The team behind the horror game Hellraiser: Revival set an unusual goal — to make the game so brutal and provocative that it would be banned or refused an age rating in at least one country. Apparently, the developers achieved their desired outcome: Indonesia refused to classify the project, effectively banning its sale in the territory.
This was revealed by the game's narrative director, Anthony De Fault, in an interview with IGN. According to him, the Saber Interactive team aimed to convey the extreme content characteristic of the Hellraiser film series and Clive Barker's original novella, The Hellbound Heart.
The developers wanted not just to show forbidden themes, but to make players interact with them. Hellraiser: Revival contains nudity, scenes of violence, abundant gore, references to self-harm, and sexual episodes. According to De Fault, it was important for the team to go beyond traditional horror, where the player merely observes shocking events.
An unofficial goal of the team was to achieve a ban, a refusal of rating, or restrictions in at least some part of the world — as one of the indicators that we did our job well
He also noted that the interactive format of video games allows for a more direct experience. Therefore, the team aimed not only to demonstrate taboo subjects but also to involve the player in them, including through violent actions and a more intimate first-person perspective.
However, the developers still had to make some concessions to avoid exceeding acceptable age restrictions. De Fault cited an example of an episode in which one of the characters masturbates while looking at images of the main character's girlfriend.
According to the narrative director, the scene was initially quite explicit, but showing the character's genitals could have led to a stricter age classification and limited the game's distribution in many countries. In the end, the developers changed the arrangement of objects in the room so that the player could not see what was happening from a certain angle.
De Fault believes that this small change did not diminish the scene's impact on the audience. Moreover, the player's imagination might be more effective than a direct demonstration of what is happening.
It is worth noting that, to some extent, the developers achieved their goal. In Indonesia, the local video game classification system assigned the project an RC (Refused Classification) category, meaning a refusal of classification. In practice, this deprived the game of the ability to be legally sold on the Indonesian market.