It was an empowering moment for Southeast Asia during last December’s The Game Awards 2023. Indonesian-made A Space for the Unbound (ASFTU) found itself among the nominees for Games For Impact, a category created for thought-provoking games with a pro-social meaning.
Set in the late 1990s in rural Indonesia, ASFTU tells the story of two high school students who, nearing graduation, attain supernatural powers that help them delve into the minds and traumas of the people around them. A key development aim was evoking the look and feel of a bygone Indonesia — rightly so given two-thirds of the team, developer Mojiken Studios and publisher Toge Productions, are based in Indonesia.
Both companies have since merged, but a third name appears when the ASFTU’s credits roll: Chorus Worldwide, another publisher with team members scattered across the United Kingdom, Canada and Japan.