"In playing Thirty Flights of Loving, we appreciated how quick-paced it was, and the idea of stopping to have a conversation with someone and how that might just put the brakes on the experience completely." says Jonathan Burroughs, co-director of Virginia.

Virginia is a complex thriller about a new FBI agent trying to locate a missing young man while also trying to find evidence of corruption in her partner. It digs deep into a town's dirty secrets, the truths buried in the characters' pasts, and the hidden agendas of some powerful people in the game's world. It's an adventure inspired by Twin Peaks, Fargo, and True Detective.

It also never says a word.

Virginia, through a series of budgetary decisions and artistic choices, doesn't speak for its entire duration, telling its winding story through careful selections of images, moments, and details, guiding the player through a tale that's open to interpretation. It's the sort of experience that risked being too straightforward or dangerously vague with its imagery, and yet the team at Variable State put it all on the line to tell the story as they wanted to.
Choosing Silence

"The decision was made with a view to making our lives easier, which must sound preposterous in hindsight."

During early development, the team at Variable State were having a difficult time figuring out what concepts to go with for the thriller they had in mind. "Going back to Viginia's origins, around March 2...