Following his VR debut with Death Game Hotel, SWERY wants to create a "multiplayer experience that no one has ever seen before."
It's been two weeks since Death Game Hotel arrived on Quest, a gambling puzzle horror game that we believed "excels in multiplayer" in our recent review. While it's the debut VR game from White Owls Inc., this isn't the first time Hidetaka "SWERY" Suehiro has explored virtual reality, following some VR experiments back in 2017 and a canceled food-themed PSVR game.
In an email interview with UploadVR, White Owls' CEO revealed that Death Game Hotel was conceived during 2020's COVID-19 pandemic. White Owls later presented a prototype demo to Meta.
"With the "Stay Home" situation preventing us from going out, meeting friends, or going to the office, White Owls distributed VR headsets to all employees and held game meetings in VR. This experience sparked the idea to create a safe space where people could come together and connect at any time, leading to the start of this project."
Inspired by Squid Game, Saw, Kaiji, and Tomodachi Game, White Owls initially considered using Mahjong and Poker as Death Game Hotel's base, with the added twist that players need to "bet something beyond our expectations."
Considering previous takes on the "death game" concept across video games like Danganronpa have often been single-player, I was surprised that multiplayer was always White Owls' main focus.
"Everything was designed and developed with multiplayer as the main experience in mind. In fact, single-player was added later, much like a campaign mode in FPS games."
Suehiro informed me that the biggest challenge involved establishing the game's cheating mechanics, alongside detection timing for said cheats. White Owls eventually limited the timing window while allowing a grace period after detection.
"Since it's a multiplayer game, it's truly unpredictable when and who will attempt to cheat."
As for choosing VR over traditional platforms, Suehiro reaffirmed his belief in the game's social aspects, telling me the "overwhelming sense of being together in the same place" made VR stand out for Death Game Hotel.
"The tension when “bluffing” or performing a “cheat” can only be felt through the unique platform of VR and cannot be conveyed through a flat screen. In the future, if I create VR works, I intend to focus on these sensations that are difficult to reproduce on a flat screen."
Mixed reality support was considered prior to Quest 3's launch, though White Owls concluded MR wouldn't fit Death Game Hotel because the game involves gathering friends globally into an imaginary setting.
It's unclear if Death Game Hotel ever appear on Steam or PSVR 2, though. White Owls has "various strategies in place to deliver this work to more users," but I'm told these strategies "won't succeed" if the Quest version doesn't become popular.
As for what's next, I queried whether White Owls plans to work on more VR games. An emphatic "Yes!" told me everything I needed to know.
Having worked on our very first VR project, I believe we have successfully managed to recreate sensations that cannot be experienced on a flat screen. We have also accumulated valuable experience through many challenges we’ve never faced on traditional platforms, and we definitely plan on tapping into all this knowledge we’ve gained when creating future games. Ideally, I would like to create a multiplayer experience that no one has ever seen before, so stay tuned.
Would White Owls consider VR adaptations for previous games, such as 2010's survival horror game Deadly Premonition? Suehiro states it's dependent on the rights holders, but "If given the chance, I would certainly like to do it." He also confirmed White Owls created a Deadly Premonition VR demo during the sequel's development, though this was "just a test" and was subsequently scrapped.
Death Game Hotel is available now on the Meta Quest platform.
Jason Coles
