Keiichiro Toyama, the creator of Silent Hill and founder of Bokeh Game Studios, recently confirmed in an interview that he is already working on a new project that is not a sequel to Slitterhead, the action horror game released last year as the studio’s debut title.
This information was shared in a recent interview published by Famitsu during an art exhibition related to Slitterhead. Toyama acknowledged that the sales of their first game were below their expectations. However, it still became somewhat of a “cult” title.
Despite this, the team has decided to move on to a new project and is already fully engaged in developing a different game, which, according to Toyama, is not a continuation of Slitterhead.
Regarding the 2024 action horror game, Toyama explained that the team initially intended to create a game that would appeal to a wider audience and achieve higher sales. However, it ended up becoming a cult hit with a niche audience, possibly due to confusion around whether Slitterhead should be classified as horror or action.
Nonetheless, Toyama emphasized that commercial success was not the sole goal for the studio with Slitterhead. Ultimately, he expressed satisfaction with how his team was able to showcase its unique identity through the game and do things that wouldn’t have been possible with a AAA studio.
Toyama also mentioned that he is thinking about the long-term future of his team, and as he gets older, he will eventually need to hand over responsibility to someone else.
Bokeh has already demonstrated its creative abilities and freedom with Slitterhead, a unique title both in its genre and its moral ambiguity. Now, the team plans to explore different genres and incorporate more ideas that might appeal to younger generations.
“I can’t reveal the exact details, but we have started working on our next title. In the beginning, we wanted this to be a studio where we could do many different things, like implementing the ideas of younger generations and even working on more light-hearted projects,” Toyama explained.
He concluded by adding, “Once again, we have to pour in all our efforts as a studio and prove that we are up to the task. We are currently working towards that goal. However, we’re still in the beginning phase, so I believe we’ll be able to reveal more details [about the new game] somewhere in the future.”
