The latest The Game Awards were among the most discussed ever and, it must be said, the criticisms are very justified. Keighley’s show, which is supposed to celebrate developers first and foremost, gave the impression of wanting to put only celebrities on a pedestal. In this theater of pats on the back and lazy stars positioned to present this or that thing, someone however managed to stand out from the crowd: Abubakar Salim; a rather well-known actor himself, yes – in video games mainly as the voice of Bayek in Assassin’s Creed Origins – yet far from far from the world of development, given that he went on stage to present a game he directed.
Salim’s voice was not that of a disinterested actor, but rather that broken by the emotion of a person there to reveal to the world a team of developers he founded and a game born after the loss of his father. In his cynical mix of jokes and soulless advertising, his brief interlude was undoubtedly one of the most human and pleasant moments of the entire event, to the point of having led many people to become interested in the creation of his team, called Tales of Kenzera: Zau.
Now the game is finally about to arrive and, after the interesting demo made available on Steam, we had the opportunity to hear what inspired it directly from the mouth of Abubakar Salim and his developers. Here’s what they told us and what we can expect from their curious work.
The colors of Africa
Surgent Studios’ work puts you in the shoes of Zau, a young shaman who enters into a risky pact with Kalunga, god of death, to bring his recently deceased father back to life; a challenge that the boy can face thanks to the spiritual powers that his lost parent bequeathed to him: two mystical masks that allow him to fight monsters and capture their spirit.
The masks are an interesting gimmick that has allowed the team to put in place rather interesting systems in terms of gameplay, but the theme of loss is actually much more linked to the structure of the game than simple mechanics in battle can suggest. Abubakar began the presentation by showing a clip of a documentary on the production of the title, predictably focused on the death of his father and how he wanted to pay homage to him with this video game. Even more fascinating, however, were the words ofart lead, Ackeem Durrantas these showed drawings of various maps, underlining how Kenzera’s campaign is thematically divided based on the stages of mourning; peace and spirituality, anxiety and responsibility, fear, anger, acceptance… the levels of the game are designed to reflect these passages, and we are really curious to see if their changes will be only aesthetic or will also significantly impact the experience of game.
The care for the artistic direction, however, does not seem to be just thematic. Zau is an extremely peculiar title, because for once it makes African culture its own in its purest form, without going for the classic Egyptian or Middle Eastern imagery, but precisely the symbolism and aesthetics of the Bantu culture. In the game characters and settings are inspired by the Maasai and Ndebele peoples, the landscapes with gigantic savannah trees and the very particular structures created by the Yoruba population. Rarely have we seen games so closely linked from an artistic point of view to deep Africa, and we believe it truly represents a breath of fresh air, which significantly distinguishes Zau from other products and gives perfect meaning to its extremely lively tones, despite the primary theme be the loss.
Fighting against loss
This level of care does not seem to be linked exclusively to the aesthetics of the game: gameplay and game design in general they are designed with great concreteness, given that the title is designed to be a rather contained experience (not very short, mind you, but neither should you expect a gigantic metroidvania). Tales of Kenzera is therefore a work very much devoted to action, which introduces Zau as a character already prepared and immediately skilled in combat, as well as equipped with a fair number of movement skills. It’s pretty clear how Zi Peters, the lead designer has tried to avoid downtime, giving shape to a less chaotic experience linked to backtracking than what we are used to seeing in this genre.
Also for this reason the level design seems to owe more to the recent Ori and Metroid Dread than to games like Hollow Knight and similar (despite the great classics of the genre still being a strong inspiration, according to the designer’s words). The maps are extensive and explorable, of course, but at the same time more linear than other “competitors”, with good use of structural loops and obvious crossroads that should indicate the primary path with a fair amount of naturalness. It is an understandable and rather smart choice if the plan is to offer an adrenaline-filled experience without too many frills, but its application will still need to be carefully evaluated: by oversimplifying maps and an exploratory element, a metroidvania risks losing much of what makes the fascinating genre.
The combat system also teases, given that Zau’s two masks offer powers indicated respectively for melee and ranged combat, and that the progression could offer many surprises regarding the more difficult fights. Here too, the value of the enemies and the variety of the bosses will have to be evaluated, but it is a good base from which to start and already in the demo the solidity of the mechanics had positively surprised us.
Finally, we talked about music with Nainita Desai, the composer. Here too, the musical themes are closely linked to the sounds and ritualism of African peoples, and it seems that the lyrics are in Swahili, given that the composer’s mother speaks that language and was therefore able to translate the lyrics written into English. In short, there is a crystal clear desire to show the world the beauty of the profound culture of Africa in Tales of Kenzera: Zau and, considering the passion shown by the developers, if everything were to fit together beautifully we could find ourselves in front of a game with an impact truly unique, despite the small size of the team. Let’s hope this is actually the case, a new indie pearl is always good news, after all.
Tales of Kenzera: Zau is clearly a game created by an incredibly passionate and involved team, more eager than ever to showcase the beauty and peculiarities of their culture, and with their hearts in the right place. In the competitive world of video games, however, passion is only a great starting point and it takes countless other talents to create truly memorable works. The chat we had with Surgent Studios gives us hope: these developers have clearly not launched themselves into an impossible project and seem to have the necessary skills to give shape to their original vision. However, there isn’t much left until the final test, so stay on our channels to find out if Zau will actually be another indie pearl or just another forgettable metroidvania.
