This War of Mine: when games aren’t funny anymore

Interview with Pawel Miechowski, senior writer at 11bit

(This article was originally published on Appszoom.com on June 2014.
TWoM was released five months later)

11bit Studios is a Polish developer and publisher, well known for their Anomaly games which somehow twisted the defense genre. Anyway, as I guess you’re here for the interview (preview of TWoM here), let’s proceed and save the chatter for dessert.

APPSZOOM — After the acclaimed Anomaly series, where mankind struggles to fend aliens off from Earth, how did you reach the idea of This War of Mine, which seems the absolute opposite?

PAWEL MIECHOWSKI — We’re always looking for concepts we find interesting from a gameplay point of view. And we’ve largely explored the tower offense and defense formula in Anomaly series. However, This War Of Mine concept emerged in a different way. At one of creative meetings we were sharing ideas and then my brother Grzegorz (he’s the CEO at 11 bit) brought the article “One Year In Hell” which simply was an interview with a man who had survived a siege of a small city in Bosnia in early 90s. We read it and were ignited by the idea. Let’s make a game about the other side of war… About how civilians struggle to survive a siege of a city. From then the concept evolved into what This War Of Mine is now. Of course we’re still working on it.

– How have you researched this topic? Have you talked with real survivors?

Yes, we’ve interviewed some over the internet and we actually know some people who personally experienced life during war, including our family members. Please note we’re from Poland, so our grandfathers and grandmothers are the ones who survived Nazi and Soviet occupation. Also, we’ve found articles and interviews online with different survivors. The Siege of Sarajevo is really well documented one and also an example of how people were determined and how they cooperated to survive. Some thrilling stories can be found in the book “Besieged” by Barbara Demick about that siege, although the book focuses on many different aspects.

– What kind of game is This War of Mine? Is it a sort of choose-your-own-adventure game? Or more like “The Sims Go to War”? What genre would we put it in?

People have the desire to live. When war surrounds people, obviously they have to struggle for necessities, defend themselves, but most importantly sooner or later they face moments when something or someone has to be sacrificed in order to save someone else. Those who survived wars, had to protect their families and that required being not the good guy… and then facing consequences of this fact. So I’d say This War Of Mine is a survival game that depicts war from perspective of civilians. A mature empathy game. Still, this is thrilling experience. We are making it an engaging game and at the same time an experience that is picturing the war as how regular people see it. It’s a responsible design, but also something incredibly inspiring.

In a macabre way, I can’t wait for a Spanish Civil War: No Pasarán DLC

– The Anomaly series has been technically flawless so far, achieving very high ratings and praise for making the most of mobile devices’ capabilities. Will TWoM push it further?

Thank you for the kind words! I believe it’ll be the case. The devices are more and more powerful with each generation so there’s no need to limit graphical features (while it’s worth noting that we’re using some demanding shaders) and TWoM is being designed for both PCs and touch-screen controlled devices.

– Tell us about the artwork. Who did it? How will users react to the style? Are there cutscenes or animations of some kind?

Art style is supervised by art director Przemek Marszal and made by the team: Dominik Zielinski (lead artist), Bartek Rydel, Jakub Piotrowski, Konrad Wisniewski (3D Artists), Jakub Kowalczyk (Background Concept Art), Olaf Ponoga (characters), Artur Bielenica (additional animations).
The visuals and graphical tonality are being designed to match the mood and the topic of the game. So there is no positive warm palette of colors, but mostly the opposite. Also, we’ve developed shaders to give a sort of hand-drawn charcoal effect but on the other hand we’re keeping the overall style close to reality. For example, the animations created by Dominik and Artur are based on scanned moves of ourselves — walking, climbing, digging, fighting and whole lots of other moves. The models are also not imported 3D models, but ourselves scanned and prepared as in-game characters. We have never approached visual style in a way we’re doing it in TWoM.

– Throughout video game history, warfare has been exalted and dealt as something heroic and dignified. Do we need more socially-committed games like TWoM?

After the announcement we got huge feedback, and mostly very positive one. People were commenting on articles in a tone of “finally someone is doing this”. So I see games have grown up. We grew up along with games and we’re 30-something years old now. And the community (by that I mean gamers, journalists, creators, anyone interested in gaming) perceives games as a natural form of storytelling, just like movies or books and that games are capable of speaking about important topics and people actually expect that games would do that. People need serious games as much as they need drama movies. When you’re in a mood for fun, you go for a comedy or action movie and when you want to experience more serious story, you can do it either in movies and games.

Boris, you fought like a macho. We’ll get those bandages for you.

– Those who played it at E3 reported that it was even more impressive than what it first looks like, and some even tagged it as an “adult game.” Do you think children and the faint of heart shouldn’t play it?

This is adult game, but this is definitely not a simulator of war atrocities. This War Of Mine focuses on moral decisions and difficulties people must face in order to survive. This is heavy enough. We don’t need and don’t want to tell stories about loosing humanity. This War Of Mine is about saving your soul when it becomes very difficult. Your moral decisions create the story. In fact, you’re the storyteller. It’s a game for people who empathize with other people put to very difficult conditions — life in a city under siege.

– There are some topics considered taboo in the industry, but TWoM has been called “a survival simulation”. Is This War of Mine going to break any unwritten rule?

I think the entire process of games going mature is a sort of breaking a rule. In the past games were supposed to be just entertainment. Now it’s not only about escapism, but more than that. Games now can be perceived as a form of art speaking about different topics. This War Of Mine is a part of this process.

-Will characters mourn their beloved friends, family, and partners?

Real people are emotionally connected. They feel empathy one for another. They feel for others. So it is in This War Of Mine.

– Will it bring up themes of rape and/or prostitution?

The violence is present and like in reality what happens is heavily dependent on your reaction. But I need to underline, This War Of Mine is a tool to experience war from perspective of civilians, not to simulate atrocities.

– Are there children involved in This War of Mine?

Yes. Civilians in the war need to protect their children, naturally.

– What about land mines and chem weapons?

I think this question leads to again to thinking about simulating different forms of violence, not about how people struggle to survive.

– Are characters able to betray each other?

You play the characters, your decisions tell the story. So if you thought what would you actually do when being put in a city under siege, you would get answers to many questions about TWoM.

– Which stats do characters have? Is there some kind of personality chart?

When war breaks out, what skills would you have? Some people are stronger, some have fighting skills, some are good cooks. And each people react differently to what they’re forced to do.

– Is there a way for players to create their characters or scenarios?

No, at the moment we’re focused on making This War Of Mine the experience we want it to be and we’re not thinking about modding tools yet.

– The cursed question: will be a paid game without a lite or free version (we’re talking about mobile only) like other 11bit games have been so far? Can we expect a release on Android and iOS at the same time?

I think the game will be ready on both system at the same time. And yes — this will be a premium experience. No IAPs, no free version. That wouldn’t fit completely to what TWoM is. Besides, we’re hardcore gamers so we don’t have any particular knowledge on how free games work.

– Is there a rough launch date?