A Space for the Unbound

**A Space for the Unbound** is a story driven side scroller pixel art visual novel developed by Mojiken, a studio based in Surabaya, Indonesia. Takes place in rural Indonesia in the fictional city of Loka, the game follows Atma and Raya as strange happenings distort their reality.

Before it's release in January 2023, the game has managed to obtain multiple awards being, the future division award at Japan Game Award 2022 (part of Tokyo Game Show) , Best storytelling award at SEA game awards 2020 (part of Level Up KL) .

## Story

Atma wakes up after a strange dream where he spends time with a young girl named Nirmala helping her write stories. Raya being Atma's romantic partner after some time spending time with him reveals that she has magical powers capable of warping reality, although this power comes with the cost of her physical well being. Atma's mission is to support raya as reality seems to mysteriously alters around them. The full story consist of 5 chapters, a prologue and an epilogue.

On May 20th 2022, Kosmik, an indonesian based comics publishing company, released A spin off webcomic based on the events of the main story in collaborations with Mojiken Studio and Toge Productions titled "A Space for the Unbound : Broken Memories" . This comic follows Niken, A teacher at Loka High school, and her romantic interest in Pram, a coworker, as they start to realize strange happenings that alters their reality that influenced their relationship. Written by Kathrinna Rakhmavika with art drawn by Yuda N. F.

## Gameplay

As a side scroller point and click adventure game, the mechanic is rather straightforward. Walking is left or right and player can access new area by interacting with marked doors, paths, etc. with up or down or the player can also go pass the left or right edges of the area. Most of the game is interacting with npcs and completing puzzles and mini games.

### Magic Red Book

A worn out red book, with two names written on the cover being Atma and RFN. The book functions as a pause screen where the player can save progress or go to menu, and is filled with informations such as the map, Atma and Raya's bucket list, collections, inventory, and to do list. The most significant aspect of the book relates are the function to space dive.

**Space dive** is the ability to enter a person's mind and help them resolve certain problems or manipulate them into certain actions. Player can enter another character only when in possession of the red book and to characters marked by a golden flower, Atma will open the book and it allows him to enter their mind. How a player able to obtain information or action to progress is by completing puzzles found during space dive. Difficulty varies from character to character, certain puzzles requires object or information from the real world.

**Atma and Raya's Epic Bucket list** is a list Raya and Atma write at the start of chapter one. This list is attached to the magic red book and is accessible through pausing the game. The completion of each bullet will unlock a special cutscene, completing all of the list will unlock an additional scene to the end of the game. completing bullet points is done by collecting certain items, reaching certain parts of the story, interacting with certain NPCs, and reach certain achievements on a mini game.

### Magic Wand

A twig decorated with golden flowers attached to it. Late game object that allows the player to access different time in certain areas. traveling through time and changing certain aspect of that the past will change other pasts and the present. Actions the player can take in the past are interacting with NPCs, space diving, also move and take objects.

## Characters

The game mainly follows Atma interacting with the citizen of Loka City. The main casts of the story consist of people within Raya's circle of acquaintances. The only playable character beside Atma is Raya on later section of the game.

* **Atma** is a seemingly normal high school student who is Raya's romantic partner. Using the magic red book, Atma can perform Space dives and support people with all sorts of problem.
* **Raya** is a mysterious girl with mysterious powers. She can warp reality at the cost of her physical well being.
* **Nirmala** is a young aspiring writer who spends her time writing stories in an abandon train wagon near the river. She has complicated relationship with her family and often sneaks out of the house. She is struggling with her academic
* **Marin** is an aspiring artist, attending art club when she was young. She wears glasses and a red jacket.
* **Erik** is the son of Karunia Djaya's General Store owner. He both bullies and romantically interested in Raya. Being a student at Loka High school and also a member of a bike gang, he is often seen outside of the school with or riding his motorcycle in school uniform.
* **Lulu**, her full name being Lusi Oktaviani, is the the former student council president of Loka High School. Popular around town.
* **Bosque** is a cat with white and grey fur, who is particularly close to Nirmala.
* **Admiral** is an orange and white cat who Atma and Raya fed, housed, and named after sneaking out of school in chapter one. Admiral later accompany Atma.

## Development

On April 5th 2015, Mojiken published a free to play game on to itch.io under the title "A Space for the Unbound - The Bridge -". A short literal waiting game where a girl who would later be Raya waits on a bridge for a boy who would later be Atma. Project and art director Dimas Novan D claimed This built was created as part of Mojiken Studio's internal game jam  alongside Brigitta Rena and Masditto Bachtiar who both would later be involved in the final version and also Assaji Tjahjadi. Although this was regarded to be the prologue on the page itself, Another free to play game titled "A Space for the Unbound - prologue" released to itch.io and steam on January 2020, This version consist of some part of the full game and functions as the demo.

## Trivia

* An artbook consisting of character sprites, full backgrounds, sketches, and more is available as a DLC on steam .
* The Japanese release of the game has the added title "心に咲く花" (read : Kokoro ni saku hana) . This translates to "Flower that blooms in (your) heart".
* The release of the game was announced to be delayed on august 2022 due to a dispute with a former publisher .
* It is implied that the game takes place in Surabaya as there are numerous landmark hinting the location.
* Easter Eggs in A Space for the Unbound can be found scattered throughout the game, here are notable instances:
	+ Classic film posters reference can be found near Movie Theater, the posters referencing *Terminator 2 - Judgement Day* and *Ada Apa Dengan Cinta.*
	+ During the trials in Chapter 3, a reference to Ace Attorney can be found when Atma said the iconic line "Objection!".
	+ The Raven from A Raven Monologue can be found when spacediving to certain musician.
	+ Eda from When The Past Was Around can be found along with The Owl in a scribble from music sheet.
	+ A reference to "She and The Light Bearer", one of Mojiken past game can be found in the school library.
	+ A tribute to Mohammad Fahmi (Game Director of Coffee Talk) can be found in Ria Cafe.

## Official Links

* A Space for the Unbound PlayStation Store
* A Space for the Unbound Nintendo Store
* A Space for the Unbound Xbox Store
* A Space for the Unbound Steam page
* A Space for the Unbound - prologue Steam page
* A Space for the Unbound - prologue itch.io page
* A Space for the Unbound - The Bridge - itch.io page
* A Space for the Unbound : Broken Memories Webtoon Canvas ( ID | EN )
* A Space for the Unbound Game Twitter
* Mojiken Studio Twitter
* Mojiken Studio Instagram
* Mojiken Studio YouTube

## Gallery

Raya staring at AtmaNirmala explained she wanted to tell a story of her fiction story to AtmaAtma petting one of the cats while Raya looking at AtmaA housing complex that Atma can explore
## References

1. ↑ [1] Awarded Games for Future Division, Japan Game Awards official website (archive 23/11/2022)
2. ↑ [2] seagm.com article "Games to look out for based on Level Up KL SEA Game Awards 2020" written by Raymond Foo
3. ↑ [3] "A Space for the Unbound Webcomic Comes to Line Webtoon" Kosmik official website
4. ↑ [4] "Devlog : The Story Behind A Space for the Unbound" written by Dimas Novan and Mojiken Team
5. ↑ [5] A Space for the Unbound Artbook DLC page
6. ↑ [6] Chorus Worldwide's official japanese page for A Space for the Unbound
7. ↑ [7] Official delay announcement via @ASFTUgame on twitter.com