Team Clout studio publishes third issue Development Diary His dark action horror game ILL was entirely dedicated to the game’s sound design. The project’s game director Maxim Verekhin and composer Alon Mor shared details about the creative process and explained why the game’s soundtrack deliberately avoids banal jump scares and typical genre clichés.
The authors suggest that voice in ILL is a sophisticated storytelling tool. Inspired by the academic avant-garde of the 20th century (Györdem Ligeti, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Schaeffer), the composer relied on oppressive silence, a sense of the unknown and distortions of the usual organism to create an atmosphere of psychological discomfort. The tracks feature heavily modified field recordings. For example, the slow chirping of birds becomes a terrifying chorus of moans, the blows of a whip form a rhythmic pattern, and the clanking of machinery develops into ambient textures. The recently released Whalesong explores this philosophy, conveying through sound the harrowing story of the birth, struggle, and downfall of a giant, unknown creature.