Journalist, radio host and longtime horror aficionado Louise Blain is going to work at Blumhouse Games, joining the fledging horror games outfit as creative lead, in a position that will see her identifying opportunities for Blumhouse Games, but also vetting potential partners.
Blumhouse Games was launched back in February as part of the multimedia company Blumhouse, with Zach Wood as its president and Don Sechler as its chief financial officer. The subsidiary has a particular focus on horror games (across PC, consoles and mobile). As Bloody Disgusting reported at the time, Blumhouse Games aims to target horror games with indie budgets (less than $10 million).
“Through my time in the industry, I’ve had the good fortune of working closely with developers to bring their ideas to life,” Wood wrote in a statement in February. “There’s a unique opportunity for horror and genre in the indie game space, and I’m thrilled about teaming up with Blumhouse to meaningfully leverage the company’s brand, reputation, and creative talent.”
It's a smart aim - horror games have a reputation for being cheaper to create as they often don't require a lot of expensive assets or a lot of complicated mechanics. A scare, much like in the production of horror movies which are similarly cheap to make, doesn't have a dollar value attached.
Louise Blain (above) is best known for her work on GamesRadar+, NME and the BBC
Which is good because Blumhouse already know how to terrify people. Blumhouse Productions is best known for producing horror movies such as The Purge, M3GAN and Paranormal Activity. Blumhouse is also producing the Five Nights at Freddy’s movie adaptation starring Josh Hutcherson, which is set to release in cinemas next month.
Blain has accumulated numerous bylines over the years, at publications including GamesRadar+, TechRadar, PC Gamer, NME and The Guardian. She also serves as the writer and presenter of BBC Radio 3’s Sound of Gaming, and has been consulting on several horror games before her work with Blumhouse.
While Blumhouse does have a wedge of horror properties - and this writer in particular would love the idea of a The Purge game - the stated plan back when the gaming imprint launched in February was for the company to pursue original properties within video games. Let's see what happens next.
Disclaimer: not only was Louise Blain a long-term employee of our sister site GamesRadar+ and a regular contributor to this very website, she's also a close friend of this writer and has influenced him to watch a lot more horror movies than he should actually be watching.
If you’re a fan of scary games, be sure to check out our list of the very best horror games to play right now. For a bit more variety, you can also read our roundup of the best indie games.
