Regret is a Survival Horror, a Passion Project, and a Personal Struggle

White noise

If you’re going through Hell, keep going

 

That’s the Winston Churchill quote that developer Aivars Priedītis of Revenge Games used to define his upcoming title, Regret– but the quotation echoes his own development process as well.

It was a long three years ago that Priedītis first conceptualized Regret, a narrative-driven survival-horror game heavy on the psychology; he wanted to create something that could affect his players and remind them of their own lives.

“Video games are the perfect way to tell the stories, to inspire people, maybe even give them strength to achieve something in their life, should they connect with the character,” Priedītis says. “You don’t see these sort of games very often.”

Regret follows Keenan, a teenage boy, and his pet fox, Curo. After Keenan’s mother dies, the boy is forced to move in with his father out in the rural town of “Silver Pines”. Upon arrival however, Keenan finds the place has been devastated by a literal living darkness, and his father, a stranger to the boy, is missing. Keenan must fight to stay alive, to cope with the loss of his mother, and ultimately fight for his sanity– a personal struggle. Despite some clear inspirations, Priedītis says that Regret is less Silent Hill and more Dead Space or Alan Wake– except without the unanswered questions.

“I just want to make it clear. It’s not about this weird place that seems to be alive and ever changing, it’s about the thing that is living there and changing everything and everybody… it has a reason to exist, and an explanation as to why is it there.” 

Some early concept art for Regret’s monsters

Regret will feature some classic survival-horror conventions, such as puzzle solving and limited ammunition to fight the darkness-spawned monsters. Players will need to adapt to their enemies– should they hide or fight and, if so, how? There will also be an inventory and upgrade system that revolves around scattered “blueprints”. Players will even have some freedom to explore outside of Silver Pines, and Priedītis says that “the further you go, the worse it’ll get”.

The game will shake some things up, however, by offering players a companion– something not often seen in the genre.

“[A] companion in a game where you focus on [a] character’s life and mind in pain, is a perfect element. [The companion is] a weak spot for a character, the perfect enemy, if you will. Imagine the fear of losing the very last piece that is keeping you sane.”

“It gives me a wide variety of ways how to write this story. Otherwise it would be ‘well, here you are, alone. In this dark room, go and survive.’ We’ve seen that before, right? Might as well make yet another zombie game. But [in Regret] you have puzzles… and something to care about.”

Priedītis still has more tricks in the bag, however, and isn’t shy to tease them on Twitter.

It’s obvious that Priedītis has a clear vision for Regret, but it took a lot to get there. Even now, he says that Regret will be something more, and something different, when players finally get the chance to play. In a way, Regret has been a personal struggle of Priedītis’ own.

“It’s damn hard to write such a story and when you do see games like [this], people usually fail to understand the very moral… Like Braid that was about this love story [but] to people it was just Mario with a rewind button.”

Development challenges haven’t been limited to writing, however; until February, Priedītis was working on Regret “full-time” alone, coding and designing every inch of the game into sleepless hours. Now, he has German composer Thomas Hoehl taking at least some of the weight off.

“The guy gets it, you know. He understands what Regret is about… And to work with such a talented and hard working person, is an honor to me.”

Regret is still a long way off, but Priedītis has been working hard on the game and hopes to have an official website and trailer ready by the summer.

“Quality demands hard work and [a] metric boat load of time.”

You can follow Priedītis on Twitter and check out Regret’s devlog here.