Before the release of Silent Hill 2 Remake, there was quite a bit of pessimism when it came to Bloober Team and whether or not the studio could pull off remaking what is considered by many to be one of the best horror games of all time. In an interview with PC Gamer, the game director behind the upcoming Cronos: The New Dawn—Jacek Zięba—spoke about how the studio stopped feeling like it was an underdog after Silent Hill 2 Remake’s release.
“We are starting to stop feeling like underdogs all the time after Silent Hill,” he said. “The Silent Hill era wasn’t so easy in the eyes of the public. There were a lot of voices: ‘Oh no, Bloober is doing this. They will destroy that.’ It was very tough for the whole company to stick to our guns and put all our heart into that thing, even if most people don’t want it. We proved people wrong, so that’s nice.’”
Questions about whether or not Bloober Team could pull off the Silent Hill 2 Remake came about largely because of the past titles by the studio—The Medium, Blair Witch, and the Layers of Fear games—were quite underwhelming when it came to horror. After Silent Hill 2, however, Zięba believes that the studio is “in a different moment” as it gets closer to releasing Cronos: The New Dawn.
“We’re in a different moment,” Zięba said. “I think we’re riding the wave of people being intrigued, and we need to deliver. We know we need to deliver. We put our hearts into all our games, and we do whatever we can to make it the best.”
In the interview, Cronos: The New Dawn lead writer Grzegorz Like also spoke about how Bloober Team wants to continue improving with every game it makes, even after the critical acclaim it got thanks to Silent Hill 2 Remake.
“Every time you publish a game, you learn, and then you change, you evolve. You try to be better. I swear to god, we want to be better—even after Silent Hill,” he said. “People were like ‘this is perfection!’ This is not perfection.”
“Or maybe it is,” countered Zięba. “We also like to say that with Silent Hill and Cronos, it’s like two pizzas with different toppings. Even if we created one perfect one, maybe now we can show you a different one.”
Cronos: The New Dawn is under development for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, and slated to come out in Fall. Earlier this month, Bloober Team had released a video showcasing some of the gameplay of the upcoming horror title, giving us a look at a creepy, abandoned hospital while also showing off how its gravity manipulation will work.
The video, featuring 10 minutes of gameplay through Section A-0, had the player partake in some gravity-defying platforming as they explored the hospital, while also dealing with Oprhans.
The studio had also previously confirmed that the PS5 release of Cronos: The New Dawn will be getting a physical release courtesy of a partnership with Skybound Game Studios.
