![]() Kabaret features music with lyrics in Bahasa, creatures straight out of Southeast Asian folktales and mini-games such as Congkak, a traditional game of seeds played inside a wooden boat-shaped board. Trapped in this dark fantasy, Jebat must work under The Caretaker and perform tea ceremonies with other monsters, in the hopes of finding out how to break his curse. The plot revolves around Jebat, a boy-turned-monster who is whisked away to the ‘Alam Bunian’, a mythical realm filled with supernatural characters. Some masterfully wear their culture on their sleeve, while others are simply great games made in this part of the world.įrameborder="0" allow="accelerometer autoplay clipboard-write encrypted-media gyroscope picture-in-picture web-share" allowfullscreen>ĭive right into the heart of Southeast Asian folklore with Kabaret, a visual novel with adventure elements and a striking art style that borrows ‘wayang kulit’ (shadow puppetry) motifs, a nod towards the studio’s Malaysian heritage. The following games are titles coming out of Southeast Asia. As the prevalence of Southeast Asian independent games and studios increases, charting our way forward to the global stage is crucial to the growth of the industry as a whole. With a burgeoning local industry valued at over US $5 billion, while also playing host to a sizeable 270 million gamers, we might be newer to producing our own game titles, but we are not new to games. Is it realistic for us to think we can harness those same factors when putting our own cultural labour of love into the market?’ The zeitgeist has been gradually shaped to support those cultural motifs. ‘Coming from a relatively younger scene compared to the global industry – might be forgetting the big picture, like how long Japanese and Chinese iconography like yakuza, samurai, triads, and kung fu have been at play in the broader games audience. ![]() Read: Games for Change Malaysia and what South East Asian gamedevs need While culturally and geographically close to Southeast Asia, the global resonance of Japanese culture in a Yakuza game, versus Southeast Asian culture, are worlds apart. I was hoping to start a conversation with the developers I care about in the SEA region, and have them examine their intentions about how they were trying to authentically depict their own cultural backgrounds in their games,’ says Kwek.Īnother pitfall Kwek noted was a tendency to emulate what China and Japan are doing with their games. ‘ is unlikely to be true – many times the root problem lies not in what we say, but in how we say it. Whether it’s the prime adjective that sits before the noun, laksa, satay, or a guided tour to Malaysia’s Batu Caves, it feels as though the self-perceived ‘otherness’ of our heritage has the community more concerned about what is ‘correct’ rather than how the experience is actually delivered.Īt his talk, Kwek shared that he has seen Southeast Asian game developers take exquisite pains to render an accurate portrayal of their culture, only for the market to respond poorly, with the result of low sales for the game. The question of ‘authenticity’ is one that has plagued Southeast Asia, from every angle. Are we finally past the fact that we’re making games at all, and now concerned about the how and why? Having a nuanced conversation about the region was a positive indication that Southeast Asian games are breaking beyond the ‘up-and-coming’ phase of adolescence. At GDC 2023, Brian Kwek, Owner of Ysbryd Games, a Singapore and UK-based publisher, gave a talk titled ‘The Trap of Marketing “Authentic” Games: Lessons from South-East Asia’.
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