Slitterhead Was Originally Meant to be Open World

Silent Hill, Siren, and Gravity Rush creator Keiichiro Toyama and his team at Bokeh Game Studio are set to deliver a new horror title in the form of Slitterhead later this year, though even a passing glance at the game is enough to tell you that it is not looking like a traditional genre experience, instead adopting an action-horror approach revolving around a unique body-swapping mechanic. Interestingly enough, if things had gone a little differently, Slitterhead would have also been an open world experience on top of that.

The same was revealed by Toyama in a recent interview with VGC, where he revealed that the initial plan in the early stages of Slitterhead’s development had been to build it with an open world structure, something that the development team ultimately decided against due to the game’s lower budget. The mission-based structure that the game ultimately went with, however, ended up working well for the experience, according to Toyama.

“One decision we made early in the game was that we originally wanted an open-world setting for the game, but it wasn’t reasonable with the budget,” he said. “That decision worked well, boxing in the missions and progressing through the storyline.”

Slitterhead is due out on November 8 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC.