A Space for the Unbound is an Indonesian adventure video game developed by Mojiken Studio and published by Toge Productions. It was released on January 19, 2023, for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. The game is set in the late 1990s and follows Atma and his girlfriend Raya, who live in a suburban area in Indonesia, as they explore their newly attained magical abilities and deal with supernatural powers that threaten their existence.
The game designer's focus was capturing what it felt like to grow up in Indonesia in the 1990s and preserving his memories as an Indonesian through the game. The game received positive reception from critics, with reviews focusing on the game's solid sense of place and heartfelt story.
Gameplay
Critics remarked positively on the game's distinctive pixel artstyle.
The player controls Atma, an Indonesian high school student who is getting close to graduation with his girlfriend Raya.[3] Through the powers of a red book that Atma finds, he gains the ability to "space dive" into people's minds and help fix their problems through puzzles that the player completes.[3][4] These changes can affect the person's point of view and help them deal with their trauma.[3][4] His girlfriend Raya, through the same book, gains "X-Men-esque powers", including levitation and changing the nature of reality.[3] They face the issues that come from their new powers and investigate the supernatural forces that threaten their existence.[3] Later on, Atma obtains a magic wand and gains the ability to "rift dive" to another time in a location.
Throughout the game, the player is able to interact with people, objects, and cats.[3][4] Most of the game is at a slower pace and involves exploring and talking with people through point and click gameplay.[3][4] The game features several minigames that help ground the game in its place and time, like practicing football and dodging falling objects with button inputs; fighting minigames which involve pressing a sequence of buttons in a time limit to attack and pressing the button when the moving bar hit the target. The game also features a number of cats, which the player can pet and name.[4]
Atma and his girlfriend Raya, who are both Surabayan high school students, are close to graduation and unsure of what to do with their futures. Instead of discussing with their school counselor their plans for the future, they create a bucket list of things they wish to do together, with the first item being to go see a movie at the cinema.
Atma frequently dreams of spending time writing a story with a young girl named Nirmala, who gives him a red book that allows him to "Spacedive" and enter people's minds. All of these dreams end in him apparently drowning trying to save Nirmala and waking up at his school desk.
At the cinema, Raya reveals to Atma she is capable of reality-manipulating powers, conjuring a world inspired by the movie called Cat Wonderland, which is populated by cats. However, the cats suddenly begin to warn them that the end of the world is near. In a panic, Raya exits Cat Wonderland and collapses from exhaustion, revealing that frequent use of her power renders her in a state of weakness. Back in the real world, Atma discovers that the cinema staff have begun acting like cats. By using Spacediving to enter their minds, he restores them to normal. Outside, Raya falls unconscious as a crack appears in the sky.
Some time later, Atma reawakens at his school desk and discovers Raya is seemingly well. However, she collapses again after attempting to stop the anomaly that had appeared in the cinema, and is escorted away by a teacher, Miss Niken. With help from Admiral, a cat whom Atma and Raya adopted who has suddenly developed the ability to speak, Atma seeks out to find a black forest gateaux -Raya's favourite dessert- to restore her strength. However, as the cake is ready, Erik, a gang leader and bully from Atma's school, runs over and kills Admiral. In a panic, Erik knocks out Atma and takes the cake for himself to deliver to Raya as an apology. Upon catching up to Erik at their school, Atma uses Spacedive on him, revealing his demeanor is a result of abuse from his father, leading to a desire to show no weakness out of belief it makes him stronger. As Atma is about to exit Erik's mind, Nirmala appears, ejects Atma into the outside world, and turns Erik into a werewolf-like monster. Raya intervenes, returning Erik to his normal form but disregarding his apologies; she seemingly kills him before eating some of the cake and passing out again. Outside, the crack in the sky grows larger.
Atma reawakens only to discover that Raya is missing and the school is busy preparing for the Lintang festival. Atma discovers that any attempts to ask about Raya's whereabouts result in the person being asked looping their words then pretending nothing had happened. Moreover, teachers have suddenly begun acting bizarrely and taking on different personas. With help from classmate Lulu, Atma restores the affected people to normal. Atma discovers that they had chastised Raya in some way, and she rewrote their personalities in retaliation. Atma also learns that Raya, being class president, was tasked with organizing the festival, but failed to meet expectations and was under immense pressure as a result. Nirmala appears once again during a Spacedive and transforms Lulu into a humanoid swan.
Atma finds Raya alone on a bridge overlooking the city; she seemingly kills Lulu and reveals she exerted control over the town and organized the festival because she wanted to be happy with Atma. Atma attempts to Spacedive her, but upon realizing what he is about to do, Raya destroys the book and causes a large blue meteor to crash upon the city.
Atma awakens to find the city in ruins and debris raining down from the sky; despite this, the city's people continue to celebrate the festival. Marin, a quiet classmate of Atma, takes him to safety, giving him a wand that allows him to access alternate timelines due to the weakened state of the universe. Upon reaching the ruins of the school, Atma discovers Marin and Raya fighting and protects her from Raya's powers. He finds himself in a Spacedive dimension and learns that Marin was once close friends with both Nirmala and Raya. However, she grew distrustful after learning about Atma, convinced he was an imaginary friend, and eventually neglected to protect her as she faced harassment and bullying at school. Nirmala turns Marin into a humanoid snail and Raya destroys her before falling unconscious. Atma finds the Spacediving book on her, allowing him to enter her mind.
In a flashback, it is revealed that the game's events took place inside Raya's mind and that Nirmala and Raya are the same person, with her full name being Raya Fitri Nirmala. As a child, Raya met Atma, who had run away from home seeking to start a career in writing, and the two became friends. One day, Atma drowned trying to save Nirmala, being unable to swim himself. Raya, who was facing abuse from her father, in a moment of resentment separated "Nirmala" from herself, representing her hope and positivity and believing her to be at fault for Atma's death. Since then, Nirmala had been turning people who had wronged Raya into monsters, trying to get her attention.
Atma finds himself in a shattered dream-like world, and with help from Bosque, Raya's second cat, finds Raya, who has transformed into a giant blue form. After realizing she believes exerting control is a solution to the life of abuse and hatred she has suffered, Atma attempts to convince her to return to the real world with him, to no avail. After avoiding an onslaught of attacks from Raya, her insecurities and traumatic memories of those who had abused her accumulate, allowing Atma to enter her mind.
Atma finds himself in a memory of Raya's home and learns her father became abusive due to increasing debt and disapproving of her creative endeavors, and that the story he and Nirmala wrote was an allegory for her life. He convinces Raya that attempting to manufacture her own happy ending is only hurting her more and that she must face her fears head on. He leads her through a dark cave populated by those who had bullied her. At the end of the tunnel, the ground suddenly begins to crumble and Raya seemingly begins to float upwards. Realizing Raya must let go of her past, Atma says farewell to her as he fades into a memory and she ascends out of the dream world.
Sometime later, Raya -now visibly older- awakens in a hospital bed, having recovered from an unstated incident. Her mother had recently divorced her father and is in the process of clearing out the house to move to another city. She goes out for one last walk around the neighborhood, encountering various people from throughout her life, and watches the sun set on the bridge, reflecting on her journey and healing.
If the player completed all items on the bucket list, a bonus post-credits scene shows Raya visiting the spot where Atma died and leaving him a bouquet of flowers and the Spacediving book in his memory.
Development
Dimas Novan Delfiano, the game director from the development studio Mojiken for A Space for the Unbound, began development on the title in 2015. A team of two to three people began work on the game while the studio also developed multiple other games simultaneously.[5] Dimas completed an initial prototype of the story in 2015, which served as a core for what would be developed.[5] Dimas found the first few years of development incredibly difficult, as he struggled to build a substantial game from the beginnings of the prototype.[5] In 2019, Dimas noted that he had found the "right formula for the game" and Mojiken released a demo that "was released to positive reception" in 2020.[5] Around 2020, everyone at the studio (numbering about 12-14 people) were able to shift focus to working on the game.[5]
Dimas since a young age wanted to create a game set in an Indonesian high school, and was inspired by the concept of an "anime pilgrimage," where people travel to compare real-life locations against their anime-depicted counterparts.[5][6] He wanted to highlight his personal experience of growing up in 1990s Indonesia, and wanted players to feel the same passage of time that he had experienced.[5][6] Dimas was inspired by multiple Japanese concepts during development, including "Mono no aware," or the "pathos of things," which Dimas described "as an appreciation for or awareness of impermanence and the passage of time."[5] He noted that "every generation has its own memories and [A Space for the Unbound] is our memories and we want to preserve that before we completely forget about it."[5] Dimas said that it was his goal to preserve his memories as an Indonesian growing up in the 1990s in the game.[5][6] The game was heavily inspired by the works of Japanese filmmaker Makoto Shinkai.[3]
The game heavily features anxiety and depression in the story, and Dimas and the rest of the development team consulted professionals for their input to help with telling it appropriately.[6] The space diving mechanic was created to help explore these themes in more detail.[6]
A Space for the Unbound received "generally favorable" reviews, according to review aggregate website Metacritic.
Rock Paper Shotgun's Rachel Watts said that the game "takes a supernatural teen drama [and] gives it real heart," and called its release "a wonderful start to 2023."[3]RPGFan's Audra Bowling felt that the game succeeded in blending both despair and anxiety with themes of hope and healing, and that it could help players see their lives from a new perspective.[2]Nintendo Life's Lowell Bell felt that the game's length was padded out by unnecessary challenges, but still recommend it in a positive review for its touching story.[4]
Eurogamer's Chris Tapsell called the game "magic" and said that "in many cases you will be deeply, maybe profoundly, moved."[10]TouchArcade's Shaun Musgrave praised the game's support for the Nintendo Switch's touchscreen during dialogue sequences, and said it was "one of the best narrative driven indie games I've played."[14]Nintendo World Report's Joe DeVader felt it was a "must play" for people who enjoyed narrative experiences in video games.[11]
Awards
A Space for the Unbound appeared on lists of the best games of 2023 made by Kotaku[15] and Inverse.[16]
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