The 9 o’clock tiger
this post was submitted on 17 Nov 2025
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I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
When I was about 6, I played a game for the Commodore 64 called Below the Root. I didn't know it was from a book series at the time (technically it's "book four" of Zilpha Keatley Snyder's Green Sky Trilogy from the late 70s), so the whole thing was kind of surreal and incomprehensible to begin with. I picked the little girl character (Pomma) and while I was exploring, I got fucking kidnapped by religious zealots and transported to an area of the map that was impossible to get out of. I had nightmares after that.
Runner up was the final town in Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. If you don't do the palaces in the correct order, you miss out an an item that lets you see invisible enemies in that village and the nearby combat zones. 8 year old me didn't know this, so I had skipped WAY ahead and was just out exploring, eventually blundering into said village. I started taking hits and had no idea why. Again, nightmares for a week after the fact.
waiting in line, getting a haircut, riding the train. pretty much over it all thanks to meds n therapy 🙂
oh and i stopped smoking weed 100 times per day, that really helped
When I was a child ,I would play PES (a football game by Konami) and I would pick Italy which was right after Israel ,I would get scared when the flag popped up
also would get scared of Shredder in the TMNT opening (2003) one in a video game dedicated to the 1st season of that show ,even had a nightmare if him once [watch out for Shredder]
weirdly I was never scared of the opening (I loved it) ,even the bit where Shredder saying "Watch out for Shredder!" ,I would only get scared from it in the game ,I think the volume had to do with it
When I was a kid my uncle had a really round rock that had a spot on it and he would tell us it was a cow’s eye. I was petrified by it and would run away the moment he pulled it out lol
Mayonnaise
SOmetimes if I'm drinking water from a drinking fountain, I get worried someone is gonna come up behind me and slam my face into it
When I was a freshman in high school I was drinking out of a plastic water bottle and an upperclassman squeezed the bottle and all the water came out my nose
It's a children's point and click game. It has puzzles like "Use key on lock" and "Use dentures on sausage".
For Magnus og Myggen, de følger deg som skyggen
Når Magnus løper, såååå flyr Myggen med ham 🎵
Ohh, I know this one! There is a part where a character is stuck and your have to get him unstuck by scaring him by selecting "scary" parts of sentences like: "Oh, no!" "Look behind you!" "A delicious cake!".
But to be fair, it did have some scary skulls falling down a staircase and a labyrinth at the end. What were you scared of?
I was like 4 or 5 and I was basically spooked every time they gave you a timer. Which once I found out that the whole game was timed got me proper spooked. At least that's what my mom tells me, I don't actually remember it that well. I remember the colour-fill-tool ghosts being a little spooky, I remember there being a scene where you have to play a xylophone (?) that was also spooky. OH and the ticking clock sound that gets louder when you're in certain parts of the house.
Oh yeah, the clock sound was probably the most spooky part. I still find Deadlines scary today.
what was a scary section of it
I was like 4 or 5 and I was basically spooked every time they gave you a timer. Which once I found out that the whole game was timed got me proper spooked. At least that's what my mom tells me, I don't actually remember it that well. I remember the colour-fill-tool ghosts being a little spooky, I remember there being a scene where you have to play a xylophone (?) that was also spooky. OH and the ticking clock sound that gets louder when you're in certain parts of the house.
I had an intense and unreasonable fear of Satan as a child. Yes, I went to Catholic school, how could you tell?
I was terrified of The Electric Company. Would sprint from the room as soon as Sesame Street wrapped up.
Low poly trees in games
I’m not scared of trees irl
I dont think its "st*pid" but silly. A mouse, because i am not afraid of mice -- but they have an ability to jumpscare any living creature by scurrying as fast as they can down their racetrack. Very cool but annoying when you involuntarily scream and your heart races while their little claws scrape as fast as they can go across the linoleum.
mice can also rear up, jump pretty high, and scream like a motherfucker.
one mouse managed to startle me and actually scared my cat. but then, a tiny aggressive songbird also managed to intimidate my cat.
I don't know what the right term for it is, but internet media-styled horror(think analog horror and creepypastas) really freaked me out until recently. I can't really dissect the why, but stuff like that did a good job messing up my brain chemicals and inducing a kind of lingering terror and paranoia.
Learning about what the CIA, FBI, NATO, and other similar western orgs do to minorities and people of the global south did a lot to help me overcome those weird fears. When I think about it, the idea that a malevolent entity possessing a game cartridge wouldn't immediately be sniffed out and weaponized by imperial powers breaks the immersion of these stories for me
Yeah if magic was somehow real you can't tell me that the CIA wouldn't be doing shit like in full metal alchemist where the shadow government attempts to do a blood sacrifice that consumes the souls of everyone in the entire country.
I used to be afraid of butterflies (they looked scary up close) and toilets (they made a loud noise) to the point up until late primary school I refused to use any bathroom outside my home unless someone was with me. Idfk why I was like this.
EDIT: Just remembered the time when I was little and I was immobilized by fear in my grandparent's garden for nearly an hour (felt much longer to me as a child) cause I thought I had heard(???) a butterfly behind me. There was nothing behind me. I just heard a random noise and my brain flew with it.
One time I was walking home incredibly stoned and my shadow came around from an unexpected angle and it startled me
When I was like 6 or 7 I became aware of the concept of friday the 13th being bad/scary somehow and that there was a scary movie about it, but I wasn't aware of the specifics or allowed to watch the movie so it was left to my imagination to fill in what actually happened on that date, also I misheard and thought it was the 15th, so on the eve of an entirely different and incorrect day I had nightmares about my whole family turning into vampires and my dog was a werewolf and some cows were also maybe vampires? I was terrified of vampires above all else so that's where my brain went I guess
I could not sleep and was scared to open the blinds after I listened to an audio version of SCP-001 "When Day Breaks". I was an adult at the time.
there was a thing I called the "tiger cat" which was just the creepy racoons from the "roll out" section of Fievel Goes West. It lived in my cupboard and I was terrified of it for months. Wouldn't eat with my back to it. Until one day my grandpa came over, told me to go to my room, made a ruckus and threw it into his trunk, driving it off far away where it could never get me.
The scene in question. The racoons (tiger cats) appear at 28 seconds.
Wicked witch of the west. Hid behind the couch!
Same here w Mars Attacks aliens
'oh but it's a comedy' yeh not for a *six year old
*I don't know how old i was when I watched it but around that age
i was afraid of the banshee in Darby O'Gill and the Little People (1959).
i just looked it up on youtube, seeing it for the first time in 40 years. its some odd shit. the comments are full of people being like "this scared the fuck outta me as a kid" lmao.
I got legitimately scared by a tube water slide for children a few weeks ago I was so embarrassed
A few weeks ago? How?
In burgerland we build massive indoor waterparks (I took my little cousins)
Oh oh you were in it . . . sorry, I thought you were afraid of a kid shooting out at mach 8 and taking your head off or something.
Lmao!
Nah I just got legitimately freaked out on this one slide and felt really embarrassed afterwards lol...
Probably the Dopefish from Commander Keen 4, that thing was terrifying to me as a kid.
When I was like 2 I remember seeing an advert with a talking fish puppet that sounded like Danny Devito that scared me lmao
I think it was some life jacket safety thing.