Malte Burup, creative director of Death Howl

With Malte Burup, video games are not simply objects of entertainment. Founder of The Outer Zone studio, former comic book author and children’s illustrator, Malte has spent years building a coherent body of work haunted by parallel worlds, bodies under pressure, and intimate rituals. From Mind Scanners, a clinical dystopia about power and psychiatry, to Death Howl, a bitter tale of maternal grief combining deckbuilding, grid-based tactics, and soulslike heritage, his games seek less to reassure than to test. In this interview, Malte Burup looks back on his hybrid career, the philosophy behind The Outer Zone, his very personal relationship with writing and game design, the raw freedom of his Itch projects, and how a game can become a symbolic space for exploring loss, the violence of systems, and what remains when meaning slips away.

Point’n Think: Before video games, you worked in the field of drawing, comics, and children’s books. In your opinion, what is the common thread between Uvisheden, Sofus and the Moonmachine, and your games such as Mind Scanners and Death Howl?

Malte Burup: Aside from my desire to explore strange new worlds, I think my guiding principle has always been to create something that serves a purpose beyond mere entertainment. In Sofus and the Moonmachine, I wanted to offer a high-quality alternative to all the mediocre games that children started playing when tablets first appeared. In my comic book, I wanted to show that life has no ultimate goal. In Mind Scanners, I wanted to reflect on the ethical dilemmas that arise in psychiatry. And with Death Howl, I wanted to explore the theme of grief. However, I’m going to take a break from this common thread in our next game (laughs).

PnT: When you created The Outer Zone, you talked about “games from parallel worlds,” the strange and the surreal. How would you define the studio’s identity today, after several projects?

Malte: It’s still relevant. Our protagonist in Death Howl explores a parallel world where many strange and surreal events occur. It’s a zone that lies outside of normality.

PnT: You describe yourself as both a game director and an artist. What does that look like in your day-to-day work? Do you start with images, systems, or themes? And where does your “illustrator’s eye” help you most in game design?

Malte: I wear many hats (laughs). One day, I’m applying for funding, the next day, I’m recording music. On the third day, I might draw backgrounds in the morning, then discuss design with my teammates, and end the day writing dialogue.

I think my artistic eye helps me most in determining whether a design is elegant or not. But I think my “game designer’s eye” helps me just as much with the artistic style as the other way around. However, it’s always difficult to find the balance between “artistic interest” and creating a “clear design.”

PnT: On Mind Scanners, you did almost everything: art, design, writing, sound, with only a few collaborators. What do you like about this ultra-compact way of working, and where do you see its limitations now that you’re embarking on more ambitious projects?

Malte: It’s important to note that I shared the game design with Rasmus, who also did all the coding in Mind Scanners.

But yes, I love this compact way of working. I think the bigger your company gets, the more boring tasks you have to do. I want to continue to have variety in my work, and I want the same for my teammates. What’s more, we’re quite efficient. There’s virtually no loss of communication. Rejecting a concept, changing course, and navigating in another direction costs us very little and can be done very quickly. We have time to listen to each other and consider ideas.

Of course, there’s also a certain risk in having only three people in a team, but it’s worth it.

PnT: Mind Scanners dealt with dystopian psychiatry, power, and morality in an oppressive system. What did you learn from that game, in terms of writing and design, that you consciously reused or rejected in Death Howl?

Malte: Not much was directly carried over from Mind Scanners, except perhaps the way we create the characters’ facial expressions. We also learned that it’s better to focus on gameplay first and build a universe around it, rather than the other way around.

PnT: On Itch, we can find your episodes of Tales From The Outer Zone (The Construction, Fleshworms, The Goat Crone, Cyborg Seppuku, etc.). If you had to introduce this series to someone who doesn’t know you, how would you define “an Outer Zone story” in one sentence?

Malte: Tales From The Outer Zone is an improvised retrofuturistic series of short adventures exploring a new genre in each chapter, set in the same universe as Mind Scanners.

PnT: These point-and-click games share a universe with Mind Scanners. How do you organize all this in your head: do you really think in terms of a “transmedia universe,” or do you allow yourself to return to the same world whenever you have a good idea?

Malte: Tales From The Outer Zone is free and improvised chapter by chapter. I try to stay organized, but the timeline and details can sometimes slip. I’m very relaxed about it. It’s really a pleasure to create something so free.

PnT: Of all your little Outer Zone games, which one do you feel is most directly related to Death Howl, whether in tone, in the way you treat the characters, or in the way you build the world?

Malte: The Goat Crone shares many similarities with Death Howl. It’s a period game with a female protagonist who loses a family member in an occult horror tale.

PnT: You often return to the themes of bodies under pressure, violent institutions, family, and rituals (Mind Scanners, Goat Crone, Fleshworms, etc.). What is it about these subjects that obsesses you to the point of addressing them game after game?

Malte: I’m not sure. They’re powerful themes for me. Timeless and universal. I also like films by directors who explore these themes. Like Cronenberg, Verhoeven, von Trier, and Lynch. When it comes to themes and stories, I’m much more inspired by cinema than by games.

PnT: The Itch scene is both crowded and essential for weird games. How do you see its role today: is it still a real springboard for your projects, or more of a living archive of the Outer Zone for people who discover you through Mind Scanners or Death Howl?

Malte: For now, I only use it for the Tales series. But who knows? One day, I might make a little experimental game, and then it will be the perfect place to launch it.

PnT: Death Howl is described as an impossible mix of Soulslike, grid-based turn-based tactics, and deck building. What was the very first “hook” of the project: the grieving mother, the grid-based combat, or the crazy idea of merging these three genres?

Malte: It matured over many years. It started with several different projects that merged into one. After playing Dream Quest in 2015, I really wanted to do something similar, but I didn’t know how to go about it and didn’t have the means to create a big game.

After creating Mind Scanners, a story-driven game, I wanted to create a game based on mechanics.

I thought the mechanic of killing beasts and taking their bones to improve your skills was similar to shamanism, so we went with that idea. We needed a reason for our protagonist to go to the spirit world, so we came up with the theme of loss.

PnT: You place Ro, a Neolithic Scandinavian hunter, in a spiritual world inspired by local folklore to tell a story of maternal grief. What historical, mythological, or personal references guided you, and what was non-negotiable for you in how this grief should be represented?

Malte: The pain of losing a loved one is universal and timeless. We go through the same emotional journey as we did thousands of years ago.

To help us describe these ancient feelings through a story, we turned to folk tales. These tales have survived through oral transmission for generations and have thus been reduced to their essence. I think there is a lot of truth to be found in these otherwise strange and surreal tales.

When we were working on Death Howl, we had all lost someone close to us, as I think everyone does, at least at our age. We didn’t want to tell our own stories. Instead, we wanted to express our emotional journey through grief.

We didn’t have any rules as such. We just followed our intuition.

PnT: Many critics describe the game as “uncomforting,” a slow descent riddled with grief, sometimes emotionally exhausting. Was it your ambition from the start to create a game that refuses comfort, or is it something that emerged as you went along?

Malte: I saw that review and thought they meant itwas a comforting game. (laughs). Because we think it is. Sure, the dark theme, dark colors, and atmosphere are very heavy and not very comforting. But the gameplay is another matter. It reminds us of the carefree days when we used to play Heroes of Might and Magic 3. Very comforting indeed.

PnT: The difficulty often comes up in feedback: no healing at the beginning, slow progression, grinding to unlock new cards or abilities, a constant feeling of punishment. As a designer, how do you balance thematic consistency (“grief is an exhausting battle”) with clarity/accessibility for players who aren’t “Soulslike diehards”?

Malte: We designed this game to be fun first and foremost. It just so happens that Death Howl is at its best when it’s difficult. The term “Soulslike” was used by our testers after playing the game. We never set out to create a Soulslike game or to make it difficult. Struggle and frustration go hand in hand with the theme, so the game naturally evolved in that direction.

We really want the game to be accessible, so we spent a lot of time designing the learning curve. We believe that all players should be able to play it, but we won’t give in to the temptation to offer overly assisted and overly text-based tutorials.

PnT: The card system is closely linked to positioning on the grid: action points are used both to play cards and to move, and enemies punish even the slightest wrong choice of square very severely. What design mistakes or dead ends did you have to eliminate to keep this system readable without losing its depth?

Malte: Our very first design problem was with movement. Moving only with cards was too tied to the random factor of getting a new hand each turn. And moving freely was too big of an advantage. So we naturally decided to make the player pay for each move.

In the first version, players could read the enemies’ abilities, but no one noticed the information box! They thought it was great that this information was hidden. So we decided to hide it.

PnT: Visually and musically, Death Howl is immediately recognizable: dark pixel art, desaturated palettes, organic creatures, a powerful user interface, and minimalist but intense sound design. How do you balance the readability of the combat with this dense symbolic and atmospheric layer?

Malte: We’re happy that we managed to give the game an iconic aesthetic, because that was our goal from the start. I think it’s always important to find a distinctive look and feel for your game. But finding the right balance between a cool aesthetic and readability is always a challenge. So you have to increase the contrast, change the colors, or make elements flash and animate to grab the player’s attention. As for the music, we wanted to make sure it was never too melodic or pompous. It remains minimalist and vague, so as not to disturb the player and create a cacophony with the sound effects.

PnT: Finally, how did the collaboration with 11 bit studios go on such an unusual project: what were their main challenges (difficulty curve, “Soulslike deckbuilder” marketing, storytelling)? And what will you take away from this experience for your next game, whether it’s set in the Outer Zone universe or elsewhere?

Malte: 11 bit studios guided us very well throughout this collaboration. They helped us focus on the most important aspects of the game and develop certain design ideas. They emphasized the “Soulslike” aspect after testers began to notice the similarities.

This sparked players’ interest, but also their skepticism, which led to some interesting discussions… (laughs).