Haven’s intro cinematic hits like a festival of coloured powder. Like the game itself, it’s snappy, vibrant and endlessly energetic. Shapely landscapes blur as our two characters, the romantically-entwined Kay and Yu, zip along leaving jet-trails in their wake.
A slick RPG adventure, Haven is developed by indie studio The Game Bakers, whose previous game Furi was similarly drenched in style. One of Haven’s greatest features is its soundtrack, produced by French electronic musician Danger, and whose sound here is vibrant, with a slight pop edge owing to the generally gentler and more mellow tone.
Haven begins with our romantic duo crash landing on the planet Source. From your damaged ship, you’ll venture out, travelling from one floating island to the next, looking for spare parts and slowly unravelling the mysteries of the planet. You’ll also learn more about Kay and Yu, who are both fugitives, having run away from the “Apiary” – a stifling society where everything is planned, and an entity known as “The Matchmaker” forces people to couple up.
Thematically, there’s hints of a Brave New World, of a society maximising utility and meeting every need, but ultimately suffocating all freedom and joy. There’s also a touch of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, of two lovers striving to overcome a system that assigns every detail and leaves no room to maneuver.
