The original version of this article contained an error and has been changed. See the bottom of the article for more information.
While fencing against an opponent, the player’s end goal is simple: to get eaten by a huge pink monster, Nidhogg.
“Nidhogg” is a video game designed by Messhof, an independent video game company based in Los Angeles and founded by two UCLA alumni, Mark “Messhof” Essen and Kristy Norindr.
Released in January for PCs and Macs, “Nidhogg” is now in its final steps of preparation for its release on Sony PlayStation devices, a simultaneous purchase for both PS4 and PS Vita. The game, which has single-player and tournament modes, is a two-player sword-fighting game in a side-scrolling, pixelated environment where getting eaten by a serpent serves as the reward for beating a level.
Essen, who has a master of fine arts in Design | Media Arts, has been playing video games since he was a kid and said it got to a point where he decided that he wanted to make some of his own. He began doing just that through undergraduate and graduate school and has created many independent games under the Messhof name, such as an obstacle-based game, “Flywrench,” and a bicycle-racing game, “Scratch Race.”
“I had no idea how long (making video games) would take to learn, but it just became a hobby,” Essen said.
Norindr, who has a bachelor’s degree in women’s studies and an MA in cinema and media studies, realized she became most excited researching video games during her graduate work with varied media. Norindr was soon producing video games, as well as managing a video game research lab. After meeting three different times at video game conferences, Essen and Norindr became not only life partners but also work partners at their home, when Norindr became a part of Messhof in 2011 and began producing Essen’s games.
“It became a full-time job once we had enough money to be able to make it a full-time job,” Norindr said.
Essen’s inspiration for “Nidhogg” comes from older games he played growing up, such as “Great Swordsman.” The name “Nidhogg”comes from the mythological Norse serpent, which is featured throughout Essen’s game.
“(Nidhogg) wasn’t really a game that I had a very good idea of what I was doing when I started, but I just made little bits and would add and take away bits,” Essen said.
After a year of searching for the perfect musical accompaniment for the game, Norindr got in contact with electronic musician Daedelus through mutual friends. The soundtrack has four tracks that constantly evolve with players’ placement in the game – changes mirrored by fluctuations in the music’s pacing and volume.
Over the past few years Essen said new video game technology has developed to allow designers to do every step of the gaming creation process; however, through Sony, Messhof worked with a developer company, Code Mystics, to transition “Nidhogg” from PCs and Macs to PlayStation devices. This transition involved creating a new code-reading engine to take the scripting and logic of the game and transfer it onto a handheld device.
“Nidhogg” has already received much recognition in the gaming world, winning the 2011 Independent Games Festival’s Nuovo Award and IndieCade’s game design award in 2013. Essen said the support and positive feedback “Nidhogg” has garnered places Messhof in a great position for future gaming projects.
“We’ve never been in that position before, and we’re really excited about it,” Essen said.
One of the play testers of the game, UCLA doctoral student in cinema and media studies Harrison Gish, said part of Messhof’s style defies the expectations created by players’ “normal” video game experiences. For instance, Gish said the fact that on beating a level the player gets instantaneously eaten by a monster rather than met with a reward screen represents Messhof’s commitment to absurdity and abstraction.
Gish said the simplicity in the mechanics of “Nidhogg” marks another difference between Messhof’s work and that of other contemporary AAA, or high-budget, video games. Rather than the player needing a vast knowledge of a controller interface, Gish said “Nidhogg’s” controls are about repetitive motion that also engages a great deal of skill.
“(Messhof) has found a kind of beauty in simplicity when it comes to their games,” Gish said.
Correction: Norindr has an MA in cinema and media studies.