Here's some unsettling concept art from Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama's next game

It's been a long time since the last Silent Hill game, and arguably longer still since the last good one. But while series creator Keiichiro Toyama might've left the series behind, an early peek at his new studio's latest project shows a nightmarish menagerie of monsters that wouldn't look out of place in gaming's foggiest town.

At the tail end of 2020, Toyama left Sony's Japan Studio to found Bokeh Game Studio, bringing with him a number of other notable developers behind games like Gravity Rush and The Last Guardian. In a new video over on Bokeh's YouTube channel, Toyama gave a fleeting peek at what the studio's been up to via some properly gnarly concept sketches.

A gruesome spider-people parade — (Image credit: Bokeh Game Studio)

It's not entirely a parade of grimy monsters, mind. One screenshot almost evokes DMC, a parkour swordsman staring down a gorgeous watercolour skyline while an oversized passenger jet flies overhead.

A hooded man with a sword stares down a saturated city block — (Image credit: Bokeh Game Studio)

Then there's this guy, who's honestly just a mood.

Bug-man trapped in a box. — (Image credit: Bokeh Game Studio)

The rest of the video is a good shout for horror fans, with Toyama diving into his history and approach to designing for the genre. While details remain scant on the studio's current project, he explains the game contains threads of Silent Hill's particular brand of horror—albeit, from a more "exhilarating" angle drawn from a recent love of "death game" comics.

"I'm coming back to my roots, for example towards horror. However, rather than something deeply rooted into horror, I want to keep an entertainment note. While keeping elements from horror, I want players to feel exhilarated when playing the game."

Toyama reckons the studio's debut will come to PC and consoles sometime in 2023.

20 years ago, Nat played Jet Set Radio Future for the first time, and she's not stopped thinking about games since. Joining PC Gamer in 2020, she comes from three years of freelance reporting at Rock Paper Shotgun, Waypoint, VG247 and more. Embedded in the European indie scene and a part-time game developer herself, Nat is always looking for a new curiosity to scream about—whether it's the next best indie darling, or simply someone modding a Scotmid into Black Mesa. She also unofficially appears in Apex Legends under the pseudonym Horizon.