MARTIN FILIPP: DEVELOPER & PR MANAGER, DEEP SILVER

Available in shops now, Cursed Mountain is a Wii game that casts players in the role of an intrepid mountaineer battling against much more than just the elements. In the second of a series of interviews with game developer Martin Filipp, we talk about the final form of the atmospheric survival horror and the intriguing journey involved in taking Cursed Mountain all the way from the drawing board to shop shelves.

You last spoke with us at this year’s E3. What kind of feedback were you getting to the game at that time?

Well, first of all, we’ve been really surprised – even though that’s a stupid thing to say as a developer – at how well the game has been received throughout the whole development process since we started communicating with the public. This was really interesting, and still now people have been very kind to the game – which totally freaks me out actually, because everything is so positive I’m just waiting for the big bang! But I’m a negative person!

It was very well received at E3, and it was also very positive for us that we were allowed to show the game at the Nintendo booth. That was kind of an honour for us that we were alongside just a few other third party developers showing our game there. That was a cool thing for us. And it’s also always a big motivation for the team to get recognition from the hardware vendor as you look for the strength to make that last push over the final couple of months.

And all the feedback that was online and in print after E3 was very positive. For me it was too positive, because you’re always waiting for something terrible around the next corner! So far that hasn’t been the case, and the game has been very well received in the first reviews. The key concepts of the game always seem to be well received.

With regards to those key concepts; the game contains elements of exploration, combat, puzzle-solving and a rich storyline. What is the final balance between those elements in the game? Are there equal parts of each of those things?

“Equal parts” is a good way of putting it, I think. I’m not a man of figures, because I really hate giving percentages or whatever, but “equal parts” is a very good summary. The levels are very big, really big for this kind of a game. It offers huge gameplay value and long gameplay hours. You can really loose yourself on each level, especially the bigger ones. We really believe in focus tests and usability tests with people out with the development team; we’ve been doing that for many years now. And when we had the tutorial in place and the first possibility to hand over the game to someone who wasn’t involved in the development process we saw that on the first level people would spend an hour and a half just searching around and looking for stuff. This is kind of nice.

This is also where our strategy paid off, because we really tried to offer an easy entry level to appeal to the Wii audience as a whole, and not to just start with epic action that would be too much for some players and make them put away the controller. So it was important for us to rely on the intense story, atmosphere and setting - which we really believe in - and to create an atmosphere that pulls you into the game slowly and then step by step, as the game progresses, increase the speed and pacing. So yeah, I think it’s a good balance between exploring, puzzle-solving and fighting.

Looking back at the development process, what were some of the biggest challenges you faced in bringing Cursed Mountain to light?

Convincing our guys not to make the levels so big! They were actually a little bigger at first and we had to scale it down a bit because we just realised it was too much.

Another difficult thing along that theme was that each level is very unique. We’re talking about a journey uphill. You start at 5000 meters and end up at more than 8000 meters – so there’s this constant travel uphill. This makes every level a bit unique based on the real environment in the Himalayas. Coming from an alpine country in Austria, we had the feeling that everything above 2000 meters is just white; just snow and ice.

But actually, we realised as we did research that depending on the season in the Himalayas, they’re doing agricultural work and herding yak. That was amazing to us - that at this height these things still go on. This is reflected in the levels, in the colour scheme for example within the environments you see. You see in the city how colourful it is, then you go out in open fields with the farmers and agriculture, where you have a little bit of green and some rocks, then you continue to go up and you’re really in the mountain and there are just rocks. And then the last levels you’re surrounded by ice and snow. So the difficulty here was that we were not able to reuse assets. You know, you had to create props for each level – which is kind of time consuming and also money consuming! Normally, you try to create props in a way that you can somehow reuse them at least a little bit, without making things look too repetitive or boring. This wasn’t possible with Cursed Mountain, so we had to really remodel all the props based on the specific levels. This kind of helps the game, I think, because it offers uniqueness for each level. Each level is a kind of experience depending on the height you are at and it reflects the journey to the summit of the mountain.

When you’ve been so involved in and attached to a project, is it possible at the end of the development process to try and sit down and play the game with a clear mind – as if you were a gamer playing through for the first time?

That is very, very difficult to do. What we do is, internally, with the team in Vienna, we try to make sure they don’t play the game. So we keep them away for six or seven months. For example, there are people within the Quality Assurance (QA) department that we don’t allow to play certain games for a certain time. And then, when the game comes to a level of completeness where you can hand it over to someone else, we just let these people play the game and get first-hand feedback. But, to a certain extent, there’s a point within the studio where that’s not possible anymore.

When you’re 4-12 weeks from submission, you just hand over the game to external partner companies and get consumer feedback from people who play the game for the first time with fresh eyes and can see stuff that we don’t see anymore. This is very important at the end of a project because you realise at that point that you might have stood in front of a problem during development and didn’t see it all!

So it’s very important to get fresh feedback at every stage of the development process, to always have fresh eyes looking at the project. It raises the final quality a lot.

Once the game is released, all you can do is wait and see how people respond to it. For your part though, are you satisfied that you and the rest of the team have fulfilled the ambitions you had for Cursed Mountain at the outset?

That’s a very tricky question, because you can really fall on your face depending on your answer to it! Obviously you’re never 100% satisfied with the end product. No creative person ever is, no matter which industry you’re in. A painter is never happy with the final painting on the wall, because he sees so much work still to do. It’s similar with game development, you know? You start with an ambitious goal, three years pass and you work for a long time on one product, and it becomes your baby. Along the way you have to make compromises – game development always involves compromises - hopefully making the right choices and taking the right turns throughout the long development process.

But, in the end, you always have to stand up for your game and say “Ok, this is what we achieved. This is what we’ve done and we’re proud of what we have achieved as a team.” This is very important for us based on our business model, because as an internal studio we are always convinced that we succeed as a team and we fail together as a team. It’s always a team effort. And with this kind of very special business model that we have, where so many partner companies are involved, it’s even more of a team effort to bring everyone together onto the same page, keep up the vision for such a long time, distribute it on a worldwide basis and ensure everyone remains as convinced about the product as you are over the development period.

But, to be very honest, when you talk about software development, games have a big advantage, in that they result in a final product in the end. This is a major motivation for everyone involved in the industry. When you’re done, you go to a shop, go to the shelf, take a copy and show it to someone and say, “This is what I’ve done for the last three years, and this is my work.” This keeps people motivated for a long time, because it’s a really, really big relief. Personally, I only believe in a game when I have a box in my hand. That’s when it’s real, and this is something that drives you through development. And this is one of the very fortunate moments in development when you, as a team, have achieved that together and have that box sitting on a table in a meeting room and can say, “Well done boys.” It sounds very cheesy and stupid, but it’s really true. In our industry, everyone is creating an individual part, but in the end you have a final product. And that’s a very satisfying moment.

You mentioned there’s a moment after development where you have to say, “I’m proud of what we have achieved”. What aspects of Cursed Mountain are you particularly proud of?

Actually, it’s a bit stupid to say, but I’m proud that we proved successful with our business model. Because it was a big concern at the beginning when we started the company and were searching for financing and all that. Everyone said “Yeah, cool, nice idea, we trust in your track record – but where are the people?” There were those who would come into our office and we were just a few guys, so they wanted to know where the team was. In fact, the “people” were all over the world, and some said that wouldn’t work.

On the business side, it’s interesting that Cursed Mountain was the first game that completely relied on outsourcing. So having this business model and this production thing similar to the movie industry and proving the concept was possible within the games industry was very, very cool. It was a big thing for us, and it’s a big relief to now have the first product created within that model about to be out on the shelves. This is one thing we’re proud of.

Also, during development, the first prototype that worked with gesture-based controls using the Wii Remote and was fun to play was a big thing. This is one of the concerns you have. Things always look fine on paper, but you have to prove it in the build of a game. So that was a big thing too.

I think the package as a whole, when you put it all together is something that we’re really proud of, looking back.

Do you now simply breathe a sigh of relief that the development process is over, or does that creative side of you start thinking about ideas for the next thing?

Well, we’re part of the Koch Media Group, and our job within that group is to bring up new ideas and build up brands, and as Cursed Mountain has been very well received so far, and hopefully will continue to be, we are already making up our mind for whatever might come regarding a sequel. But it’s just punching around ideas at the moment, so nothing is set in stone. But we have three games in production running in parallel, so we’re not sitting around being bored in the office!
But yeah, it has been really cool, and as I said it was a bit surprising at the beginning that Cursed Mountain was received so well. This makes us comfortable and confident that there might be something else coming. 

By the time the interview goes to press, the game will be on shop shelves. What would you say to Wii owners who haven’t played it yet?

I think that it might not be your “regular” game, it’s out of the box, but it offers a cool storyline and it’s very cinematic. So if you’re interested in movies and a story being told you can really immerse yourself in that and project your feelings and emotions onto the main character as you join him on his journey up to the summit of the mountain and have a new and cool experience on Wii. You should think about giving it a try!