Koa and the five Pirates of Mara

Game'scover

About the Game

In 2016 a small indie company was founded in Spain with the goal of creating different games and engage with different players across the globe. Their name, Chibig Studio. These developers began working on small phone games as their starting point. However, this small beginning sparked their interest and was used as a motivation for something bigger. Their own Unique Video Game universe. As small developers, they wanted to differentiate from all the others and the idea of making all of their games interconnected was the way they decided to do it so.

Their first big game was Deiland: Pocket Planet and Summer in Mara. Both Games were praised for their relaxing gameplay, their story and theway the game was delivered. Chibig's Mara universe was becomming a reality. Years later they decided to announced their next two projects.

  1. Koa and the Five Pirates of Mara
  2. Mika and the Witch's Mountain
Both projects had a kickstarter which was instantly reached. The first game that was release in 2023 was Koa and the Five Pirates. The second game set to be released in 2024. During the development, Chibig studio showcased and still showcases early builds of the game, different areas and gameplay clips but also physical parts such as the figurines, parts of the artbooks and other.
The game was originally released without any physical copy, but as per promised the game also received physical copies a few months later. The releases consist of:
Standard
Included the game alone
Collector's Edition(Burnout edition)
Included the game, art book, audio disks, Koa Keychain, Pin Chitos, Postcards set
Mara Bundles
Digitally the game can be found with other Chibig properties of Mara adventures.

Story of the Game

Koa and the five Pirates of Mara has a very simple plot. The oppening scene introduces us to Koa who is traveling on her ship. She receives a telegram calling her to the island of Puni, as Pirates have raided the island and the civilians need any help they can get. Koa rushes back to the island where she come across a trio of "friendly competitive" Pirates. Mayo, who acts as the leader fot the trio reveals to Koa that she is the one responsible for the message. She then proceeds to explain how there was no emergency and she simply wrote what was necessarry to summon Koa back. Before she explains why she reveals her new creation, a parkour challenge and asks for Koa's participation.(this acts like the game's tutorial segment where the players will learn the buttons and the mechanicks of the game).
Upon completing the challenge, the girls are excited with Koa's performance and proceed to explain to her that she proved worthy to partake into The five Pirates of Mara trial. Mayo invites Koa to Qalis island in order to sign up for the challenge. Once Koa set foot to the island she noticed that it was "dead". A local tells Koa that the scoundrels attacked the island and stole almost everything the island had of value. Koa wanting to help mentioned that she will try her best to restore the island back to its former glory. An enrage Koa meets up with the Trio demmanding explanations. Mayo explains that pirates looted the place in order to make the trias more interesting and proceeds to once again request Koa's participation.

After Koa negotiated her terms with the trio, she agrees on participating with the aim to bring back everything stolen from the pirates. She is given a blurry map and was told to embark on her journey. The map can only be revealed by the inhabitant of the light house given that Koa locates the hidden/missing parts. Koa more determined than ever is up for her biggest Trial yet. Game'chasers

Thoughts on the story

I personally enjoy how simple and yet effective the story of the game is. I always stated that platformers dont require the most complicated story telling in order to work. All they need is a decent scenario and a good gameplay. The adventure that Koa embarks is not something rediculous but it is effective in introducing the players to the characters and the set of which the story takes place. The game doesnt not include many cinematics and the main story is given to us through hand drawn portait of the characters and text in the bottom of the screen. The characters themselves do not speak as each time a text is being revealed the characters escort it with one or two sound effects. On the other hand, all the cinematics are hand drawn with nice details reminising the old animated shows.

Gameplay

The gameplay of mara is what you get when Super Mario met The legend of Zelda Wink Waker.
The hub world of the game is the map given to Koa by Mayo. The map is mostly hidden under mist because Koa doesnt have the rest of the world discovered. This is where the lighthouse comes to play as everytime Koa finds a piece she can go there and the mist will clear allowing her to travel. The gameplay then drops Koa into her ship and the players are free to sail the sea. Whilst on the ship the players can collect shells(the currency) found floating on the sea and can use their ship to sail to the islands. The islands represent a level or a location that Koa can set her anchor.

The best way to describe Koa's core gameplay is litteraly by comparing it to either Super Mario 3D world or Sackboy a big adventure. The player gets control of Koa with the goal of reaching the end of the level. The players are free to explore each level at their pace. Each area has three different collectibles:

  1. Pearls
  2. Fabrics
  3. Gear
All these collectibles are scattered around the levels and the players can collect them by simply walking towards them. just like the 2 games mentioned, the location of each collectible is unknown to the player but they can find it's respective position based on the others unlocked. For example if you start a level and collect a collectible which will be placed in the first slot, you know you haven't miss anything, but if it goes to the second or third slot, you know that from the starting point all the way to where you just picked the item there was another one/two prior. You re given the space to explore more or less. Each collectible is also used in order to unlock more things. Gears can help you upgrade your ship, pearls can be spent to fix the island and the fabric can be spent into creating more looks for Koa. All the levels and the hub world also have shells which as mentioned before can be used to purchase things from the stores such as the clothes, the updates and etc.

Game'chasers
To its core, Koa is a 3D platformer. Unlike other games its doesnt add or change anything to the genre aside from the boat movement in the hubworld. The abilities which Koa begins with are the same abilities she is going to end the game with. This means there's no power-ups scattered around the levels or introduced through out the game.
So what are the abilities(gameplay) the players will experience?
Koa is able to move around in the 3D space and Jump above obsitcles. The players can use a sprint button to move faster and a roll to make them avoid incomming attacks or even speed up. Compinning the dodge roll with jump and spring can also increase the distanced traveled on air and also sprint faster upon landing. Koa can smash things by simply ground pounding. Last but not least she can use her hands to grap items and move them from point A to point B or to even throw them onto certain targets. Unlike Mario and SackBoy, Koa is not facing any enemy and she is mostly being trialed in parkour. This means that the player does not have any attack button and that she cannot jump ontop of any enemy. Furthermore, if Koa is hit by any incomming projectiles or falls into the water she loses a heart. When Koa loses all three hearts its game over and restart the level from the start.

Boss Fights
Koa and the five Pirates of Mara might not have any compat or fighting mechanicks but this doesnt mean that the game does not have any form of combat at all. Koa will come head to head with some of the pirates that re here to test her abilities. The enemies/opponents are Mayo and her group and some of the bigger pirates who sail the seven seas. Mayo's group challenges are simply races. All 4 heroes run from the start to fisnish in order to reach the ending first. When it comes down to the main pirates encounter, the pirates usually try to prevent Koa from reaching her goal. It can be seen as a race where both parties try to sabotage one another through their acts. For example, Koa might close the gates to stop the pirates from reaching the finish line first whilst they will try to shoot Koa or the area in order to create extra obstacles.
On the other hand you have some Pirates where in one way or another there is a small "fight" among you. Pretty much the enemy will try to hit Koa with different projectiles whilst she is moving in a limited space or a parkour challenging one. Eventually the enemy will either have bombs that you can pick and throw at them or certain switches that you need to press/stomp. Each time a player hits the boss, their attack patterns will either change or throw more projectables than before increassing the diffculty. Once Koa reach the ending or defeat the boss the encounter finishes. Each Pirate rewards Koa with the piece of map needed to unlock the map further after visiting the lighthouse.
Game'chasers
Last but not least there are the Napopo levels. During the Napopo levels, the players play as Koa's friend Napopo, her starfish companion. In these levels, the player is always going down using a claw. The plaer can increase the speed of which Napopo is dives deeper. Whilst going down the player has a water meter that is constantly declining. If there is no water in it its game over. If the player hits spikes or the wall the meter will lose a big ammount of water. Whilst declining, there are air bubbles that you can collect to increase the Players endurance. The aim of these levels, is to go all the way to the bottom and collect the item. There are no collectables aside from the last one.

To be fair the platforming of the game along side the level design really helps this game shines. A great challenge of these games is to try and get the best time in every level. With Koa there's a timer that rewards the player with gold, silver and bronze based on their time before reaching the finish line. For some levels its easy to get the best time but just like every Sonic game, the players try their best to perform even better than the actual gold timer. Something that even the developers themselves addressed how amazed they were with how the community found different ways to find shortcuts to finish levels or skip various parts. It's honestly a fun thing to do.

Sound and Graphics

The sound of the game is like every game of Chibig studio meanning is fun and entertainning but not memorable or something you will be praising th game for. It has happy tunes and good melodies matching the vibe of the level but it's not the music you re going to search online or download on your spotify account. Aside from that as mentioned before the heroes dont have any voice acting but they do release sound effects whenever they talk.

On the visual department, the game uses alot of hand drawings. As mentioned above, the game has a very small ammount of cutscenes that are hand drawn to the style we get to know from Chibig. Each hero's portait is also hand drawn and they appear everytime the characters interact with each other. As for the overall austetic of the game, the company proceeded with a more chibi like art style and a cartoonish setting which works good for the game they made. It doesn't have any in-game cutscene and the game also has some unfinished animations(for example when finishing a level the celebrations are mid and lacking frames.) This doesnt mean that the game doesnt have good animations, as the backgrounds and the characters are well designed with nice details. Furthermore, the environment does react to Koa whenever she steps on water and other areas.

Game'chasers

Final Thoughts

In conclusion Koa and the five Pirates of Mara is a pleasant game whose plot may be simple, but in the gameplay you will find the value of the game. The game takes place in the universe of Mara just like every Chibig game. For the first time we get a 3D platformer. The gameplay combines elements from Super Mario 3D world and also from the legend of Zelda. It doesnt add something new to the genre but it does offer some nice time. The plot is not that deeo but is effective for the adventure the hero embarks. The gameplay is fun and allows you to not only play the game to collect all the collectables but to also try and set the best time score possible. Needless finding different skips is as exciting as any other game. The leve design is nice and each area is very different. Some levels require platforming, others require puzzle solving and others simply challenge the player with different aspects. I found myself enjoying plenty of levels but the ones i remeber the most are the speedboosting ones. The boss encounters are different from each other in terms of gameplay. The price of the game is very good as it is not very expensive. Its worth mentionning that the game can also be purchased in Budnle with other Mara games. The platinum trophy and the 100% completion can be achieved within 5-7 hours.
When it comes down to bad things the game does, there's not much things to say aside from the fact that it needed a bit more cutscenes either hand-drawn or in-game and also more animations when it comes to the end celebrations.

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