“Studio Ghibli” is a genre of game, in the same way “Aliens” and “Blade Runner” are genres of game. Blue skies, wind rustling grass that’s a just-so shade of green, a preoccupation with flight? Welcome to Ghibli town, friend.
You’ll find all of the above and several other familiar pieces of iconography in Europa, a puzzle and story-led adventure that’s out now.
Europa claims to offer 3-4 hours of adventuring, with secrets, puzzles and hidden dangers to discover. A big focus seems to be on upgrading the movement powers of Zee, Europa’s android protagonist, from boosting with his jetpack to fully flying between sky islands. Kaan enjoyed the physicality of the movement when he played the Europa demo last year.
The Ghibli-inspired landscapes in Europa are the work of Helder Pinto, who began the game as a side project while working as an environment artist at Blizzard on Overwatch and its sequel.
I’ve played plenty of Ghibli-esque games, but I’ve yet to play one that didn’t, in aping the iconography of those movies, strip away much of their meaning and impact. I’m currently playing Ni no Kuni: Wrath Of The White Witch, the Level 5 JRPG which includes cutscenes animated by Ghibli and a Joe Hisaishi score, and as much as I’m enjoying it, even it’s guilty of becoming a kind of Ready Player Miyazaki. (I’ve just arrived in a city of maybe-pig-men, the leader of which is called Porco Grosso.)
Maybe Europa is different! Maybe it breathes new life into tropes or pairs them with its own visual ideas! Or maybe it doesn’t matter, because 3-4 hours of jetpacking about, solving Zelda puzzles, can hardly be that bad. The demo doesn’t seem to be available anymore but the full thing will set you back a mere £11.51/€13.31/$13.49 over on Steam.