The Indie Game Magazine April 2015 | Issue 48 | Page 12

“Knowing the pain

won’t end quickly
adds to the fear.”

islands, were candidates for setting in the planning process of does your fascination
the game. However, because one of the characteristics of the with using scissors as
Scissorwalker we have not revealed yet is closely connected to a weapon come from?
“water,” I decided to use a cruise liner at sail as the setting.
Kono: It all started from the fact that scissors are a “weapon”
In stages we are currently developing, and will be developing in we are all familiar with, and the pain associated with it is easily
the near future, we plan to include deserted islands, and parts comes to mind. This sense of familiarity makes it easier for the
of the ship that are submerged in water. Needless to say, the audience to relate to the characters. Also because when you are
success of our Kickstarter is key for these features to be added. cut with scissors, you have to wait for the blades to cut through
(Editor’s Note: NightCry its funding goal of $300k, bringing in the flesh. Knowing the pain won’t end quickly adds to the fear.
nearly $315k via Kickstarter.)
Another thing, which is related to the theme of this project, is that
IGM : A lot of horror games rely on a sense of isolation to invoke scissors are a tool with the ability to sever two related objects.
fear. But Project Scissors openly encourages players to get to For example, when humans are born, the baby is separated from
know the ship’s crew and guests. How does designing a horror its mother when its naval cord is cut with…scissors. In this way,
experience differ when the protagonist is with a group, as op- scissors play a major role in separating two living entities from
posed to being alone?
one another, and this is a key theme in the story of NightCry.
Kono: We also will not have many scenes where a large number of
characters appear (mainly due to the limited resources available
to us). However, the more people there are, the more corpses
we can create. With more corpses, an anxiety increases among
characters, and we can create the sense of “Who’s next…Am I
going to be the next victim?” Furthermore, as we see in many
horror films, humans can be much more vicious than the monster
in extreme circumstances. I hope to be able to illustrate that
aspect of human nature in this game as well.

IGM : Clock Tower really turned the horror genre on its head with
the inclusion of multiple endings and a ‘scare meter’ to display
the character’s mood. Despite your peers at the time telling you
the basic concept of the game wouldn’t work, what convinced
you to pursue and implement such unique mechanics?

Kono: Being a horror fan myself, I believed it to be a system
that allowed me to express all that is important to a horror title.
Horror games until then were just games that added a touch of
horror to existing game systems. This system was created for
IGM : Are there any horror game/movie tropes you’d like to the sole purpose of presenting horror in a game, in a way that
specifically avoid while developing NightCry?
is true to the genre.
Kono: Not exactly a horror trope, but I want to avoid explain- IGM : For folks on the fence about NightCry, what would you
ing everything. That’s because it’s so common for us to be very say this horror game delivers that hasn’t been done before? Are
disappointed when we figure out the truth.
there any particular design innovations you’d like to highlight?
IGM : I’ve been waiting to ask this question for a long time: Where Kono: In NightCry, the player will be controlling 4 characters,

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