A 19th century Catalan farmhouse is the setting for CLeM. “It was my grandparents’ house and it inspired us to create the environment in which the video game takes place”, explains Mariona Valls, the co-founder and art director of Mango Protocol. The new work of this small Barcelona studio offers the user to immerse themselves in a dark and personal story that, unlike how it would be presented in the rest of the arts, in this case is played. In the skin of a strange rag doll, the player moves through the different rooms, carefully observes all the details and interacts with the objects that adorn each room. The goal? Find out what happened in that gloomy abandoned house.
Although different in the mechanics that can be played, CLeM is similar to Ugly, another recently released video game developed by the also small Catalan team Team Ugly. This time the player controls a tormented noble who has to deal with the traumas of the past while traveling through a huge palace jumping from one place to another and using a mirror that allows him to exchange for his shadowy self.
Original, right? One of its creators, Gerard Singuerlin, reveals its influences, “the animated miniseries Más allá del jardín and the experimental music band Mr. Bungle”. Both CLeM and Ugly are two good examples of what is known in the electronic entertainment industry as an indie game. These are works developed by much smaller teams than those responsible for the big blockbusters of the video game and which, therefore, can afford greater artistic and creative freedom.
Almost half of the video game development studios in Catalonia (46%) and Spain (49%) have fewer than five employees. This is evidenced by the respective editions of the White Book of the video game industry prepared by the employers’ association of the sector with the support of the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Industry. For years these small independent studios have been creating interactive works of great cultural and artistic value, but, in the vast majority of cases, they go unnoticed by the general public and off the radar of mainstream media. “These types of games have not yet reached the general public,” says the creative director of Barcelona’s Nomada Studio, Conrad Roset. “In the media, many more singers, film directors or politicians are interviewed than video game creators,” says the head of the acclaimed Gris. In this evocative video game, the player guides the steps of a girl through a dream world that confronts her with a painful experience of her life.
Although independent, his is a much larger studio than those previously mentioned and his game, he admits, has received a lot of media attention, but this does not prevent this artist from perceiving that “there is an imbalance between the importance of the video game in the field of industry and popularity and the coverage it receives from traditional media”. Roset, who is in full development of his studio’s new project, Neva, cites the example of The Game Awards, an annual gala in the video game sector in which Gris was awarded and whose last edition tripled in global audience the Oscars – reached 118 million viewers, compared to 35 million for the cinema gala. “Although progress has been made, there is still work to be done so that video games are valued as cinema, literature, music or art are valued, so that they have a more balanced recognition, like what other cultural industries receive “, he affirms.
Another of the factors that can cause this ignorance of the indie game among the general public is the great diversity of genres that exist within this creative industry. This is pointed out by Carla Sevillano, level designer at Piccolo Studio, also from Barcelona – yes, the video game sector in Catalonia is mostly concentrated in Barcelona -. “The games that tend to make the most noise are those that do not have as artistic a purpose as others that do center and pivot their design on this element,” says the person responsible for shaping some of the game’s scenarios After us. In this emotional title, the player controls Gaia, the spirit of life that must travel through an Earth that has been ravaged by man. Indeed, in the four games that have been mentioned so far, neither guns are fired, cars are driven, nor a ball is kicked.
“The diversity of genres contributes to its richness and breadth, and it is important that players and the industry at large continue to explore and promote the variety of experiences that video games can offer,” says Sevillano. An idea that the designer and artist of Ugly takes a little further. “It’s not that the artistic side of video games is unknown to the general public, but to the vast majority of players”, points out Singuerlin. “I think it is very difficult to understand the expressive capacity of video games from the outside, but it is also difficult from the inside if the only experience lived are works that only serve entertainment”, he adds.
Conversing remotely with these four video game creators, either via voice memos or messages on Discord, it’s easy to notice the richness of their works in terms of their inspirations. Although they all admit that they look at what other artists are doing in the interactive medium, they are not limited to what this sector has to offer. Painting, sculpture, video clips or animation are part of his references. “The anime and animated series of the nineties have marked the visual style of all our games, but also our travels through Europe, Japan and South Korea have shaped the landscapes of our universe”, explains Mariona Valls . “Cinema is also key – affirms Conrad Roset – films from the Japanese studio Ghibli, such as Princess Mononoke, or the French film The Red Turtle have served as inspiration for us, in the same way as the work of contemporary artists, such as Chillida”. Precisely, Carla Sevillano has a special predilection for sculpture and architecture when looking for ideas for the three-dimensional scenarios she designs: “I am passionate about abstract sculpture, but also watching documentaries about the architecture of civilizations ancient to understand how they conceived and executed their constructions”.
For these video game creators inspiration can come from many places, but can we talk about original games when they are works that in most cases are developed as a team? Although with different views, they all believe it. “Just as it happens in other arts, such as cinema or theatre, there are creative profiles that give intention and coherence to the work beyond the strictly technical and playful part. But we must not forget that, just like in the aforementioned cinema and theater, games are developed by usually large groups of people, without whom the creation of the latter would not be possible”, affirms Singuerlin. For his part, Roset highlights the importance of a member of the team taking this type of initiative. “That’s what’s happening with Neva, I want to be in control of the creative, narrative and artistic part, since it’s what brings a unique vision.” For Carla Sevillano, author games are those that “compared to video games designed for large masses, allow you to experiment and explore various artistic and narrative forms”.
Although the large numbers that have been driving the video game sector for years are what have most aroused the interest of the media, Mariona Valls sees it as essential that its artistic value is recognized. “I have the feeling that the cultural part is not communicated enough, since everything is focused on talking about the amount of money that moves the industry”. His words take on much more meaning at this precise moment in which the electronic leisure sector is experiencing a major crisis at an international level. Market saturation; the purchasing power of the players, which is getting lower and lower; the ability of the big titles to retain users and the erratic planning of many companies during the pandemic have caused this creative industry to suffer a crisis that this 2024 alone already accumulates more than eight thousand layoffs worldwide and dozens of closures studies -also in Catalonia-. “Hopefully it will change soon and both adults and children will have space in the media – points out the creator of CLeM – because if this crisis explodes completely, we will no longer have space or any justification to be considered as valid creators”.
