A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead the interview with the Italian development team that is working on the brand’s first video game
It will be up to Stormind Games, the same ones behind Remothered and Batora, to ferry this series of Hollywood films into the world of video games with a horror-tinged first-person adventure.
In the firmament of film productions that mix sci-fi and horror, A Quiet Place occupies a special place. The 2018 film, directed by John Krasinski, who most remember for the role of Jim Halpert in The Office, depicted the drama of the Abbott family , forced to live in absolute silence, on a planet Earth invaded and devastated by a mysterious alien race with superhuman strength and no sight, but extremely developed hearing.
The film won over critics and the public thanks to the careful photography and direction, the acting skills of the performers involved – the co-protagonist is played by Emily Blunt – and the quality of the plot which was able to alternate action scenes with extreme effectiveness with sequences in which the family relationships were explored with just the right amount of drama.
In an industry where The Last of Us sells millions of copies and where there is a clamor for a sequel to Alien Isolation, it was only a matter of time before we saw the video game debut of the Paramount Pictures series . Series, precisely, because after the second chapter of 2020, A Quiet Place – Day 1 will take care of bringing fans back to the cinema starting from next June 27th.
A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead – Announcement Trailer
The onerous task of translating the brand into polygons and textures will be the Italian Stormind Games, known to the general public for Remothered and Batora .
We had the chance to ask Antonio Cannata, CEO, Luca Esposito, narrative designer, and Manuel Moaver, game designer , a few questions to find out more about A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead, the studio’s next game, as well as one of the first games based on a Hollywood brand to be developed in Italy.
Single player, great attention to the plot
To tell the truth, Saber Interactive has been trying to make a video game about A Quiet Place for some time. In October 2021, the start of work on a production linked to the series which was supposed to debut by the end of the following year was announced via a tweet. We don’t know what of that project has survived to this day, but for sure, this time is the right time.
A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead will delight fans of the film and the genre before 2024 is over. It will be a first-person adventure with an obviously horror tone , it will use the Unreal Engine 5 and can be played on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series, confirming a project that intends to be at the cutting edge from a technical and graphic. Saber Interactive and Stormind Games wanted to underline with some emphasis that it will be a production totally aimed at single player, with particular attention to the narrative and personal story of Alex, the protagonist of the game.
“In a horror story it is important that the protagonist has evident fragilities that make her vulnerable, but at the same time she has granite motivations that give her the strength to go all the way on this nightmarish journey”, Luca Esposito tells us, the game’s narrative designer. For modeling the character’s psychology, Evelyn and Regan Abbott , mother and daughter from the original film, were obviously taken as a point of reference, but the sources of inspiration were multiple. “To give a unique character to Alex we looked outside the door of the house, finding excellent references in Lupita Nyong’o herself, who, however, at the time we didn’t know would play the protagonist of A Quiet Place – Day 1. We knew her for Us , the film directed by Jordan Peele, and that was enough for us. Even Ree Dolly, the protagonist of Winter’s Bone (played by Jennifer Lawrence), and Phoebe Bridgers, a famous musician, were very important inspirations and keeping it as a reference accompanied us throughout the writing of the plot and dialogues.”
The focus on the narrative aspect, however, will not be solely focused on Alex. Working closely with Paramount Pictures, the team has given shape and life to other characters that will enrich the adventure. “On the other hand, one of our main objectives was to convey as much as possible the feeling of being in the world of A Quiet Place, as we learned about it through the events of the Abbott family. Many settings and situations will certainly be familiar , without ever falling into didactic citations. We wanted to create a title that had its own personality and at the same time blended well with the narrative universe of A Quiet Place.”
The main theme will be extremely similar to that of the films. Human relationships, especially family ones, will be the narrative pivot around which the entire story will revolve. The plot will deal with repentance and forgiveness , with extremely touching dramatic moments, in which Alex’s ethics will be questioned, as every science fiction and post-apocalyptic story should do. Not only. “The impossibility of communicating and expressing oneself becomes an emblematic obstacle, not only for the survival of the individual, but also for the fragile integrity of human relationships”, underlines Luca.
The structure of the game also seems to respect a single, extremely focused vision, without deviations on the path, a sign of how Stormind Games has concentrated in every detail on the writing of Alex and everything that will revolve around her. Luca himself confirms this to us: “for A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead we decided to build a linear narrative, so as to be able to create a well-defined plot that touched on the themes of the game in the way we wanted, focusing on those are the stories that we have decided to tell, also in accordance with Paramount’s supervision”.
Few details on the gameplay
A game that has its roots in a brand like A Quiet Place must obviously find a balance between action and horror , in order to always keep the tension high, without exceeding in sequences that could be frustrating.
Manuel Moaver, game designer at Stormind Games confirms this: “this was by far the most important game design challenge of the game. In a world like the one depicted in A Quiet Place, even simply walking in the wrong place and in the wrong way becomes an element of very high risk for its characters. We worked hard to find the right balance between the narrative coherence of the film franchise and the gaming needs in order to offer an experience that was not limited and capable of enhancing interactions with the world. game, as well as allowing the player to make decisions, explore and use the tools at his disposal, always having a clear understanding of the risk inherent in each of these actions”.
Naturally, it is not the first time that in a video game we find ourselves facing enemies without sight, but capable of identifying us in some way. It is therefore natural to ask ourselves how the team thought of introducing some innovations applied to the stealth sections , which at the same time were coherent with the narrative universe of reference. Unfortunately, in this sense, many details are still missing. Yet, Manuel lets slip some interesting information: “like it or not, working on a stealth game based on an enemy that can’t see you but can sense in an exceptional way has put us in a position to rethink many things that happen in stealth taken for granted and this put us in a position to find different solutions and first we started looking at the world around us… closing our eyes!”
Apparently, in A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead all the player’s actions, even those that in other games are the most harmless, will generate noise, thus making Alex virtually detectable by the enemy. Peering beyond a door, placing a board to overcome an obstacle, even just opening a drawer in search of resources, are all inherently risky operations, which will need to be evaluated from time to time. It is no coincidence that the heroine will be equipped with a sound level meter , an instrument that she will build herself and which will allow the user to constantly evaluate the noise produced in comparison to environmental sounds. In short, moving in absolute silence will be much riskier than doing so near a waterfall or an industrial machine, with all the necessary assessments that the player will be required to make accordingly. The risk is not necessarily worth it, even when you are short of resources and the cabinet a few steps away seems generous with precious materials.
In this regard, the question arose almost automatically: will there therefore be a crafting system in the game ? “We thought a lot about whether to include crafting elements in A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead,” Manuel replied, “but we realized that in the experience we wanted to create, which is a first-person horror adventure focused on narrative, these mechanics would not have had enough space to be developed with the right depth”.
Among the questions that currently remain unanswered, there is also that of Alex’s role in the most action-oriented phases . In the original film, the Abbott family, after several attempts, finds a way to combat the alien creatures with some effectiveness, but at the moment it is not clear whether the protagonist of the game will also be able to fight face to face with the violent extraterrestrials. “The creatures are truly fearsome, they have armor that makes them immune to firearms, they have exceptional hearing, they don’t suffer from extreme conditions such as being in the center of a fire and so on”, explains Manuel. “On the other hand they have some weaknesses that during the game Alex will learn to exploit to his advantage and there will be moments during the game in which the protagonist will take her moments of revenge. There will be a lot to discover, however, over the course of the game and for now we don’t want to tell you anything else.”
In short, it seems clear that for most of the time we will be forced to hide as much as possible, constantly consulting the sound level meter while we try to make our way through the various settings which will certainly present obstacles and traps of all kinds. It is difficult, however, to hypothesize anything else. Certainly, Stormind Games is called to a significant test of strength, aware of the enormous burden of having to ferry a Hollywood brand which, at least so far, has only achieved successes at the cinema.
“Honors always involve burdens”, said Antonio Cannata , CEO of the software house, with a certain pride. “The team is certainly more aware of its capabilities and the areas of improvement to work on for the future. Certainly our main goal is to make a great game. I hope that the Italian industry can support us, given that working on an IP Hollywood is still very unexplored territory for Italy and we are doing something new for the first time as an independent team. I hope that this can contribute to the creation of further growth and development opportunities for our industry.”
However, it seems that the climate within Stormind Games is extremely serene and, above all, motivated by the close collaboration with the publisher, Saber Interactive, and with the film’s distribution company, Paramount Pictures: “a climate was immediately established of collaboration and mutual respect, very direct and transparent, as we like, and I thank them for this. The relationship with Paramount Pictures itself was very collaborative”, Antonio confided to us. “Certainly, the track record of our team, together with the ability and experience of negotiating with companies much larger than ours, helped us a lot in reaching the agreement.”
Trailer, images and words of the developers suggest a game developed with all the trappings and, above all, with a profound knowledge of the source material. We just have to wait confidently for new details on A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead and a more precise publication date.
Also Read:
Fate/Samurai Remnant gets new DLC: Record’s Fragment: Bailong and the Crimson Demon release date