Slitterhead, the unusual horror action title from the creator of Siren and Gravity Rush, exists today because of concepts initially created for a potential Siren 3.
In an interview with Keiichiro Toyama (translated by Automaton), he reveals that, while still at Sony, a third Siren game was floated due to a reemerging interest in the series. Unfortunately, that never made it very far, but it did ultimately lead to this year's body-hopping body horror adventure.
"Slitterhead was born out of the idea of What if I were to make Siren 3?" Toyama said. With the series beginning to see an uptick in popularity, Sony apparently wanted to explore a potential AAA successor, prompting Toyama and his team to start conceptualising ideas.
He wanted to have the Siren successor be set in an open world 1990s Hong Kong, but "various circumstances" led to his departure from the platform holder and going independent. Ultimately, he and his team decided to continue building on the idea, leading to Slitterhead.
Another benefit of going indie is he could make the game with a high age rating in mind. "This would have been difficult to achieve during my time at SIE, so this time, I thought I’d take on a daring challenge," Toyama said.
We rather liked the game which, despite its flaws, we called an "absolute must-play if you’re looking for an original take on the survival horror genre".