A recreation that’s competently made however not particularly progressive, bolstered by a strong story and delightful setting.
The Ultimate Grade
1-Up Mushroom for…
Competently made with exact controls and strong platforming challenges; Zau’s hearth and ice skills provide first rate fight selection; Afircan setting is attractive; nice storytelling with a private contact from one of many recreation’s creators
Poison Mushroom for…
Exterior of the setting and storyline, the sport feels relatively generic; not sufficient innovation to face out from a stuffed crowd of different, higher Metroidvanias on Change; small glitches right here and there
Metroidvanias have exploded in reputation in latest occasions, a lot in order that they’re now virtually a dime a dozen, particularly on the indie scene. Regardless of their relative ubiquity, metroidvanias proceed to supply builders an opportunity to essentially stretch their artistic muscular tissues. Tales of Kenzera: Zau is the newest such recreation to try to do one thing new with this subgenre. Developed by Abubakar Salim and Surgent Studios, Zau is a metroidvania set in Africa following the exploits of a budding shaman who’s making an attempt to win again the soul of his departed father and produce him again to life. Though Zau’s setting and storytelling stand out from the gang, the gameplay is pretty spinoff, in the end stopping the expertise from reaching its full potential.
Gamers are forged because the nominal Zau, whose journey is closely impressed by Salim’s personal experiences dropping a dad or mum. Salim, who’s a voice actor some would possibly acknowledge from his work as Bayek in Murderer’s Creed Origins, even goes as far as to play the function of Zau himself. With such a private contact, Zau can’t assist however impress from a storytelling perspective. The character interactions are very effectively achieved, particularly the connection between Zau and Kalunga, the God of Loss of life. Kalunga acts as council to Zau on his journey, providing knowledge that Zau has but to study. As a foil, Kalunga presents the participant nice perception into Zau and the place he’s at throughout this making an attempt interval of his life.
It’s when gamers start specializing in the gameplay that issues begin to unravel for Zau. The sport is competently made, to be clear, with exact controls and strong platforming challenges all through. Nevertheless, on the finish of the day, there isn’t a lot to level at in Zau that stands out in comparison with others video games within the style. Enemies, whereas impressed by African folklore, really feel relatively generic and in addition lack selection. This sensation extends to a lot of the roughly six to seven hour lengthy marketing campaign—from a pure gameplay perspective, Zau comes throughout as a tad paint-by-numbers.
Nonetheless, for all its rote parts, Zau does them proper. Exterior of a few glitches (as an illustration, I used to be phased outdoors of a battle enviornment and couldn’t reenter to complete the struggle, inflicting me to must reload the sport), Zau is offered effectively. The African setting, specifically, could be very stunning, and the hand drawn pictures of Zau, Kalunga, and different characters throughout dialogue scenes are gorgeously rendered. A whole lot of thought has gone into immersing the participant on this world, it’s only a disgrace that this originality couldn’t lengthen itself into the gameplay.
That every one stated, anybody who needs to chew right into a well-crafted, if not wholly progressive Metroidvania can actually do quite a bit worse than Zau. Together with the attractive setting and attention-grabbing story, the sport will preserve gamers entertained effectively sufficient for the period. Whereas I can see concessions had been made visually to get Zau operating on Change, general it’s a strong conversion that runs soundly. The world isn’t large, however there stay numerous nooks and crannies to discover, with secrets and techniques and upgrades to uncover inside.
If I’ve some other gripe past the generic platforming and exploration, it might be the fight. Apart from enemy selection being lower than I would really like, I additionally felt like battles took longer than they wanted to. Small skirmishes repeatedly felt like they overstayed their welcome. Zau has what are basically hearth and ice assaults that he can change freely from, and though they’re satisfying to make use of, I’d have toggled enemy well being down a wee bit to steadiness issues out. It’s not likely a difficulty of problem—I believed the enemies had been satisfying to interact with—simply that it takes too many hits to get by small fry baddies.
By the point the credit roll on Zau, gamers could have fought by swaths of foes and explored many attention-grabbing locales. As a lot as Zau manages to get proper, it’s in the end failed by an absence of innovation that leads to an expertise that seems like one thing is lacking that will have pushed the sport to the following stage. Whether or not it might need been extra artistic makes use of of Zau’s powers, or extra ingenious world exploration, it’s onerous to say precisely. I’d nonetheless nonetheless like to see Salim and Surgent Studios crew on one other undertaking and take what they realized with Zau and broaden upon it. I give Zau a lightweight suggestion for individuals who have been wanting a brand new Metroidvania to play, however anybody in search of one thing really new is more likely to be disillusioned.
Nintendojo was offered a replica of this recreation for evaluation by a 3rd celebration, although that doesn’t have an effect on our suggestion. For each evaluation, Nintendojo makes use of a customary standards.