My interview with the developer of ‘Iconoclasts,’ Remastered
Once again using a short cut to consistency by re-running my old work
Welcome once again to this always erratic blog about games and such. I mentioned last time during “The Games of 2023” that I wanted to adjust the angle of what I do on this blog a bit and the first stage of that is doing a few more remasters of pieces that ran back when I was on The Young Folks. The idea behind this is twofold: first off, I think it’s an interesting challenge to look back at things I’ve written before and see what I think of myself and my progress (and, let’s be honest, cringe.)
The second idea here is posterity. The site itself could fall off the internet at any given time and has probably been harvested for parts so that Sam Altman can buy a yacht or something. I get kind of sick thinking about the only legacy a huge chunk of my writing just isn’t around any more - or worse, is being mutilated by some kind of algorithmic nightmare. I want to be the final authority on my own words. And if a standing archive of my work ends up being something that can help keep moments in time alive, to keep conversations about games in that moment available, even a little, I would consider it a magnificent accomplishment.
On that note, this is one of a few things that I think could be such a piece. This is an interview I did with Joakim Sandberg, the developer of Iconoclasts. I had reached out on the occasion of the game’s Switch release to chat about the game and some of its themes. For context, I had also reviewed the game for TYF, giving it a pretty positive score, so the chance to talk to the man behind it was exciting for me. This interview actually changed my opinion of the game - I went from quite liking it to adding it to my personal list of favorite games ever…
…because boy howdy did Joakim Sandberg humble my ass.
At the time, I had only really been removed from my membership in the Assemblies of God for a couple of years and was very much still working through my own deconstruction. That deconstruction was definitely influencing my analysis of Iconoclasts’ themes and story - which fed directly into the questions I posited to Sandberg. While he was very gracious with his responses, it was clear to me immediately after that I had misinterpreted the game.
This interview serves as a reminder to myself that while art is subjective, it is also made by people with their own subjective viewpoint. When critiquing or analyzing a piece of art, it’s important to avoid being so far up in your own head that you become an expert in a version of the art that you effectively made up rather than the actual work. I won’t claim to be perfect at it today, but this experience was an important lesson for me and one I return to as a reminder pretty regularly. Iconoclasts is a fascinating and cool game without me loading my baggage onto it; and learning that lesson in the most embarrassing way I could has endured it to me. If Joakim Sandberg ever finds this, I hope he’ll forgive me for not being a better prepared critic.
Even so, overall I do think the interview is at least compelling as Sandberg is able to provide a lot of insight into his design process and thoughts. Particularly of note to me is his thoughts on solo development. I don’t know that many indie games have archival interviews like this, so I hope that someday this helps someone in their own research into the topic. I’m leaving the interview below unedited from its original publication (save for replacing “The Young Folks” with my name where needed) for this reason.
Finally, while this doesn’t really contain spoilers for Iconoclasts, it was absolutely conducted from the perspective of a completed playthrough, and I genuinely would recommend giving it a play through, as it’s great!
The following interview with Joakim “Konjak” Sandberg was originally published on TheYoungFolks.com on August 3, 2018 as “Interview: ‘Iconoclasts’ Developer Joakim Sandberg On Managing Life And The Dangers Of Devotion”
Travis Hymas: First off, let’s talk about the new content for Iconoclasts. A free update is going out to existing versions of the game along with the Nintendo Switch release, can you tell us about what is in the update?
Joakim Sandberg: Along with the Switch release, there will be some simple content added, like a Boss Rush letting you play most of the bosses in a row on one life. There is also an added Relaxed difficulty mode. It exists for those that get into the story, but don’t want to get stuck on a challenge. When a game like this has so many elements it might be that you get enamored with one, but can’t get into it as easy as you’d like because of another.
In some form or another, you’ve been working on Iconoclasts for an extremely long time. What is it like working on your own to produce a project like this?
Sandberg: It’s not recommended, in hindsight. Unless you know how to manage your life! It wore me down socially and mentally, but at least I somehow got to the finish line. But it’ll take me a long time to truly think about how I feel about all the parts of making it, however dark that sounds, haha. If anyone considers a similar game to make, reconsider it twice, then remember that you should not bank on it being a huge success and accrue debts, or sacrifice friendships. Take weekends. These are always my recommendations now, before I even tell people my game design recommendations.
By all accounts, Iconoclasts has already become a fan favorite and critically well received. There is a thriving fan Discord and the game has an 87 on Metacritic. Was there a moment you can think of where you knew this game was going to be a hit?
Sandberg: I have a hard time expecting much, haha. The game has done pretty well, definitely for someone like me working on his own without having things to repay after I was done. All I really did when making the game was try to tell a story in a way I would prefer it in a context of a sidescroller 2D game, more than sticking to too many tropes (though the game consciously starts out that way). I think that if there are fluctuations in opinions, but scores are generally still high, I did something more unique.
Iconoclasts quickly reveals itself to be about a religious organization that rules the planet while abusing its people. I’m not sure how familiar you are with America’s relationship with religiosity; but as a former Evangelical Christian I found a lot of the One Concern’s teachings and behavior to be very similar to that experience. Are you or have you been a religious person?
Sandberg: I’m a cliché Swede in that I am either agnostic or atheist. Contrary to the cliché I’d say many more Swedes are agnostic than atheist. It’s just human nature. We function better if we sometimes have something to blame, or something to thank, for the things out of our control. Unfortunately that also sometimes means blaming other people. It’s these societal group behaviors that always fascinated me. More so today than when I started Iconoclasts back in my early, naive 20’s. If I started today the plot would probably be even more indulgent with these themes.
Devotion, not just religious, is a lot of what drives the world these days, and how easily exploitable some groups are. But also that every person had a life that lead to where they are today. A lot of “evil” people become that way solely because they are driven by voluntary ignorance to the world around them, or acting on what is expected of them. All of this sounds very lofty, but those are the feelings that drive my narrative ideas. I just very much enjoy watching how the world unfolds, and why it does, in my own way. I say enjoy, it very rarely unfolds in a positive way these days. If I made another narrative-driven game it’d probably be even darker.
Was any part of Iconoclasts meant to call back to your own experiences in any way?
If not, how did you come to settle on religion as a backbone for Iconoclasts?
Sandberg: A lot of the main characters are a piece of me. Me worrying if making the game is a mistake, experiences I had growing up, feelings I had if I belonged, and so on. When it comes to religion, that part is just a catch-all for society as a whole. You could make religious analogies to our dependencies on technology. Finding a group we feel we belong in and that answers questions that used to give us anxiety for their lack of concrete answers makes us happier, at least in the short term. Literal religion has its problems with its established rules, but in the same sense the iron grip of some politics or corporations dictates the world and people as well.
Religion, in a narrative, is a useful comparison to these things from the real world, to me. I’m not out to attack a specific one. Though to be fair, some extreme ‘supposed’ Christians have been pretty bad lately!
A scene that particularly stuck with me involves a character talking about the One Concern’s “thoughts and prayers” and calls them fake. Again, you may be familiar with the current American political situation, but this struck me as a comment those politics. Am I reading too much into this?
Sandberg: You can read into it as you’d like. It is definitely an offshoot of faith solving things for you. The “you” being the person giving condolences. “I don’t have to do more than this, I gave my prayers”. In the exact context of that scene, Elro is incredibly frustrated with his life and the questionable passing of his father, and this simple platitude, that to someone who is very weary with the world or depressed, becomes the last straw to break the back.
That is definitely based on my opinion of the expression. It is a catch-all-tragedies response, and honestly means nothing. The person saying it may mean well, but to the victim more and more often just comes off like a greeting card kind of response for something that truly impacted them.
Of the members of Iconoclasts’ cast, do you have a favorite?
Sandberg: As a dumb man who likes some things, Mendeleev is visually my favorite and my greatest indulgence, haha. But to be more serious, I am very happy with the plotline for Black, as many others seem to agree. But I also am happy with the arc Elro goes through. He isn’t a good guy, judged by his actions, but that’s not the point. The point is seeing his line of thinking, and what he might feel is expected of him to need to do. Faulted characters are much more interesting, and everyone is faulty somehow.
I’ve read before that your influences for this game come from your different opinions of certain franchises – such as liking Metroid Fusion more than Super Metroid. In that spirit, what is your favorite unconventional opinion of a popular game franchise?
Sandberg: Hard question. Not really sure what kind of response you’re after. laughs If you’re looking for blunt opinions, I guess how – though I love Dark Souls – those games get credit for a story that isn’t there. It is a lot of magical nonsense in item descriptions that due to its nature of not being tied into a clear narrative is connected together by the players, or people that unconsciously are better storytellers than the developers, but still giving the latter the credit. It’s pretty fun. It’s fine, I just like to see these things as they are.
But closer to games that have to do with Iconoclasts, I think that people ask for non-linearity like Super Metroid had, but nobody would ever have the patience for it anymore. Nintendo knows it. People will complain when Samus Returns lets you use power to fill out the map anywhere, and how the game is more linear, but far fewer people would finish the game if it did things that Super (Metroid) did. Things like needing to find a secret block in an elevator room for the main path to beat the game. Or knowing that this specific lava is just pretend lava.
Are you playing any games right now?
Sandberg: I play the same, very few games, for a long time. I still play Dark Souls 3 and Overwatch. I played some PUBG until it got too annoying for me. Not much more than that at the moment. I like to find two or three new games a year I can obsess over, rather than play 30.
Finally, Iconoclasts has been a long time in the making, and it could be said with this new update, you’re still making it. With this release, would you say you have finally finished Iconoclasts?
Sandberg: I think so. There isn’t more story to tell that wouldn’t either detract from what I wanted to say, or detract from what fans have imagined.
As the concerning as hell KOSA bill gains traction, I appreciated The Verge EIC Nilay Patel trying to hold an American politician’s feet to the fire.
Play Nothing Door. It’s cool.
I’m planning a couple of trips this year (PAX East baybeeee) which has revived the everyday carry guy inside me again.
A not so friendly reminder that there is incredible violences being visited upon the Palestinian people in Gaza right now as you read this. Please help in calling for an immediate ceasefire.