What is Tchia?
Tchia is an open world action-adventure game where players control the titular protagonist Tchia as she travels throughout a fictional archipelago based on New Caledonia. Tchia was released on March 21st, 2023 by Awaceb for the Playstation 4 & 5 and Microsoft Windows. A subscription to PS Plus Extra or Premium provides free access to Tchia. The game took me around 8 hours to finish the main story.
Game Review:
Tchia is visually stunning. One of the first things that jumped out at me was the artstyle and fidelity of the world. This game is clearly inspired by The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker in terms of its art style. Characters are very similar to those in Wind Waker, being depicted in a very cartoonish style. The objects in the world almost feel like they’re formed out of clay, there’s a squishy weightiness to the objects you can interact with all throughout the game. And this cartoon modeling style is juxtaposed with some really gorgeous topography and water rendering. The land and water looks more realistic and is a real treat visually.
Tchia also takes inspiration from another game in the Zelda franchise: Breath of the Wild. This is evident in the ability to climb anything in the world, Tchia’s glider, and the stamina system that determines how much of an action that Tchia can do before becoming too tired. These mechanics work but are not as fleshed out or polished as those found in Breath of the Wild. Climbing can often feel janky, with Tchia often snapping to the wrong surface or unable to go past a certain ledge. Tchia also utilizes similar ragdoll physics as Breath of the Wild. If you get hit or fall, you fall like a ragdoll and continue to do so until you naturally stop rolling or die (lose all stamina). Ragdoll physics are never my favorite but they can be funny occasionally.
Action is really important to people who play games, especially when that is one of the defining characteristics of the genre of a game. Tchia’s action is fun for a little bit and then becomes pretty stale as you progress through the game. Combat consists of throwing oil lamps or gas containers at fabric piles or magical fabric enemies to burn them. It’s just that on repeat while dodging their attacks. It feels good at first but quickly declines after the 3rd or 4th camp of fabric enemies.
Tchia has a magical ability where she can “Soul-Jump” into objects or animals to become and control them to either help with traversal or combat, similar to how Cappy works in Super Mario Odyssey. Different animals and objects have different abilities but none of them feel amazing. Birds can fly, deer can sprint, fish can swim, dogs can dig. Most of these don’t have much use outside of traversal. And then there’s silly abilities that are just there for comedy. For example birds can poop as an ability. It has no use other than a quick giggle. And sharks can bite, but I never figured out what they can actually bite outside of just making a bite motion. Objects also can have unique attributes, but really the only ones that you need to use are oil lamps and gas cans to burn things as described before. Everything just feels a bit unpolished.
Tchia also has a boat in which she can sail from place to place around the archipelago. There is some unique gameplay here by making the player actually need to control the sail, the helm, and the anchor. This means that you have to move between the three components to actually be able to sail effectively. I did this for a little until I realized that soul-jumping into a bird or fish was faster and provided more dynamic movement.
Something that I don’t particularly care for much in games are cosmetics. I know some people like them but personally I just pick something and stick with it unless there are attribute bonuses for using certain gear over others. In Tchia, the world is littered with collectibles, most of which are either cosmetics or currency used to buy more cosmetics. But collecting seems to be most of what you can do in the open world of this game. Traversal is fun but if there’s nothing really substantial to obtain, players should be allowed to just explore without all of the collectibles clogging the map.
Music is a feature that can transport us into games we’re playing or movies we’re watching. Music has a way of bringing to life what is happening. Tchia has incredible music. The music utilizes orchestral score infused with sounds local to New Caledonia to create a really beautiful soundtrack. Tchia also gamifies the music in these musical sequences where it becomes a rhythm game. Notes appear on the screen and you use the joystick to move around a dial of the different musical notes and actually play the music. It’s really fun and actually was very challenging in certain songs. The one gripe I have about these sections is that all dialogue is spoken either in French or Drehu, the common languages of New Caledonia, which makes it impossible to know what’s being sung during the songs unless you speak these languages. There is an auto-play feature that allows you to be able to just watch what’s happening but I really enjoyed playing the music. To be clear, I actually love that the game is only voice-acted in French and Drehu; I think that’s a great way to honor the inspiration for this game. It just made it logistically hard to follow the lyrics while I’m playing the song.
The story in Tchia is where I have my biggest complaints. Things just seem to happen and there’s not enough of an emotional response to certain events. For example, a person would die and there wouldn’t be much of a reaction and characters would just move on with what the next thing they were going to do. Or there is a romance that seems to happen out of the blue with very little context as to why. Now some people might have picked up on things that I did not, but I was not expecting anything like that to happen until right before it did. There were also moments intended to be funny that came across rather strangely, such as a chicken’s head being cut off and then spurting blood like a gag joke. And there were moments that were unexpectedly dark or scary, such as a child being eaten alive. The story seems a bit rushed and like it needed a bit more time before release but I understand that it was developed by a much smaller studio with fewer resources to pour into it.
Family Friendliness:
On first glance and throughout most of the game, Tchia is very family friendly. But there are a few moments where I’d be a little hesitant to recommend it to people to play with or in front of littles. Specifically the chicken’s head and spurting blood, and the scene where a child gets eaten are a bit surprising and scary and might be an issue for a little kid. It’s cartoony and not graphic so older kids could handle it just fine and they do offer a family mode in the settings that claims to make specific scenes less intense. Tchia is good for families in that it celebrates the unique culture of New Caledonia and can open up conversations about learning more about other cultures like it.
Features for Parents:
Tchia has an incredibly generous save system. You can save basically whenever and wherever and you won’t miss a beat. You can also pause whenever you need which is great for being able to pick up and put down. The language only being spoken in French and Drehu means that subtitles are crucial, and they do allow you to adjust size and style of the font to make it easier to read. They also provide a no-fail mode if you don’t want to have to worry about dying.
Final Verdict:
Tchia is a great celebration of the culture of New Caledonia and offers a lot of really cool gameplay ideas. But it’s not as polished as it could be and could have used some more time in development. If you are a subscriber to PS Plus Extra or Premium or if you are interested in Tchia, I would say this game is worth a try but in my opinion this game is just okay.