The History of Fatal Frame III: The Tormented

Shibata created the concept as production ended on Crimson Butterfly, and has said the setting drew on his own nightmares, including a specific dream of a haunted mansion filled with the spirits of dead loved ones. With the PlayStation 3 approaching, he made this the final PlayStation 2 entry, a trilogy closer written to be understandable to newcomers. The theme was fear emerging from everyday normality, horror that is indigenous rather than fantastic. Kikuchi set a design theme of interactive fear and split play between the Manor of Sleep and Rei's ordinary apartment, a dual location the series had not tried before. Rei, a professional photographer, salvaged a discarded plan from the first game, and Kei answered fan requests for a male protagonist. The game's key colour is blue. Kikuchi chose a summer release, to land in Japan's traditional ghost story season.

Ayako Toyoda composed the score, and made a striking choice: no composed music plays inside the haunted location at all. The Manor of Sleep runs on ambient and environmental sound; music is reserved for the real world, and one piece inside the manor is a lullaby sung by child actress Miyu Tsuzurahara, who also voiced the child ghosts.

Tsuki Amano returned for the theme song. She had begun a song called Tattoo before being contacted; Shibata brought her back from the outset, and during writing she reshaped it toward moving on from grief and retitled it Voice. A slight mismatch remained, her lyric about moving on against Shibata's wish for a song about remembrance, and Kikuchi had to resolve the friction between them.

It debuted fifth in Japan's charts and sold over 69,000 copies there by the end of 2005; Tecmo reported that it performed within expectations.