While Bloober Team has been quietly working on its remake of the original Silent Hill for quite some time now, studio CEO Piotr Babieno has spoken about the recent success of the horror genre, and in an interview with IGN, spoke about his own thoughts on the genre across games, books, and films.
Interestingly, Babieno believes that the horror genre tends to be quite successful when the world itself is facing major issues. This includes things like climate change, wars, and socio-economic troubles facing many parts of the planet.
“I would say that horror is always at its strongest when something bad is happening to the world. When we have climate changes, when we have wars, [or] when we have some economical issues in the world. This is the moment when society [has] some kind of fear inside.
“That’s why horror movies, horror novels, and horror games are working so well. It’s working for horror, but I’m not happy about it because it always means that the world is not in good shape.”
Babieno’s thoughts on horror shouldn’t be surprising to fans of the genre, since horror has long been used to discuss troubles facing humanity in more interesting ways than simply showing the problems. Even older horror films and books have done this, tackling a wide range of issues in the process, and some of the most critically acclaimed horror films in recent years have become beloved for doing a similar thing.
As for Bloober Team, Babieno has noted that the studio has always been a fan of the horror genre ever since it first released Layers of Fear back in 2016. He also spoke about how the team tries to be open with its fans and acknowledges criticisms and feedback, using it as a way to see where it could improve.
“There are a lot of great horror game developers in the world; we are one of them. We’re trying to focus [purely] on creating horror, so that’s why the iteration process allows us to work not just on the formula [for creating fear], but on the technological aspect of creating games.
“Also understanding our fans. Understanding what we did wrong and how we could improve. Project by project we are always thinking, ‘Is this the next step for the studio? Is this the next step for our fans?’ Because if it’s not, you don’t want to waste four years of your life creating a new title.”
This ties into how the studio has gone from being highly criticized for its early efforts in the horror genre to now being trusted by Konami to remake one of the most beloved horror games of all time. The team decided to essentially just focus on its projects to ensure that it was “delivering the best quality game, and put the noise around it out of our head.”
“So, this is what we tried to do; we believed from the very beginning that we’d be able to achieve this, and it happened. Silent Hill 2 was a pivot point for Bloober Team.”
As for the future of Bloober Team, the studio currently has a number of projects under development. Along with the remake of Silent Hill 1, it is also working on Project H, which is being headed up by the team behind Cronos: The New Dawn. However, this project is still some time away, according to Babieno, since it’s still wrapping up pre-production.
“This project is like a huge step from Cronos and from our previous titles, so it will deliver a new kind of experience. But at the same time it will be very familiar to everyone who [has] already played Bloober Team games. So we will still keep our DNA in it, but we will show this in a completely fresh new way.”
Babieno has some major ambitions for Bloober Team in the long term, noting that there might be “a place for a third huge horror IP” alongside genre heavyweights like Resident Evil and Silent Hill. “I think we’re on the right track with everything we’re creating. You can feel that Bloober Team’s games are a little bit different [to] those that are already available on the market.”
“The most important [goal] for me is to set new milestones in the game industry.”
