Intervista a Phil Crifo di Awaceb, lo studio che ha sviluppato Tchia [ENG]
Tchia, un titolo open world ispirato alla Nuova Caledonia, uscirà la prossima settimana su PC e sulle console Sony. Non sono moltissime le persone che hanno lavorato al progetto e allo sviluppo di Tchia, ma noi di NextPlayer abbiamo avuto l’opportunità e la fortuna di intervistare Phill Crifo di Awaceb, lo studio che ha sviluppato questo meraviglioso titolo.
Grazie a Phil e al suo collega e amico Thierry Borra, abbiamo realizzato che l’ispirazione della Nuova Caledonia è il fulcro vitale di tutto ciò che circonda Tchia e che, conoscendola a pieno, trasforma il titolo in un vero e completo capolavoro.
Qui sotto l’intervista in inglese del titolo in questione:
Thank you very much for granting us this interview
How many members are part of your team and when it was founded? Tell us
more about the story of your small studio.
We’re a small team of 9 full time developers and we’re based in Montreal Canada.
Awaceb was founded by two childhood friends from New Caledonia, myself and
Thierry Boura. We’ve known each other since we were babies and grew up playing
games together. When we decided to create a studio, it was obvious for us that our
origins would influence what we do, so we named the studio as a nod to New
Caledonia. Awaceb is local slang for “it’s all good” or “no worries”.
When did you come up with the idea of making a game like “Tchia”? Have you
ever created or played a game of this genre before?
The gameplay concept for Tchia is very close to the initial idea we had when we set
out to make games in 2013; we ended up scoping down and we made a 2D
platformer called Fossil Echo because we were such a small, inexperienced team
that it was more reasonable. But when it came time to work on our next project, we
still had those aspirations to make a sandbox open world game and we dived back
into that concept. The idea to get inspiration from our homeland of New Caledonia
came in very early too, and informed pretty much every decision we made on the
game – be it design, art, and story. We grew up playing GTA games and –like anyone
has– we always dreamed of a GTA game taking place in our hometown; so that’s
basically what we did with Tchia! Even though the themes and gameplay aren’t
similar at all, there is a world-building quality and a way to portray the essence of
real-world places that I always admired in the 3D GTA games.
Can you explain how the culture of New Caledonia is integrated into the game?
Basically any question we had when working on the game, we answered it by looking
through the prism of New Caledonian culture; it was a very reassuring and solid
skeleton to build the game on. For example, the Soul-Jumping mechanic took its final
shape because New Caledonian folklore and legends are very often about
shapeshifting and animals taking human forms and vice versa, so that seeped into
our design process. The game’s world and stories are also very much infused by the
country, we recreated iconic landmarks, fauna, all the characters are voiced by local
talent in traditional languages, etc…
We all thought that Tchia is inspired by “The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker” – is
it true? Are there any other games that influenced the making of the game?
There is a side to Tchia that shares some common DNA with the Zelda series in the
sense that they both stem from the idea of telling an epic tale based on childhood
fantasies. Miyamoto says that Zelda was inspired by his time exploring caves as a
child, similarly Tchia was inspired by mine and Thierry’s childhood growing up in New
Caledonia and the innocence and light-heartedness that entailed. Outside of this we
didn’t aim to emulate any specific game, it was more a case of a “what works here
and could work for Tchia” type of approach.
What are the studio’s plans after Tchia? Are you planning to take another road
and experiment with developing a game of a different genre, or do you want to
explore this genre even more?
I think open-world is in our DNA, and we still have many things to experiment with in
the genre. In terms of story and themes, I still can’t say for sure, but I think we want
to build upon what we have learned working on Tchia to create something more
refined, more thought out, while keeping the lightheartedness and toy-box approach
that makes the game fresh and inviting.
Ringraziamo ancora una volta Phil e vi ricordiamo che Tchia uscirà su Playstation 5, Playstation 4 e PC tramite Steam il 21 marzo 2023. Sarà disponibile anche sul PS Plus Extra e PS Plus Premium il giorno del lancio.
