Stillness has had a long history that I’ve tried documenting. I started building up the games idea in 2014, and began making it in the early Summer of 2016. So far, near everything in the game has been done by yours truly.
My initial inspiration from the game came from the years I spent stuck in depression, with little else in my life but my thoughts. As such, I wanted to make something that kind of captured a lot of what I was thinking & feeling at the time.
Growing up, I was an odd kid. Blatantly passionate about my selective interests, and basically asocial. And… I didn’t feel ashamed about that, because that was who I was, and didn’t like the notions I received from people, that I should have been ashamed.
But, well, over several years of those subliminal messages, being told I didn’t exist, that my interests made me weird, that I was supposed to act, supposed to be someone else, well eventually that just gets to you.
by the end of my senior year of high school I had entered into a state of depression, and didn’t really get out of it until I had gotten to the end of my first year of college, roughly 3 years later. the first 2 years of which, I spent the vast majority of my time just trapped with my own thoughts. Stuck in a mire of how miserable I was, and how I shouldn’t be, because my life was fine, and hating myself more for it. and most of all, I hated the fact I didn’t really hate myself at all.
I am a lucky person. I know this. I was able to get out a state many can’t. And in many ways I’d like to say this game is for them as much as it is for me, but in just as many ways I’d say that’s a bold-faced lie.
Stillness is made, primarily, for me.
Now, of course, I’d love if other people could like it as much as I do, otherwise, why would I bring any of this up. Why would I showcase it at all? But the central core, was to make a game I’d like to play. A Story I’d like to see. And I hope there is an audience who agrees with me on that.
Of course, thats just the personal inspiration, Stillness takes some nods several games I’m a fan of. Silent Hill is an inspiration. the general melancholy, the level design, and of course, the set up of Silent Hill 4: The Room, which Stillness knowingly shares (although the outcome will be very different, I assure you).
Another inspiration for me has been the works of Andrew Hussie. the Art style for Stillness was inspired by Problem Sleuth, and the choice to have examination/narration to be handled in 2nd person was taken from Hussie’s distinct 2nd person narration in his works.
Lastly, to round out this and give you 3 examples (although there are surely more than 3), I present a sort of “mood” inspiration: 6 Differences. this little spot the difference flash game was one I played when I was young, and it stuck with me for years later. its surreal modern life aesthetic stuck with child me, and is definitely something that inspired Stillness‘s creation.
And with That, I’ll leave you with this little poem of the game:
The Human Mind is a Fascinating Thing.
In the Absence of Light, we see things,
and In the Absence of Sound, we hear things,
so then whose to say, in the Absence of Emotions,
we won’t feel something…
Jesse Lozano 