New in v2
Per-layer arpeggiators
Create advanced rhythmic performances. Each layer can run its own arpeggiator — different rates, rhythms and patterns playing against each other.
Scare Tactics
Frightful Atmosphere Design
Scare Tactics is a collection of unsettling atonal textures, menacing drones, abstract hits, curious instruments and eerie transitions; providing all of the elements needed to construct convincingly creepy horror scenes full of dark ambience, jump scares and ominous presence. In total, there are 200 'oscillators' as well as 50 production-ready presets.
£15.00 GBP
Personal License
Powered by Floe
Our free plugin for expressive performance — simple yet highly customisable with layers, FX, granular and more (CLAP/VST3/AU).
Part of Cinematic Atmosphere Toolkit
This library is one of the 6 libraries that make up Cinematic Atmosphere Toolkit. Have a look at Cinematic Atmosphere Toolkit’s page for demos and more information. We’ve recently made the individual libraries more easily accessible to buy separately — they’re full products in their own right.
Hear Scare Tactics in Action
Atmosphere Demo — Stuart Keenan
0:00 1:00
Sampler Demo — Sam Windell
0:00 0:35
Scare Tactics plays in Floe, our free plugin for Windows, macOS and Linux. It's where your library lives, on its own or alongside any others of ours: a preset browser, three layers for blending instruments into a single sound, and filters, envelopes and a rack of effects to shape them with.
Scare Tactics belongs to our Originals Series. It was first made for Mirage, Floe's predecessor, but is now fully at home in Floe: every instrument is tagged and ready for all of Floe's features, arpeggiators and granular synthesis included. Its factory presets are the original bank, made before Floe's newer features existed, so they're yours to take further.
Floe is free and open source: install it, add your library, and start playing.
New in v2
Granular synthesis
Stretch, freeze and reshape any instrument into evolving clouds and textures — even multisampled instruments.
Pro effects rack
Eleven high-quality, reorderable effects — including pro-standard reverb and delay, and convolution reverb with creative IRs.
Built for the studio
Four macro knobs for expressive performance of multiple parameters. MIDI CC, sustain pedal, undo/redo, A/B comparison for preset edits, visual EQs and a random variation generator.
Free and open source
Floe is a companion project to FrozenPlain — totally free and open source for longevity and ethical service to the music-making community.
Layer across libraries
Blend instruments from any library in a single patch. Floe's three-layer architecture, each with its own controls, allows for creating hybrid textures.
Details
Requirements
Runs inside Floe v2 or later, the free plugin
- Windows 10 or later
- macOS 11 or later (Apple Silicon or Intel)
- Linux (x86, glibc 2.31 or later)
- 64-bit DAW
Plugin formats
CLAP and VST3, plus AU on macOS.
Works in Cubase, Logic Pro, Studio One, Ableton Live, Reaper, Bitwig, FL Studio, Ardour, and more.
Library
- Floe format, fully tagged and integrated in Floe
- Download size: 141.6 MB
Help and support
Contents
Full preset list 50 presets
50 presets (complete production-ready patches) in Scare Tactics Factory Presets (v1.2).
Atmospheres & Textures 27 presets
- Crushed Bass Pulser
- Daunting Drone 1
- Daunting Drone 2
- Fearful Pad 1
- Fearful Pad 2
- Fearful Pad 3
- Fearful Pad 4
- Fearful Pad 5
- Fearful Pad 5 Mono Tex
- Fearful Pad 6
- Flashback
- Forbidding Drone
- Ghost Machine
- Hell Siren
- Intensity
- Mystery Moment
- Noise Rush
- Other Realm
- Paranoid
- Psycho
- Steam Scream
- Subtle Scare
- Supernatural Storm
- Torture Rack
- Tremolo Terror
- Wastelands
- Wide Pad
Hits 8 presets
- Haunted Hit
- Imminent Threat
- Spirit of 808
- Suspense Hit 1
- Suspense Hit 2
- Suspense Hit 4
- Terror Hit 1
- Terror Hit 2
Keys 8 presets
- B Movie
- Chime In
- Delayed Bass Pluck
- Epilogue
- Sub Level
- Subservient
- Tension Synth
- Wonky Key
Sound Effects 7 presets
- Disquieting Passby 1
- Disquieting Passby 2
- Ghostly Sweep
- Ghoul Approach
- Horrifying Creak
- Noise Swell 1
- Noise Swell 2
Full instrument list 200 instruments
200 instruments (sound-sources loadable into each of Floe's layers) in Scare Tactics (v1.2).
Abstract Textures 40 instruments
- Air Texture
- Apparition Texture
- Approaching Texture
- Background Texture
- Barren Texture
- Blank Texture
- Building Texture
- Cavern Texture
- Cloaked Texture
- Daunting Texture
- Devoid Texture
- Dread Texture
- Drifter Texture
- Drone Texture
- Eldritch Texture
- Fears Texture
- Fiend Texture
- Fright Texture
- Ghoul Texture
- Grim Texture
- Harsh Texture
- Haunt Texture
- Hell Texture
- Hermit Texture
- Hum Texture
- Intangible Texture
- Knife Texture
- Landless Texture
- Mechanical Texture
- Miasma Texture
- Moon Texture
- Paranoia Texture
- Percussive Texture
- Phobia Texture
- Shudder Texture
- Synth Texture
- Unstable Texture
- Vacant Texture
- Wanderer Texture
- Wraith Texture
Drones 20 instruments
Atmosphere 10 instruments
- Atmos Drone
- Foundry 1 Drone
- Foundry 2 Drone
- Gleaming Drone
- Grating Drone
- Ominous Drone
- Rumble Drone
- Ship Drone
- Two-tone Drone
- Wasteland Drone
Synth 10 instruments
- Crushed Drone
- Dark Mover Drone
- Dark Saw Drone
- Deep 1 Drone
- Deep 2 Drone
- Grid 1 Drone
- Grid 2 Drone
- Panner Drone
- Suspense Drone
- Wide Saw Drone
Oneshots 100 instruments
- Abstract 01 FX
- Abstract 02 FX
- Abstract 03 FX
- Abstract 04 FX
- Abstract 05 FX
- Abstract 06 FX
- Abstract 07 FX
- Abstract 08 FX
- Abstract 09 FX
- Abstract 10 FX
- Abstract 11 FX
- Abstract 12 FX
- Abstract 13 FX
- Abstract Swell 1 FX
- Abstract Swell 2 FX
- Atmos FX
- Atonal 01 FX
- Atonal 02 FX
- Atonal 03 FX
- Atonal 04 FX
- Atonal 05 FX
- Atonal 06 FX
- Atonal 07 FX
- Atonal 08 FX
- Atonal 09 FX
- Atonal 10 FX
- Atonal 11 FX
- Atonal 12 FX
- Chord 1 FX
- Chord 2 FX
- Clap FX
- Formant FX
- Hollow FX
- Horror FX
- Key 1 FX
- Key 2 FX
- Key 3 FX
- Key 4 FX
- Key 5 FX
- Key 6 FX
- Mech FX
- Metal FX
- Noise FX
- Noise Hit 1 FX
- Noise Hit 2 FX
- Noise Hit 3 FX
- Noise Hit 4 FX
- Noise Hit 5 FX
- Noise Hit 6 FX
- Noise Hit 7 FX
- Ominous 01 FX
- Ominous 02 FX
- Ominous 03 FX
- Ominous 04 FX
- Ominous 05 FX
- Ominous 06 FX
- Ominous 07 FX
- Ominous 08 FX
- Ominous 09 FX
- Ominous 10 FX
- Ominous 11 FX
- Percussive 01 FX
- Percussive 02 FX
- Percussive 03 FX
- Percussive 04 FX
- Percussive 05 FX
- Percussive 06 FX
- Percussive 07 FX
- Percussive 08 FX
- Percussive 09 FX
- Percussive 10 FX
- Percussive 11 FX
- Percussive 12 FX
- Percussive 13 FX
- Percussive 14 FX
- Percussive 15 FX
- Percussive 16 FX
- Percussive 17 FX
- Percussive 18 FX
- Percussive 19 FX
- Pluck Bass FX
- Reactor FX
- Sharp Snap FX
- Sub 1 FX
- Sub 2 FX
- Sub 3 FX
- Sub 4 FX
- Sub 5 FX
- Sub 6 FX
- Sub Drop FX
- Synth Hit 1 FX
- Synth Hit 2 FX
- Synth Hit 3 FX
- Synth Hit 4 FX
- Synth Hit 5 FX
- Synth Hit 6 FX
- Synth Key FX
- Synth Pluck 1 FX
- Synth Pluck 2 FX
- Thud FX
Transitions Passby 40 instruments
- Abrasive Passby
- Bass Passby
- Caustic Passby
- Chord Passby
- Creak 1 Passby
- Creak 2 Passby
- Creak Horror Passby
- Dark Passby
- Fright 1 Passby
- Fright 2 Passby
- Fright 3 Passby
- Fright 4 Passby
- Ghostly 1 Passby
- Ghostly 2 Passby
- Ghostly 3 Passby
- Ghostly 4 Passby
- Ghostly 5 Passby
- Ghostly 6 Passby
- Ghostly 7 Passby
- Ghostly Passby
- Harsh Passby
- Hell Passby
- Horror Passby
- Modulator Passby
- Noise 01 Passby
- Noise 02 Passby
- Noise 03 Passby
- Noise 04 Passby
- Noise 05 Passby
- Noise 06 Passby
- Noise 07 Passby
- Noise 08 Passby
- Noise 09 Passby
- Noise 10 Passby
- Phobia Passby
- Robotic Passby
- Screeching Passby
- Tonal Passby
- Warm 1 Passby
- Warm 2 Passby
All preset tags 52 tags
Every tag used on the presets, with how many presets have it
Sources 1
synthesized
50
Sound types 13
texture
17
hit
9
sound fx
9
bass
7
drone
6
riser
5
keys
5
pad
4
noise 2pluck 2transition 2oneshot 1soundscape 1
Moods & genres 19
cinematic
50
horror
46
dark
34
tense
27
eerie
24
ambient
15
menacing
9
aggressive
7
sci-fi 6thriller 5industrial 4electronic 4dystopian 2disturbing 2mysterious 1melancholic 1subdued 1dreamy 1ethereal 1
Timbres 19
metallic
29
dissonant
10
distorted
8
percussive
8
rumbly
8
harsh
7
gritty
5
non-pitched
4
pulsing 3hissing 2noisy 1lo-fi 1glassy 1fluctuating 1resonant 1ringing 1muffled 1warm 1whining 1
All instrument tags 47 tags
Every tag used on the instruments, with how many instruments have it
Sources 1
synthesized
200
Sound types 8
oneshot
140
sound fx
65
texture
40
transition
40
drone
20
bass
7
pluck
2
downer
2
Moods & genres 12
cinematic
200
horror
97
dark
76
eerie
52
tense
12
sci-fi
9
aggressive
7
mysterious
3
menacing 2dystopian 2subdued 1dramatic 1
Timbres 26
metallic
103
percussive
51
harsh
31
dissonant
31
non-pitched
21
evolving
18
rumbly
14
fluctuating
9
distorted 9multi-pitched 8gritty 8pulsing 6noisy 5airy 5digital 5grainy 5ringing 5cold 2hissing 2resonant 2muddy 1fuzzy 1glassy 1breathy 1smooth 1warm 1
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Scare Tactics
£15.00 GBP
Personal License
We don’t run seasonal sales; no need to hold out for one.