Tchia stands on the shoulders of Zelda — then leaps off

We’re quickly pulled into the story of the titular Tacchia and the world of her childhood. She is no misbehaving child, but she is a daring adventurer as she sets out out of curiosity to find Mevora, the ruler of the world, who has captured and imprisoned her father. This means navigating away from your home island and seeking out new lands rich with lush biomes – everything from red, dusty plains and rusty city buildings to bamboo forests and meandering rivers. Quickly, Tachia becomes aware of a special power she was born with: the ability to shapeshift into animals and objects in her immediate environment. It’s a mechanic that’s been implemented with expert care, despite the fact that Techia can transform into a lot of things. Instead, it turns tachiya Something new and beautiful from an adventure reminiscent of The Legend of Zelda. tachiyaThe variety and fluidity of movement, experimentation and exploration make the game a real pleasure.

tachiya Not a map in the traditional sense; Instead, it’s a digital version of a paper map, still a bit crumpled from being in the bottom of a backpack. As Tchia, you must seek landmarks to fully understand your geographic location. There’s a single-button function that gives an estimate of your location with Tachia taking into account the entire country before circling a larger spot on the map. (Search and pinned locations are marked on a compass that you can also keep on screen, potentially making navigation much easier if wandering isn’t your bag.) tachiyaThe map reinforces the game’s focus on exploration; Don’t run straight from task to task. Take some time to look around.

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Image: Avaseeb/Kepler Interactive

On your journey, you’ll come across various minigames that put your skills to the test. You can carve the idols, which is a matching and memory game; You can unlock guitar melodies by stacking rocks in certain places; You can race sailboats in time trials, weaving between rocks and through narrow passages; the list goes on. You also face armies of enemies made of pieces of cloth, kept alive only by the evil leader’s magic. This is not competition in the usual sense. You’ll have to use Tachia’s transformative powers and your environment to eliminate enemies – perhaps becoming coals in a nearby fire to burn the cloth to dust.

I spent a lot of time wandering, trying to become different animals. Each animal feels differently in a locomotive sense, but most also have a unique “ability”. It’s nothing big – stags can sprint, sharks can bite, and seagulls can hunt. The discovery of all these different animals, and the ensuing experiments, round out the exploration. It felt fresh enough to keep me interested in anything tachiyaThe more remote locations of the U.S., where the islands can feel a bit empty. Ironically, my favorite thing to transform into is a rock. Hear me out: rocks are one of the faster ways to travel, and they minimize fall damage – a rock won’t explode from plunging from too high a height, like Tachia Will. I started playing a game of jumping from rock to rock as far as I could go. It’s also useful to have a rock to drop coconuts and rain down on enemies. It’s silly and amusing, the climax of a short moment tachiya Sometimes brings in the form of a dark story.

with a base like tachiyaWhere you can do something as absurd as turning into a mobile wrench, the humor is key. mechanic may be compelling in a game that takes itself too seriously, but tachiya deftly pokes fun at itself, and video games in general, without ever crossing over into genuine self-deprecation, there’s a moment where Tachia has to get tickets and fill out forms to see the leader of the world, Like she was at the DMV. She fills out loads of paperwork before she begins exploring the far reaches of the island. But just as she is leaving, another man walks in and draws a ticket – it is visitor number 1,000, and as a reward, he is sent to see the leader without being discovered. Of course, this could never happen with Techia, because then there would be no discovery. As video game players, we know this. The moment made me laugh.

Image: Avaseeb/Kepler Interactive

tachiyaThe lightness of the game also comes from the music, an element just as important as the shape-shifting mechanic. It’s more than just background noise. Music is used as a narrative device, establishing relationships between the characters Tachia encounters during her travels. Throughout the game, the characters meet – often around a campfire – to sing and play in indigenous Kanak languages ​​such as English, French and Drehu. ,tachiya Inspired by the homeland of the Avseb co-founders of New Caledonia, a small archipelago in the Pacific where these languages ​​are spoken. Aveseb appointed to give voice to New Caledonians tachiyacharacters.) Tchia plays along to the song, her ukulele is attached to the controller and the rhythm is fully playable in the minigames. These are not played for score, and this is important; This allows the player to engage with these moments in a way that feels less competitive and more collaborative.

tachiya Could have easily filled the action-adventure mold of so many games before it. It takes on even more risks by pulling so heavily from The Legend of Zelda. But, despite those effects, it doesn’t detract from equality. Tchia’s transformative power comes from her eye, green where the other is not. it makes sense, that it would let us see tachiyaThe world of, and this genre, in a whole new light.

tachiya Will be released on March 21 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and Windows PC. The game was reviewed using a pre-release download code provided by Kepler Interactive. Vox Media is an affiliated partnership. These do not affect editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased through affiliate links. You can find Additional information about Play Gamez’s ethics policy here,