It’s always a pleasure to see one-man projects come to life, especially in a field as challenging and unforgiving as video game development. The overall barrier of entry pretty high, while retention rate is abysmal, with most projects never seeing the light of day.
In the spirit of successes like Toby Fox’s Undertale, or Eric Barone’s Stardew Valley, British freelance environment and stylized artist Benjamin Gregg now tries his hand at a solo venture in Kumo, an emotionally-charged adventure title in the same vein as Rime and Journey. Check out its Kickstarter trailer below.
For a one-man development team, this looks quite amazing, especially given that it’s currently been in development for only 18 months. I do see the inspiration from Rime, being that it looks to be set on a highly minimalist island surrounded by nature and strange ruins, while this soothing and slightly familiar music follows you. There’s also some sort of ribbon mechanic in the same vein as the one in Journey, which I’m guessing will be used to solve puzzles in the world.
According to the official press release, Kumo is a beautiful and atmospheric story about a young boy looking for a second chance at life. You play as the boy, named Kumo, as he traverses the desolate and strange land, filled with will and determination to escape his current limbo, reunite with his parents, and find his way back home.
The game’s progression also sees you steadily rising above and beyond the clouds, accompanied by a beautiful 10-piece soundtrack that will tug at your heartstrings. It’s the kind of feel-good game that will also floor you with emotions, and I can already see this being a therapeutic experience for a lot of parents with newborn children or those who might have met unfortunate circumstances.
Kumo will be making its way to Kickstarter on July 31. If successful, it will be making its way to both Steam and the Epic Games Store for both PC and Mac, where it will receive five localizations: English, Finnish, Swedish, German and Spanish. It will also receive console versions if fudraising is successful, with releases on the Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch.
As wary as I am with regards to crowdfunding in general, there is no doubt that projects like these are worth looking at, especially if you’re into this whole genre of emotional and somewhat life-affirming titles. I will be keeping a keen eye on Kumo, though, solely because the titular character’s determination closely mirrors the efforts of its creator’s one-man journey to make it into a very harsh and often oversaturated industry.
You can check out Kumo’s site here. You can also wish list it now on Steam.
