Summary
“The simplest elevator pitch I can give is ‘classic survival horror in World War I’,” Conscript developer Jordan Mochi tells me atWASDin London. “If you’ve played old Resident Evil or Silent Hill games, it’s very similar to those but with a top-down perspective and set during World War I.”
Both of these survival horror icons were big inspirations for Mochi, who admits he hasn’t delved into more obscure gems, or recent titles like Amnesia or The Outlast Trials. “I haven’t really branched out from Resident Evil or Silent Hill. I’m comfortable there.”
Conscript channels those classics with its distinctly retro feel. “Because it’s my first game and I was learning on the job, I had limitations,” Mochi explains. “I was teaching myself how to code as well, and the game’s made in Game Maker, which is quite limited, so it’s a 2D game. I realised that the pixel art style was manageable for me. It also, by coincidence, helps the style of the game, where things are obscure because of the low resolution, which helps the horror as well.”
Conscript’s style was born from necessity, and the horror effectiveness of it was little more than a happy accident. It’s reminiscent of Silent Hill’s fog, which was meant to obscure limitations of the original PlayStation and how far it could render into the distance.
Despite its classic retro stylings, Conscript is still very much a modern game, and Mochi didn’t find balancing these approaches too difficult. “I always wanted to design it in such a way that channelled those older games, but I didn’t want to carry over the clunkiness.
“That was always something that I had in the back of my mind, because those old games are pretty hard to play, right? There’s just so much input lag and the movement’s kind of clunky. I wanted it to feel like those old games, thematically and graphically, and the mood of them, but I didn’t want to carry over the clunkiness.”
For a few years, Mochi didn’t have any direction as to what exactly he wanted to make. He has a history degree and a great love of the subject, so he knew he “wanted to make a survival horror game” that honed in on that passion. But couldn’t settle on a time period. Add in his fascination with World War I, and the perfect setting, “seemed to fit pretty well”.
“Originally, the game was going to have a hub world. The way I describe it is like Mario 64, but you go into paintings, and it’s like a Horrible Histories sort of thing. Obviously, that’s a classic indie developer problem, I want to do everything at once and not settle on something.”
World War I Doesn’t Have The Same Morals As World War II
“World War II is seen as the moral war,” Mochi tells me when I ask why most games favour this historical conflict. “It’s very good versus evil. That’s how it’s depicted. You can agree or disagree with that but that’s how history looks back at World War II. World War I does not have that kind of aura around it. There was no good side or bad side. It was literally just 16 year old boys sent out to die for their country.”
When I look back at how I was taught history at school, it also focused on World War II rather than World War I. Mochi hopes that players of Conscript will learn more about the Great War, but more importantly, that it shows the real atrocities of warfare, “I hope it’s educational, especially with the current state of the world now we have multiple wars happening all over the world. It’s an anti-war game. That’s the point of the game. That’s the message I want to get across. War is bad”
Conscript isn’t out yet, but it’s already having an impact on players and finding a dedicated fanbase. Mochi tells me about one particular fan that resonated with him, “When I was at PAX in 2022, I had this young kid come up and he played it and he loved it. He came back last year in cosplay, in the French uniform, as the main character of the game. He was like, ‘I played it last year and I became obsessed with buying World War I uniforms’, and that made me feel so good.”
Conscript Doesn’t Hold Back The Horror To Show The Reality Of War
When it comes to horror games, there’s always a threshold. How much is too much? Where’s the line and do you cross it? Do you dial it back? But for Mochi the answer was simple: No. Much of the game is based on history, with primary sourcing being letters from that time period to give an authentic touch.
“There have been times where I’ve been like, ‘f*ck, this is heavy’,” Mochi says. “There have been times when I’ve been making the game and kind of disturbed myself with the subject matter. But it would be a disservice if I took it out, because the whole point of the game is to show that history was horrible.”
A few years ago while visiting Gamescom, Mochi travelled to Verdun in France to tour old battlefields, take plenty of reference pictures, and even drew maps. “There are some levels that are based on real maps that I drew when I went there. I’ve really tried to give it the attention it deserves.”
“You have to be careful because it is also a game, and it has to be fun,” Mochi tells me. “There have been times when you have to weigh [up] accuracy and fun.” Some players at WASD found the game quite heavy and depressing, but still enjoyable in spite of it all. “It’s horrible and terrifying and depressing, especially when you see the endings, but people have told me that it still feels fun to play.
Mochi has been working on Conscript for seven years as a solo developer, and he considers himself “one of the lucky ones to have made it this far”, and to have found a publisher. “Most of my original vision was here. I didn’t really have to make many cuts, which I think is pretty rare, especially for a first game.”
Conscript doesn’t have a set launch date, but you canwishlist it on Steam and check out the demo, too.
