change with every round you play, adding an element of surprise in every run. Routes, item locations, and enemy encounters can differ between attempts, so memorizing one successful run won’t necessarily help you the next time. You’ll need to pay attention, search your surroundings, and work out how to progress with whatever resources you find. Communication is another important part of the experience. Proximity voice chat lets you talk to nearby teammates, but it also makes encounters more stressful when someone starts shouting in a panic. Each entity has its own behavior, so learning what attracts it and how it hunts can make the difference between escaping and becoming its next victim. Escape Together is still in Early Access, and it has been the same since 2022. Even so, its combination of changing levels, cooperative survival, and realistic-looking environments makes it a solid option for gamer groups looking for a dedicated Backrooms horror game. 1 Backrooms: Lost Tape Backrooms: Lost Tape takes you into the yellow rooms through the eyes of someone who never expected to end up there. You play as a cinema usher who accidentally falls into the Backrooms and must find a way out. The game uses a found-footage-inspired presentation, with a VHS visual style that makes its strange environments feel like recordings of something that should never have been captured. Rather than focusing on multiplayer chaos, Lost Tape puts the emphasis on solo exploration, puzzles, and uncovering what happened. You’ll travel through different levels, search for clues, and encounter hostile entities along the way. The story is divided into chapters called Tapes, with the available chapters following different characters and adding more details to the mystery surrounding the Backrooms. The absence of a traditional heads-up display also helps keep the experience immersive. Instead of relying on a screen filled with information, you have to pay attention to the spaces around you and work out what to do next. Its realistic visuals and unsettling atmosphere suit players who prefer a slower, more story-driven horror experience. If the idea of exploring empty rooms while piecing together a mystery appeals to you, Lost Tape undoubtedly deserves a place on your best Backrooms games list. Release Date May 27, 2026 Runtime 110 minutes Director Kane Parsons Writers Will Soodik Producers Chris Ferguson, Dan Cohen, Dan Levine, James Wan, Jenno Topping, Kori Adelson, Michael Clear, Osgood Perkins, Peter Chernin, Roberto Patino, Shawn Levy