A love of stop motion and clay: that's Barraka, the original puzzle adventure by Zomorro Studio

Although nowadays we all know that true originality in videogames is found in independent development, there are not many projects that resemble what Barraka will soon be offering us. The title, created by the solo developer Ibai Aizpurua (Zomorro Studio) presents us with an exploration adventure with puzzles and metroidvania elements created entirely using the stop motion technique and plasticine figures. A surprising proposal, which impressed us and the rest of the attendees at the recent edition of IndieDevDay, and about which we had the opportunity to talk to its creator in an interview that you can see below.

"Barraka is a small game made in plasticine (clay). It's a puzzle adventure game and it also has mini-games. The theme is a funfair that is haunted by an evil witch. So the main character, Tainoa, must defeat the witch. And it's just an excuse to explore the haunted place. You can enter different attractions and each attraction is a different world," Ibai told us about the project, which came about as an extension of his didactic work teaching stop-motion. Plasticine was his main tool, of course, so combining that passion with his desire to create play, the seed of Barraka grew.

"I started this project using plasticine, or claymation, or stop motion. My workflow usually consists of designing different elements and characters, which I then try to reproduce in clay. I usually then take pictures and use, I call it a hybrid animation, it's a stop motion, but I also use digital techniques to manipulate sometimes the frames. So I mix traditional stop motion with digital animation."

But then he clarifies that he doesn't really use 3D animation, but animates "frame by frame". A titanic task to reflect the different attractions of the fair, in which each one is a genre in itself.

"Most of the game is like an exploration and puzzle game that in each room you have to solve to get to the exit (...) But when I create games, sometimes I get scared. I don't want players to get bored, so I include a lot of mini-games because just like at a fair, you find a lot of variety in the rides". This variety includes metroidvania sections, Whac-A-Mole or racing mini-games, and also a lot of Zelda-style puzzles.

It also looks like we won't have to wait too long to play Barraka, as Zomorro Studio hopes to release it on Steam before the end of the year. A console version is also on the way (all platforms confirmed), and it will be interesting to follow this project closely, as it looks fantastic.