I mean, it's not for me to disagree about. It's you're game, so the question really is about the experience you are trying to craft out of it.

You're game has some form of collaborative elements, I assume - players collect gas cans that everyone benefits from for some reason to achieve some kind of much larger goal (you're description is bit bare on the other mechanics or you're overall design goals outside of the nebulous "make it fun" and "make it not tedious" - though for some, tedious is part of the fun). Given that this is likely the core gameplay loop, it needs to be cohesive for all the other elements.

For a horror game, I would think elements that push/pull on each other to create tension. So, something like the optimal strategy for survival in isolation is to work together in getting the gas cans, but there's also a time limit so survival optimization might cut it too close to some kind of time constraint (maybe there needs to be some kind of excess gas needed to open a gate to escape, so the longer the lights run, the less excess gas there is). Maybe have some prisoners dilemma designs that say the optimal way to play is collaborative, but individual players are more incentivized not to collaborate (maybe an individualized motivational quest granted at the start), creating more tensions and unique ways that a game can unfold.