Twenty years have passed since Clive Barker terrified cinema audiences with Hellraiser, but the British fantasy writer, artist and director still occupies a special place in the hearts of horror fans worldwide, having created one of the most memorable casts of freaks and monsters since the golden days of Hollywood.

Barker, now 55, left the UK for Hollywood in the late 1980s, since when he has written novels, plays and directed and produced films to varying degrees of acclaim. Now, though, he is aiming to outdo himself in a different medium with Jericho, a video game set before Adam and Eve.

“I have a sense that games can be – and sometimes are – something marvellous,” says Barker, who is on a trip to Madrid from his Beverly Hills home. “That’s why I still want to be part of this growing, visionary movement. I think there is something in games which is unique to them. I’ve always called my readers ‘co-creators’ because the same book brings completely different things to different minds. You are also a co-creator in a game, but in a much more obvious way, which shapes the process of the game and story.”

Jericho is Barker’s second major foray into the world of games. The first, in 2001, was a rescue job for the developer Electronic Arts on a game already under development, called Undying. It sank on release, perhaps doomed from the outset. “

Actually, I felt it was underrated,” says Barker. “It was elegant, nice to look at and had complexities.”

The frustration at its failure is clearly still there. “You put a lot of work into these things. You get paid well for it, but actually there’s a lot of things I could do which would make me a lot of money a lot quicker. I could go and be a script doctor for any number of people who want horror writers to come in and fix things.”

True to form, Barker has not taken any shortcuts on Jericho, and his troubled Gothic escapade makes huge imaginative demands on its “co-creators”. The back-story involves the “Firstborn” who, according to certain Gnostic and Apocryphal texts, preceded Adam and Eve. The squad-based first-person shooting title unravels in the labyrinthine streets of a Middle Eastern metropolis, with players controlling a seven-man squad variously expert in combat, magic, exorcism and telekinesis. “ Jericho was an idea that really wanted to be a game,” Barker explains. “Rather than a novel, a short story or a comic book.”

As the game was being developed, Barker, who doesn’t play games himself, would bring someone in to demonstrate early versions, and was fascinated by the dynamic between the player and the played. “I was reminded of my dad watching the wrestling on Saturday afternoons. He would yell at the screen and curse – living vicariously through the battles. Like watching the wrestling, games are battling for those who don’t want bloody noses.”

Barker warms to his theme. “People make very weird mistakes. They think that comics are like movies, which they’re not. They think games are like movies, which they’re not. Occasionally, you can take something like 300 and, if you are completely loyal to Frank Miller’s vision, you can get a movie version of what Frank drew. But if I had my choice, I’d take the comic.”

For this reason, Barker is adamant he would not want to see a game version of Hellraiser. “I have no interest whatsoever in turning it into a game. Apart from anything else, I don’t own the rights: I earned $21,000 from writing and directing the first movie and that was my deal with the Devil. We look over our shoulders too much anyway. Let’s look forward. I have huge faith in what the gaming medium can be. It’s not all about technology, it’s got to be about something else as well – obvious things like caring about the characters.”

So does he think games are a respectable outlet for “real” writers? “Absolutely. Admittedly this is a bit of a troubled area. We’re going to have to work on our relationships as creators, writers and game designers. Right now we’re a dysfunctional family. I’ve heard people say you don’t want too much story but I disagree.”

Barker is planning more projects with the Warwickshire-based developer Code-masters. A Jerichosequel is one plan. “I’ve already told Code-masters where the next game will head,” he says. “It starts on an aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean, with 666 children in the hold...”

Jericho (PC, PS3, Xbox 360, from £34.99), rated 18