Bloober Team was once known for creating smaller scale horror games such as Layers of Fear and The Medium, but with the Silent Hill 2 remake and incoming Cronos: The New Dawn, it’s looking to reach new heights as a developer.
IGN spoke with Cronos director and producer Jacek Zieba alongside director and designer Wojciech Piejko to discuss the past, present, and future of Bloober Team soon after it revealed Cronos and just days after the Silent Hill 2 remake was released to critical acclaim and one million sales.
Coming to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and S, and PC via Steam, Cronos is set in a post apocalyptic 1980s Poland and promises a “twisted time travel story” in Bloober Team’s first foray into an original survival horror franchise. We discussed how it came to be, what other iconic franchises did and didn’t influence its creation, and much more.
IGN: Congratulations on the reveal! That must be very exciting and probably nerve-wracking. How long has Cronos been in development?
Jacek Zieba: We started pre-production somewhere during the end of [2021 release] The Medium, the ideas and everything. When we finished The Medium parts of the team were designated to start doing Cronos, so now it’s in an advanced state of production.
Wojciech Piejko: Before The Medium was finished, we sat with leads and other guys and came up with the new idea for the game and that was how Cronos was born.
IGN: How does it feel now to finally have it out in the wild and show off what you’ve been working on for so long?
WP: It’s surreal. Surreal and a big relief. It’s always like a nerve-wracking thing. I think there are two big moments in development. Of course, the release, which is the most nerve-wracking one. But the second one is this, the moment we are sharing right now, showing the first trailer of the game, seeing the feedback
So it was a big relief of course and a big moment for the company, that we are doing this two hit combo after releasing Silent Hill with all the great reception, and we are really thankful for all the players. And now this also seems to resonate with people. So we are super excited and super relieved. And of course it’ll give us a second wind. ‘Okay, now it’s real. Now we need to finish it and fulfill the dream.’
IGN: Is it difficult to actually just settle down now back into work today without constantly checking out the comments and the conversations around the trailer?
WP: Exactly. It is what is happening in the studio since this morning. [Sharing] reaction videos and comments. We are really, really happy.
IGN: Was it a very planned and intentional move to reveal Cronos so soon after Silent Hill?
JZ: In a way, yes, because we have two big teams, two big projects started some time ago. So yeah, we knew that this day would come that we can reveal it, but it’s not like we made this decision two years ago or something. Those kind of decisions are very tricky and sometimes you just seize the moment like, ‘Okay, this is the time now, we should do it here.’ So it’s like, you’re sometimes just waiting and you are just prepared for this kind of stuff.
WP: Yeah, it’s also like the stars are aligned. The reception of Silent Hill is great; now Microsoft wants us on their show. So okay, maybe that’s good moment because we’ve got this trailer prepared and we were looking for a perfect moment. We saw a lot of comments like, ‘How? Do you guys sleep?’
IGN: I think it’s fair to say the Silent Hill 2 remake is the biggest and most significant release for Bloober that has put you on the map more than any previous release. It had positive critical reception and you just announced one million sales too. Has that energized you? Has it influenced Bloober Team in other ways?
JZ: I think that energized us, yeah. We proved we could do it as a team, as a company, because the team poured all their hearts into it. I think it was very tough for them, seeing what happened on the internet for years and to now say to everyone, ‘Okay, you were wrong. We can do it and people really like it.’ That’s the most important stuff.
People really like it so we can be in this together with players, because all of the people in Bloober are also big fans of Silent Hill and put a lot of love into their remake. So that’s a big reward for everybody here. But yeah, it’s a great success, the biggest as you said, but it only gave us energy to keep going further. That’s our new strategy. It’s not like, ‘Let’s just be bigger and bigger. Let’s just create better and more interesting games than before.’
WP: To be honest, I can’t express enough how happy we are with the release of Silent Hill 2. The team did great, a really tremendous job against all the odds, against all the comments saying we don’t deserve to touch this legendary game and everything. We are all fans of Silent Hill. So for us it was a dream come true. So of course it was hard for the team, but they overcome everything and made the impossible possible. We love the new version of Silent Hill, which is still true to the original and added some more content which people like. So yeah, we are thrilled. We are thrilled.
IGN: Let’s talk about Cronos. Can you give me the synopsis, the elevator pitch on what this game is?
WP: Alright, so you are a traveler, a mysterious person hidden beneath this environmental suit and you’ve been sent to the ruins of human civilization with the goal of looking for time rifts. During your exploration you’ll need to survive encounters, solve some puzzles, and overcome anomalies that you saw [in the trailer] like floating buildings and other elements. This is our own take on puzzles in this game and you need to look for the time rifts that I mentioned, jump back in time, and extract key people who didn’t survive the apocalypse.
IGN: What can you tell me about the apocalypse itself and what’s clearly gone very wrong in this world?
JZ: I think only the name of it! It’s The Change. The Change happened and the rest is mystery at this point.
WP: The Change happened in the eighties, in Poland. We love to share our culture and the environment and architecture in Poland. It’s an alternative version of history. The Change, this apocalyptic event happened in the eighties, and that’s where we are.
JZ: This is also why our sci-fi is more retro, something like Alien or the old Star Wars. So it’s more analog than flashy. No new tech.
IGN: What are your other inspirations? Fans are comparing it to Dead Space and also seeing lots of classic survival horror like Silent Hill in it too
JZ: Definitely Dead Space is there because of the protagonist and stuff, We can share a little about a special approach to combat. Just like Dead Space has the cut off the limbs mechanic, we also have something we will share later. Also like Alan Wake with the flashlight.
WP: It’s something that brings up the tension. It’s not only run and gun but you need to think. We put a little more strategy in the combat.
JZ: Besides those, Japanese survival horror, like the Resident Evil series, the old ones, the remakes. Those were a very, very big inspiration for us
WP: In terms of movies, films like 12 Monkeys. Our biggest film or TV series inspiration is Dark, the TV series by Netflix. It tells a story about time travel and a fictional German town, so a very European thing. We thought the same, ‘Okay, we can set the game in Poland. We can also use time travel.’ This showed us we can do it and people are interested in it. We don’t need to make the game about somewhere else. Let’s show culture, let’s show Poland. Oh and The Thing [is another inspiration].
JZ: Also Annihilation with Natalie Portman was a very, very big influence.
IGN: Having mentioned these other game franchises, do you want Cronos to be a competitor to Resident Evil, to Silent Hill?
WP: Our goal was to create our first IP in the survival horror genre because, of course, Silent Hill is a property of Konami and, we are really grateful and honored to be able to work on this game, but with Cronos we wanted to make something ours, with our vision of the survival horror game and mixing the elements that we have mastered through the years.
We were always a storyteller, so we still want to tell a good story, but this time we would like to also incorporate more gameplay into it. So expect a survival horror game like the games you mentioned, Resident Evil, Dead Space, Silent Hill. Those are the type of games we… We would like to be among them. But yeah, I think it’s our own take. That was a goal of this journey of the new Bloober, to expand and have more gameplay oriented games but still telling good stories.
IGN: What lessons did you learn from The Medium that influenced the creation of Cronos?
JZ: I think after The Medium it was very clear to us that we needed to evolve. It was like, ‘let’s end the chapter of the adventure games.’ Layers of Fear, Observer, and The Medium, [games that were] strange, experimental, with fixed camera tools. ‘Okay, let’s finish with that.’
We also want to evolve, so let’s go into survival horror, let’s create something of our own, something different than other games in the genre in terms of world, story, and also gameplay. Let’s create another game of our dreams.
WP: It’s a privilege to make the games that you would like to play yourself for horror fans. We are in the studio making Silent Hill, Cronos. it’s like a dream combination.
IGN: The general strategy of Bloomberg Team 3.0 is to redefine the genre, so how is this game doing that? What are your plans to make this the new benchmark for survival horror games?
JZ: I don’t know if we can say.
WP: We’ve got these features, the one mentioned before, our take on combat. We are trying to expand the idea, not only of survival horror [mechanics] like a limited inventory and stuff, but also add some new ideas to it. I think it’s all about the mixture, making different pizzas with different ingredients, and I hope this one will be really tasty.
IGN: Which themes, of sci-fi or horror or time travel, did you lean into most when making Cronos?
WP: We of course knew that we were doing the Silent Hill game, so we didn’t want to overlap with, let’s say a more grounded story. We said, ‘Okay, we will be doing this, so we need to go somewhere else to have a different world, to not repeat ourselves.’ So yeah, that’s how we came up with Cronos.
IGN: Cronos was in development when both the Dead Space remake and the Dead Space inspired Calisto Protocol came out. Was this a worry at all?
JZ: We were concerned at some moment. Nobody knew about Dead Space remake when we started our production. And on Callisto, we were very curious on various levels as a developer, also as gamers, like how it’ll play If this is a spiritual successor of Dead Space. And it wasn’t good in the case of gameplay.
So we could cool off, like, ‘Okay, it’s not new groundbreaking, survival horror, we can still have a shot.’ And in case of Dead Space remake, it was just awesome to play it again and see how it’s done and see how this can help us in our production. So definitely two interesting moments, but mostly we just learned something from it, more than be discouraged on our journey.
We don’t think in categories like, ‘Okay, people don’t like Callisto or people don’t like Dead Space Remake, so now we have a problem.’ No, we are also doing something different than these two games.
IGN: As big fans of the genre, what excites you most about Cronos?
JZ: I think there are two things. One I can say, the second one… So the main character, the Traveler, who they are, what’s happening, why they’re doing this, the suit… We put a lot of effort into building it, to make it something special, make it something different. And the second part is this combat part. But it’s a secret.
WP: I would say the same. I’m really happy how the Traveler looks, how we designed the suit. That was something that we really wanted from the very beginning, to not have a typical soldier type, but more a diver, a diver in time, and that’s great. I saw a lot of comments like, ‘Whoa, I love this suit, love this.’ I know! Yes, yes, it’s great. I’m so happy about it.
IGN: Horror games often make their protagonists rather faceless, but it sounds like you have big plans for yours and your story. Is that right?
WP: Yes, of course. Yeah. I know that we are making a third person game with the character in the helmet, but you still learn a lot about yourself and your place in the world. I know we are starting very big because like, oh, the word is destroyed and stuff, but yeah, please remember we are Bloober. We like to tell an intimate story about people and characters and this will not be different.
IGN: So with lots to it, do you think there is potential for more Cronos beyond The New Dawn?
WP: Definitely, definitely, definitely. Yeah, we’ve got plans for Cronos.
IGN: Now going down this independent route then, making your own franchise, is Bloober still open to making, for example, another Silent Hill remake or even a brand new Silent Hill game?
JZ: I think that’s a very tough and open question. I think we are always open. If we like the opportunity, we’ll take it.
WP: There are opportunities that you have to seize. Like Silent Hill 2, you can remake the legend. So yeah, I do believe that everything’s possible. We are also fans of the genre. If the IP is interesting we probably will also be interested.
IGN: You mentioned earlier that the Silent Hill 2 remake has been criticizedfor all sorts since its announcement, but now it’s released everyone loves it. Has that reception increased Bloober’s confidence?
JZ: I think definitely, yes. It just gives all of us more confidence, I think definitely for the Silent Hill team, but also for us. Yeah, like ‘We can do it. We can do that kind of crazy stuff.’ We also love our previous games and some of them have better or worse reception, but still, we all put all our hearts into them and we also learn with each of them. So I think I’m only hyped to see how Cronos can land. And also what’s further than Cronos.
WP: Long story short, I think we all feel that we leveled up as developers.
Editor’s Note: This interview was lightly edited for clarity.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
