Death Knell Games On Survival Horror: “We’re Getting Sick Of The New Resident Evils”

Thanatophobia. Now that’s a catchy title. The word actually means ‘fear of death’ so you can hazard a guess as to what genre this debut title from Death Knell Games falls in to. Of course it’s a survival horror and one that we hold close to our hearts. Why? Well, as huge fans of survival horror we find ourselves rather disappointed in the AAA shift towards something that more closely resembles action-horror.

Survival horror was popularized around the early nineties, mostly because of a little game called Resident Evil. Characteristics of which were gruesome enemies, a creepy atmosphere, some jump shocks, awkward camera angles, cheesy acting and fiddly controls. Some may think this sounds awful and not very user-friendly. That’s just the thing about survival horror though; it’s often best when it’s not user-friendly, as in when in it’s awkward and clumsy…to a point.

Thanatophobia, being a modern game, should avoid such design flaws but it is hoped that it wll resurrect true survival horror as we elitist gits refer to it. One thing we wanted answered after finding out about Death Knell’s game was whether it was going to use the static camera angles of old. This is something we believe is intricate to the original survival horror and something that the game seemed to tease. We contacted Death Knell Games to find out more – this is the conversation that ensued.

John Pearce – Art Director/Team Leader
Danny Goodayle – Technical Director
Andreas Schouten – Narrative Designer
Kimmy Denkiewicz – 2D Artist
Mark – Business Manager

IGM: How did Death Knell Games start off?

John: Dan and I were at Greenwich University together. I returned to uni after fiddling around with film and TV and went back to try my hand at making games for a change of scenery. I was actually making something in Unreal 3 for coursework and I had heard the rumors that Dan was a very promising programmer and that I should look out for him. So I basically just asked him for a little bit of help and we went through some of the logic and math of the stuff I was working on. We then became friends and decided to do something together after uni. So, when I had finished I grabbed Dan as soon as possible and we decided to make Death Knell and produce a survival horror game.

IGM: So you two (John and Dan) are the original founders?

John: Yes, we’re the original crew. We then invited Andreas along, who we’re going to refer to as Bambi because that’s his nickname. Bambi is a rather large Swedish gentleman who I originally met via gaming on Steam. He’s quite obviously very intelligent and well-spoken especially when it comes to English so we wanted him to work with us. We actually all went on holiday together. Bambi invited us over to Sweden, so we went over with a group of people and talked a lot about the game because Bambi has a lot of interest in the style we wanted. I could see that he was really promising when it came to writing and we had a lot of ideas rotating while we were on holiday. I then talked to Dan about bringing him on board and so we invited him to join along writing for us.

IGM: So do any of you have any experience developing a game professionally before or is this your first big project?

Danny: This is the first large project that I have begun work on. Previously I have worked on iPhone games, I actually already have Shlumpf out on the iPhone. That’s along with a couple of other projects that were almost published, but no, nothing of this size – this is a very large game.

IGM: Okay. Anyone else?

John: No, I am coming straight out of uni but I do have a background with computers and technology since I was very young, maybe 8 or 9 so I guess since about the late eighties. So yeah, I have always had an interest in development and did well at uni with coding, so it’s more of a natural flow of progression for me.

Danny: John’s actually done a couple of student projects that were quite interesting at the time.

John: Yeah, like for my dissertation I actually did a piece on photorealism in games. So I was looking at Battlefield 3 and FarCry 2, that kind of stuff. What is the future of photorealism in games? What kind of timescale can we expect before it is really achieved and can it even be achieved? Answering questions like that. So what I did was to make a project in UDK in Unreal 3 making my own environments and figuring out how easy, or not, it was to actually achieve.

IGM: Understood. So, have you always had an interest in survival horror? Is this something that you have all wanted to do or was it an agreed upon compromise? Basically, why did you choose survival horror?

John: Well, I did a mini survival horror game for coursework and wanted to develop it into something more exciting. When Dan and I started to talk about what we wanted to do, we both knew we wanted to do a horror game but it was important for us that it was an old style horror game. It’s because we’re both getting sick of this, not that they’re bad games of course, but we’re getting sick of the new Resident Evils and Silent Hills. We grew up with games like Silent Hill 2, Fatal Frame and later it was Penumbra. So it is important for us to go back to the roots that made the genre exciting rather than having a spam-fest with loads of ammo. You know, it’s like if you can aim well then you can easily finish the game. We’re aiming for something a little more cinematic and a lot more old school.

IGM: Presumably you have seen the trailer for Resident Evil 6 then. What did you think of it? Just looks like an action game, right?

John: Yeah. It just looks like an action game.

Danny: Yeah.

Andreas (Bambi): Just awful.

John: The thing is people are already complaining about the storyline of Resident Evil 6. I think that most are excited that finally there are proper zombies back in it after they were absent in the last two. Don’t get me wrong, it will sell massively because people do want to play it. However, we’re aware of a community that wants to go back to the old school and remember games like Silent Hill which had a strong story. I mean, you played Resident Evil 4 because it was fun to go through collecting guns and getting headshots. Whereas Silent Hill 2 was all about the puzzles and avoiding trying to fight stuff, mainly because the controls were so crap, but you had to stockpile your ammo and actually think about what you were doing.

IGM: How do you plan on achieving this old school survival horror formula with Thanatophobia then? How are you balancing puzzles, story, atmosphere and combat?

John: Well, there will be combat in the game. Puzzle wise, it’s not directly a puzzle game like Myst or anything. We’re really aiming for that early Resident Evil/Silent Hill type balance between things.

Mark: It’s all about pushing the story and having intelligent gameplay with an evocative atmosphere.

John: Right, we’re especially trying to get over shock scares, like you had in Dead Space.

IGM: Interesting. What kind of scares are you going for then? Thinking about Amnesia, the scares in that were mostly found within the game’s atmosphere, using sound especially. Are you trying to avoid jump scares altogether or are you going more for that atmospheric type scare? Spooks, if you will.

Danny: It’s not really jump scares to be honest. How do we say this?

John: It’s all about atmosphere. Obviously we’re being careful not to say too much but we are going for atmosphere. Having a nice atmosphere. Whilst having…

IGM: …a good atmosphere?

John: Whilst having a good atmosphere…to create our suspense rather than having shock scares and direct…

Danny: Say atmosphere again please!

John: Yeah let’s just settle on atmosphere.

Kimmy: We’re trying to create an environment where the focus is the story and the atmosphere.

Danny: Maybe it’s more of a psychological thrill.

Kimmy: Yeah, it’s based on your mentality and how you feel as the story plays out in the unsettling atmosphere.

John: I’d say Kimmy’s hit the nail on the head there.

IGM: Okay then. So let’s move to a slightly different topic. How are you funding Thanatophobia at the moment?

Danny: We’re all paying for it ourselves at the moment – none of us have any funding. John and I have been doing this for about 9 or 10 months now.

Mark: Yeah, so basically it’s all being privately funded.

IGM: So presumably you’re going to be charging for the game?

Mark: Yes.

Kimmy: We haven’t really set goals as such for the marketing. We have spoke about it but our main interest at the moment is actually producing the game and getting our teeth into it. We do have an idea of it but we’re mostly focusing on making this game for gamers rather than really focusing on the monetary side of it.

John: It will be going out commercially at some point and the price will be reasonable for an independent game.

Mark: Yeah, my role is to deal with the commercials and thing. So while the game is being developed by the real enthusiasts I start to to build up the commercial side.

Danny: It would be nice to build up a community around the game as well so that we can get people more into it.

IGM: Right, so the big question is, and Danny has been very teasing with this one, are you going to have static camera shots in Thanatophobia?

John: This is something we have been discussing as to whether this is information we wanted to release yet or not. What we have decided to say is that there will be static cameras and it will be more of a cinematic style game. It will definitely not be an over-the-shoulder type game.

Danny: Not over-the-shoulder, not first person and there are static cameras…..with a twist.

IGM: Oh you had to say that didn’t you?!

Danny: Yep. Now you’ll want to know what the twist is.

IGM: Indeed.

Danny: Not going to happen.

IGM: Fine. So, we’ve had a teaser trailer and we have had the first batch of screenshots. Can we expand on that at all? Can you tell us where this location is? Who is this character? Anything like that?

John: We can’t talk about the character obviously. We don’t want to give away anything about the story at the moment. The story for the game has been completed but we will continue to develop it. At the moment, as we’re going for the old style of survival horror, we believe that giving away any elements of the story will go towards taking away from the player’s enjoyment of the game. We’re just being very careful about what we’re saying is all.

Andreas (Bambi): This is a very sensitive subject as the whole point of Thanatophobia is for the player to unveil the story as they progress through the game. We can however mention that the character is an ex-cop who is tracking down a serial killer and he has just recently been given a hot tip which has drawn him to a certain key location, which will be an important place in the game.

Danny: Actually John, I just remembered about those screenshots with the numbers in the top left. No one is asking us what they mean.

John: Well I presume that’s because people are presuming that it’s some kind of frame rate or something I don’t know. It’s not really for us to say is it?

Danny: Yeah.

IGM: What is this? Tease the journalist day or something?

Danny: Sort of.

John: But yeah we’re actually quite surprised that no one has even commented on them or anything.

IGM: Right. So, okay then. Are these numbers representing camera shots? Numbered camera shots like a storyboard?

John: The last shots we released are actual in-game screenshots of us playing. They’re in a sequence in a certain part of the environment.

IGM: Well anyway, you have stated that the game is going to consist of three episodes. Why did you decide that?

John: We decided we wanted to do three episodes at the start and the reason for that is because each episode would be its own little contained thing. We should state right now that this first game is its own story and will not necessary feed into the other two episodes. If we are to carry on with the other two episodes then they will add to the overall story and will concern two other important characters in the Thanatophobia storyline. To clarify on that again, the first game will be its own complete thing. Depending on how everything goes with this first game determines what happens with those other two episodes but its not something that can’t really be talked about now.

Danny: That was actually a question that someone asked of us before.

Andreas: Yeah, they were worried that by making Thanatophobia episodic we could somehow get away with making this first entry basic and that we could cut it short and it won’t be a full game. That is not at all what we are aiming to do. This first episode of Thanatophobia will be a standalone game, it will be a proper, full experience.

IGM: That is the major concern though for people with episodic games in general. They tend to moan about them as being only part of the package it seems.

Danny: I think the only stigma with episodic games is the fact that they don’t always finish. There’s been cases in the past where a developer has promised say four episodes and then they run out of money and they only make two.

John: That’s why we’re being careful when talking about the game as an episode because it is going to be its own thing. We plan on releasing the three episodes as a whole story but in the future we’re going to have to think about funding and where this game goes. We’re keeping the emphasis off of the three episodes. What we are saying is that we have enough story for three episodes and we plan to make them if we can.

IGM: So do you have a vague window of release for Thanatophobia or is it simply a case of when it is finished?

John: We have a vague window in that we’re saying late 2012. We have to flexible with this as it is completely self-funded and everyone is working on this from the kindness of their hearts in their spare time but the plan is for later this year.

IGM: And this is going to be PC only, isn’t it?

John: For now. That’s something we’ll discuss later depending on how well it does on PC. Obviously we have the tools to develop for the Xbox but we’ll see how the market is nearer the time.

IGM: So you have a team based in Sweden and the UK. How are you finding operating as an international team?

Danny: It’s quite easy actually. We have regular meetings via Skype. John and I pretty much talk on Skype every day as well and Bambi often jumps in too. We even have an American now as well and he works through John.

John: Yeah, so our American guy is Austin. He’s the newest guy on the team. He’s helping out on the prop modelling now as we realised we have huge environments now and it’s just me working on props, doing the art direction and setting up cameras. The project is getting big so we’re having to suck some more people in.

Danny: We recently put up an advert for a new character artist as well because our previous one went off to work on a secret, commercial MMO project.

John: Yeah unfortunately that happened. They were a real big asset to the team too, we got them on board just before they were about to land a big job so that was the problem there.

Danny: We’ve actually had a series of people leave just because they couldn’t commit the time or other personal reasons.

John: The thing is we’re quite secretive about it and the people we bring on want to tell others about what they’re working on and when they realise they can’t they lose motivation and disappear. The team we have now though are really committed and we all know that in the end we will have something out there.

Mark: Yeah it feels great having a solid team now and are making big steps forward. We’re all very excited about the release hopefully later this year.

IGM: Well you’re always going to get people drop out in these kinds of projects. That’s a natural occurrence, bound to happen.

Danny: It’s just a shame when you start something really ambitious and everyone is up for it. Then someone drops out, another couple of months down the line and there goes another one.

John: Well Dan’s mate who worked on Penumbra actually said that he was really surprised we were still going. Usually with the UDK teams they break up after a few weeks just because there is no structure behind them. Whereas I have fought against that by driving everyone quite hard and making sure that we all know that we are actually making something here. Everyone is excited about what we are doing. We just love what we are doing basically.

IGM: This is way in the future again so do your best to answer this one. Presumably you’ll be trying to get on to stores like Steam and Desura?

Danny: In terms of digital distribution, being independent, we want to get on to as many platforms as possible. We haven’t discussed with them if that would be possible yet. But yes, we will be interested to do so in the future.

IGM: You said earlier that you two, at least, had been working on the project for about eight or nine months now. How is morale and motivation now, still as strong as it was back at the start?

John: We’ve really been kicking into action the last few months actually. We had a lot of the mechanics quite early on for the game so most of that side is basically complete. We need to keep developing the art and later story lines, those kinds of things. I mean, at the start development was kind of on and off and as its gone on the pace has picked up and its become more and more heavy on the development.

Danny: What’s especially good now is that we can start showing off what we have been doing and are getting some positive feedback.

John: Yeah. We were under a lot of pressure to get that teaser trailer right because we wanted to announce the game but at the same time reveal barely anything about it.

Danny: The one downside of this is that we don’t know what to tell people and when.

IGM: Well, the thing is that a lot of games nowadays are very open about development, to the point where we obviously have alphafunding nowadays. Obviously you want to keep everything very secret though so that’s not even an option for you.

John: Exactly. That’s part of our thing. We want to keep everything secret and have some kind of mystery to keep people interested. Consequently our alpha will not be going out publicly.

Danny: Although that could be a good route to funding, we’re also a bunch of perfectionists and don’t want to show anyone anything that we don’t think is perfect.

Mark: Yeah the standards for this are high.

IGM: Of course. When things have progressed a lot further though, do you think you will you be able to release a demo of the game to show people what they can expect then?

John: There will be some kind of limited demo at some point to give people an idea of the atmosphere. Obviously we won’t be giving away to much though as we don’t want people solving our awesome puzzles too early, basically. We want them to play the game as a whole. We do actually have a gameplay trailer planned a little later on the alpha release, so there is plenty more news coming.

Danny: Watch this space!

IGM: Oh we will be don’t worry about that.

You can find out more information about Death Knell and Thanatophobia by heading over to the official website.