‘Vile: Exhumed’ Developer Cara Cadaver On Getting Personal In Her Disturbing New Game
When Cara Cadaver first started learning how to make video games, she knew she wanted to get personal. But she didn’t know just how personal she’d get with her first game, VILE. Now, with the help of DreadXP, she’s extended VILE into a longer, more disturbing experience with VILE: Exhumed. By combining FMV techniques with analog aesthetics, Cadaver crafts a harrowing journey into one man’s disturbing obsession.
We sat down with Cara Cadaver to discuss her journey in game development, the difficulty that comes with tapping into traumatic experiences, and playing with fake blood.
Importantly, this interview was conducted before the game was permanently banned on Steam due to what they deemed “sexual content with depictions of real people”. So while we don’t discuss the crucial issue of censorship, especially around VILE: Exhumed, we do discuss the very real issues and experiences that Cara Cadaver pulled from to create a grounded yet grotesque experience.
In a recent statement, Cadaver said, “This censorship of my work is a direct attack on creative expression and artistic freedom, and it will not stop with false accusations of sexual content. They will come for anything that speaks more loudly than they do.”
Dread Central: So, first of all, why did you want to get into game development?
Cara Cadever: That’s a great question. It’s just a big, long answer. I have always been creative. I’ve always loved making art, telling stories, especially visually, but I never really could find a medium to do so in a way that felt like I was really giving the audience what I wanted to give them. It was always a version, but it was never right.
I did landscaping for a very long time, and it would be 12 hours in the hot sun. Then I’d come home after work and be desperate to make something. I’ve always loved horror, and I actually came across Henry [Hoare] and Jordan King’s game Bloodwash. I remember playing it and just being like, “This is not what I thought video games could be.” I’ve always played a lot of video games, but I just remember that story in particular being so cool, and so creative and different. It’s a story that I was really invested in. So I reached out to Henry, we just got chatting, and I started teaching myself. Now here we are.
DC: That’s so incredible. So you are self-taught?
CC: I’ve been really lucky to have a lot of wonderful mentors, but yeah.
DC: That is so great. So, the first iteration of VILE, how long until that started taking shape?
CC: I did a couple of other small projects. Most of them are no longer on my itch page because I love myself, so I took them down. [Laughs] I’m sure you can relate to that.
DC: Oh yes. We’re a new version of ourselves now.
CC: Exactly. Yeah. I’m turning over a new leaf. But I did a few things like that. I did one that is still up called Attachment Not Found, where you can see the threads of VILE starting to appear. But I started being interested in learning game development in 2022, maybe late 2021, and VILE started last summer. I think the file is still, I tell everybody this, it’s so silly. The Unity Project is still called Test. I just opened it and was like, I have all these things I want to communicate, but I don’t know what it’s going to be yet. And it just started taking shape as I was making it. It was a really special experience in that way.
DC: It sounds like making VILE: Exhumed was an intuitive experience. Did you always want to, from the outset, make a game that was personal?
CC: Totally. I really love the facet of horror that is uncomfortable and tense. So I knew that’s the kind of thing I wanted to create, but I never knew it was going to turn into this personal project that a lot of people find so relatable and impactful. It was not the intention at all. It’s a really silly way of putting it, but it’s the most true to how I feel. It truly was just like I had all this gross yarn inside of me that I needed to just throw up. You’re a creative person, you probably get that, right?
DC: Oh yeah, with my movie it was like, “OK, I’m just going to throw up every weird emotion I’ve kind of locked inside of me for a decade.” I didn’t know that was going to happen. And it was very shocking and a little bit overwhelming.
CC: Oh yeah. I can only speak for myself, but you almost have to walk back into those moments of your life that inspired these stories. And it’s hard.
DC: No one prepares you for how hard that is. You think it’s so easy to get so personal, but you have to put yourself into these head spaces that, at least for me, I wanted blocked out forever. But I walked back into them willingly by accident at the same time.
CC: No, a hundred percent. It’s bizarre and it’s hard.
DC: I feel like I always want to warn people. I’m like, “Do you make personal projects? Just have your therapist on standby and a long list of self-care actions.” [Laughs]
CC: You get it for sure. But yeah, it was just like this weird, cathartic experience. It felt like I was doing myself some justice.
DC: I love that. So, you obviously had the short proof of concept game, and then at what point did you decide you wanted to expand it into a fuller experience? As a side note, how many hours is it?
CC: The extended version is probably like an hour and a half if you’re really digging around. I always have a hard time estimating speeding through it, but then I’m also so meticulously looking through it. But I would say an hour and a half.
DC: When did you realize you wanted to make an extended version of VILE?
CC: There was just a lot more that I kind of left on the table that I didn’t include in the original version, just because at the time, obviously, I didn’t have a publisher or anything. So I set a timeline for myself, and I cut a lot of things that I thought about including. Then also, I don’t know, you’re so close to a project, you’re like, “I think it’s good how it is. I don’t want to keep adding things. I don’t want to keep messing with it. I don’t know how I feel about it.”
But then the reception was really overwhelming and I realized, “Oh, I wish I had told a little more of the story. I wish I had included more things.” And then there were just other, I dunno, picture ideas for effects stuff and gore that I thought would be fun to do. I thought experimenting more with that would be really cool.
DC: We’re looking through the computer of an obsessed fan, and I love that it gave me Perfect Blue vibes, if you’ve ever seen it.
CC: Thank you. That is one of my favorite movies of all time.
DC: Mine, too! Yeah, VILE: Exhumed gives me Perfect Blue vibes, like we’re in MeMania’s computer. It’s a messed up headspace, I feel like, to put yourself in as the developer and the writer. So what was that like to get into that headspace and kind of write and exist through the eyes of an obsessed fan versus being the female character who’s experiencing it?
CC: It was really uncomfortable. That’s a really great question. It was, unfortunately, a little too easy to reach for things. Obviously, I’m not an obsessed fan of anything, but it was easy to reach for plenty of real-life personal experiences and external experiences that we see all the time for just really awful behavior. And some of it I had to exaggerate, and some of it I didn’t. Unfortunately, it was a pretty easy thing to find references for.
DC: But from a technical standpoint, I love how you have the gore. Did you do a lot of your own? How did that work in terms of a lot of the gory aspects and photos we see throughout the game?
CC: Yeah, it started just as I had some leftover Halloween blood, and I was like, “Oh, FMV is really cool. And hell yeah, I love pixel art.” I love creating pixel art. The game doesn’t really explore that a lot, but outside of that, I love creating pixel art. But in terms of realistic stuff, I didn’t know how to create that in a way that’s going to feel like not silly, I don’t know, or cutesy. And I wanted it to be really impactful, and I was like, “I’ll just take some pictures and see how it works out.” So I just started trying more and more things.
For the original game, it was like my iPhone on a shampoo bottle and me trying to lie in these horrible, uncomfortable angles, so you didn’t see that I’m holding a flashlight, all these silly things, and it was really fun. It felt like the right way to portray it. Obviously, a lot of the gore is exaggerated. The more exaggerated things, I just really wanted to create to be more impactful, but I wanted it to be grounded. And the scary thing isn’t the noise in the closet, it’s not the spooky stuff going on behind the mirror. It’s the real-life stuff. So I just really wanted it to be grounded.
DC: Well, that’s so cool. As a game developer, but as a creative and being able, you’re shooting your own photos, you’re writing video scripts, you’re directing and editing video. You’re making more than a game, almost.
CC: Yeah, I had so much fun. I love horror movies, and I love found footage, so it was really fun to pull from my favorites, as well.
DC: I’m a huge screen-life, found-footage girlie, so I love games like this where instead of watching someone, you are the one going through the computer files. Is found footage a genre that you are familiar with and enjoy in your spare time?
CC: Oh yes. I think it’s my number one horror subgenre. Even though it’s different subject matter, I found Creep really inspiring.
DC: Have you seen Creep 2?
CC: Oh yeah. I love the second one more than the first one. Hot Take.
DC: Me, too! So, what do you want to do next? Are you thinking about your next game?
CC: Yeah, this is another thing you probably can relate to. I’m finishing up with this project’s cycle, and so obviously I’ve already got five other things in my brain that I’m like, “OK, what do I do next?” The one that I’m thinking of is very different, but also very the same. I want to just keep things personal.
I guess that’s really what VILE: Exhumed taught me: I love creating and telling personal stories, even if they venture off into other weird little vignettes. Using my own voice and creating a story that speaks to people in this real way, I found it to be so special. So if I ever am honored with the opportunity to do that again, I would love to.
VILE: Exhumed is available to download for free at VileIsBanned.com.
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