New Project: Mara Development Diary Reveals The Featured Apartment In-game Is A Real Location

It was nearly a year ago that developer Ninja Theory introduced a separate project in development alongside the highly-anticipated sequel, Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga. Namely Project: Mara, the new endeavor at the time was told to be an experimental approach in how to utilize the game-making medium for those experiencing real-life mental health issues.

Howbeit, Ninja Theory in terms of the coming project title did keep to itself since the initial reveal with little information to elaborate further on since. Most striking about the game is the life-like visuals that are rendered into the full experience. Set in one static location, it is also suggested that the apartment featured is a real place. Well, it actually is.

In the latest ‘Dreadnought Diaries’ episode uploaded by Ninja Theory, Chief Creative Director Tameem Antoniades elaborates on the pursuit to accurately encapture the setting for Project: Mara. You can watch the full episode in the video below:

When pursuing to properly recreate the location, Ninja Theory explains that it first worked on properly scanning real-time textures and creating pantones of the explicit colors found within the apartment. Even more, Technical Art Director Matt Stoneham created a special scanner to accurately save the different designs and capture the depth of the respected texture alike what is found through traditional forms of texture work.

As for the scale of the apartment itself, Ninja Theory attempted to recreate the setting through multiple avenues, but ended contacting third-party Clear Angle to scan in the location to accurately save the finer details. “So in the end we contacted Clear Angle who specializes in this kind of stuff and they spent a whole day scanning the apartment with their LiDAR scanners and they provided us with some of the best references we’ve ever seen,” Antoniades shares in the video.

While little is still spared on the coming project, there is some new details that Ninja Theory confirmed on another game. Upon speaking with Microsoft, the team officially revealed that the coming Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga will be developed solely in Unreal Engine 5. You can read the full report by heading here.

What grabs you most knowing that Project: Mara is using a real-life apartment?