Jason Allen joined the video game industry after spending 12 years in academia covering such fields as Business, Electronics and Biomedical Science.   He began his career in gaming as a Level Designer during the PS1 era and he is currently a Lead Designer after working on a varied collection of major PC, PS2, and Xbox games for over 10 years. 

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To create creatures that are frightening and original we begin by looking at what impact that creature has on the narrative and where it occurs within the game.

We have to make psychological considerations as well as aesthetic considerations about how we’re going to use the monster, where we’re going to use the monster, and where they appear within the progress of the game.

In Silent Hill: Homecoming there is a creature called Schism, whose head is reminiscent of an axe. That is actually designed to represent the differences between how Alex feels about what’s happening to him and what’s actually happening to him. It’s kind of like a split personality. There’s a clear reference to that in the creature design.

Similarly, Siam is about the unrequited love between Alex and Elle in that it can’t be consummated. That’s why they’re back to back.



Psychological Impact

It’s essential to get beyond simple considerations about what’s frightening about creatures and explore the psychological impact of the creatures and how that relates with the narrative.

When you play Silent Hill, you’ll also notice that we don’t just drop them anywhere within the game - there’s a specific idea related to where they appear

Not everyone who plays the game will pick up on these subtleties, but a lot of fans do spend time thinking about these kinds of connections and references. And there are others who do not make any overt connection, but feel the unease that we’re trying to create; they get a sense of something extra going on, between the lines.

I think it gives them a greater appreciation of what we’ve actually created, that it’s not just been an arbitrary reason that we’ve put a creature in a certain place or designed them in a particular way.

Environmental Space



We have to look at the environment that the creature is in. Does the creature fit within the environment space? It doesn’t really make sense to have, say, a human with crab claws running around in a hotel, but it might make sense to have them appear on a wharf or dockside. You could see that there was some kind of nautical influence going on and that would be okay.

So you have to consider the entire environment within which the creature lives as well as story elements. People expect games to make sense, and do not want to experience a feeling that it’s all some contrivance.

Another problem is one of realism. Should we only create creatures that could physically exist, in a scientifically theoretical sense? I think designers should allow themselves a measure of creative liberty here. Think of the Manga character with the giant sword. In reality, such a huge weapon would be impossible to carry, let alone to wield. But it’s not important because these are extraordinary characters and the effect is too good to be destroyed by quibbles about realism.

In games you can get away with ignoring some biological laws providing people understand that it’s a thematic device that you’re using. Very often we just suspend our disbelief because it’s a fun experience and that’s the reason we play games. But it still has to be reasonable. It still has to make some sort of sense to the player.

Original Thinking

Creating creatures that are wholly original is extremely difficult. You know there’s that saying about there being nothing new under the sun and there’s no doubt that we’re all inspired to some extent by what we’ve seen before.

I don’t think any good designer wants to copy other stuff that’s out there, but I have often created things and, some while later, seen something similar that is being created around the same time elsewhere.

They call it morphogenic fields where an idea is shared all over the world at roughly the same time. There is always a danger of that coming up but it’s mitigated by how you use the creature in the story and how they act towards the player, which gives them their individuality.

Finally, you can’t underestimate the importance of magical moments of inspiration, when you’re in the shower or driving. Those flashes that just come to you.

And, as designers, we’re always looking at the real world for inspiration; at animals or even people. It starts the thread of an idea and it may have connections in multiple different things. You pull all those things together to make something unique.