In the realm of fiction writing, the horror novelist stands apart. Horror fiction is a genre class of its own, and writers and creators, who specialize in this, develop creative styles of their own, just like in other genres. Thus, a novel or storyline by Stephen King will express events and ideas according to his writing style. This is what makes authors, with their specific and original way of writing, stand out among the many. The creative thought process of an author is a complex endeavor as it is the result of the person's experiences and developed viewpoints in life which come to fruition after quite a time of living. It is unique to the person and, in most instances, the main contributor to the greatness or uniqueness of one's work. Creative writing is a passion, and in the realm of the macabre, a nightmare brought into existence by the medium the creator uses to express it.

For Clive Barker, the medium started with words, thus earning him the reputation which as described by Stephen King as the future of horror fiction. Clive Barker is one of the most successful and prolific horror novelists of the current time, with terrifying novels like the "Books of Blood" series and the twisted "Coldheart Canyon," among several others. From there, he branched into film with the very successful "Hellraiser" movie series. At around 40, Barker got into art and since then has successfully created and marketed his own brand of horror-inspired paintings that would liken him to a modem day Vincent Van Gogh, with a much darker twist.

In 2001, EA Games published a terrifying first-person shooter entitled "Undying." The developers had a game at the time that they were developing but didn't have a solid objective and storyline. They turned to Clive Barker to come up with a unique shooter with a scary and twisted tale. To many gamers of the time, Undying was one horror classic worth preserving in the history of gaming, although many also believed that the game wasn't really able to capture what Clive Barker wanted to express. Games as a medium are a little bit different from both books and films since they are interactive and player-driven, and at times, the gameplay ends up pushing the story to the side in favor of the brutal action and combat of the gameplay.

Regardless, Undying had made its mark in the games market by infusing the famous Clive Barker brand of horror into the first-person shooter genre. Despite the limitations of the gaming medium, the game was able to hold itself up as a true horror classic and gain a lot of following among gamers of the time. The story is set in the elegance of the Victorian past not long after the American civil war and takes place in a haunted mansion with a man destined to confront the supernatural in the most gruesome of ways. Despite whatever shortcomings were inherently observed in the game, Undying deserves the right to be called a Clive Barker masterpiece.

Undying was not the only Clive Barker game that made its mark. A far more intense game was released in 2007, which is considered today as Clive Barker's strongest influence in the realm of FPS gaming. The game was called "Jericho," and regardless once more of the limitations of FPS, gameplay comes out as a classic in the Clive Barker sense. Released in 2007 by Codemasters, the game features action-packed and horrifying gameplay as well as a story that twists the boundaries of reality as we know it. Centered on the supernatural exploits of the Jericho Squad, an elite group of super-soldiers, each with his or her own supernatural ability, the game flows through several timelines in the most gruesome way, with death-defying encounters with monsters and evil spirits of all sorts. What's more, Jericho enabled the player to play each of the main characters providing different points of view and experiences with respect to the events happening in the game.

Both Undying and Jericho have no doubt contributed to the way horror games are viewed and played by providing the Clive Barker brand of storytelling. The main difference, though, between books and films is that gaming is player-interactive, and the fulfillment of the story will depend on how the player handles the gameplay and the completion of it. Though the game's medium is a little bit different from what most bestselling authors are used to, as Clive Barker himself had expressed, video games are one medium with the immense potential to deliver the horror genre to the masses.