Ilona de Bruin, a student at the Netherlands Film Academy, is working on a VR game edition of De Pont made for the Oculus Rift. Ilona says she took inspiration from an eerie Japanese folktale about the “Umibozu,” an ancient Japanse spirit who sinks ships. She wanted to gradually move the player away from the Amsterdam setting and take them into a strange new world where creatures from myths and legends emerge from the river, threatening to destroy the ferry.

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Asked about the biggest challenges she faced, Ilona points to creating the custom assets she needed, creating light effects and transitions, and managing the storytelling part.

Ilona’s demo will be one of the projects to be showcased at the upcoming Netherlands Film Festival. Stay tuned for more info on that.

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