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The Hodgepodge of Keen - One Girl Army

by rawmeatcowboy
02 July 2020
GN Version 5.0

"Zelda meets Threes." "Goof Troop meets Pokemon ice puzzles." "Sokoban meets chess."

Defining a game's major influences as the sum of two titles is an easy and eloquent tool to convey what it brings to the table. It's a ubiquitous, almost mandatory line in any elevator pitch or game store descriptive blurb. Of course, almost all games laid their foundations upon the hundreds of titles that forged the minds behind their inception.

For Keen - One Girl Army, I'm just one of these minds -- the first of many hands that would push this idea forward. Here are a few games that not only influenced the outcome of Keen as a project, but are directly responsible for its very existence.

XCOM - Enemy Unknown (2012, PC)

I jumped pretty late to the XCOM wagon, but really loved it. It made me want to put turn-based tactical combat in whatever my next game would be.

Metal Gear (1987, MSX)

Again, I only got to play this gem later, when it was re-released for the PS3. The way the huge dungeons were displayed one full screen at a time let me play every room on their own, while treating the whole map as an adventure within an adventure.

2048 (2014, WEB)

The best possible 4-direction controls for mobile. The sliding mechanic also solves the problem of moving more than one tile per swipe. Genius.

These are the main pillars behind Keen - One Girl Army: The sliding mechanics of 2048, the huge dungeons shown one screen at a time from Metal Gear and the turn-based tactical frenzy that XCOM got me into, all rolled into one.

Of course, the games that inspire me were inspired by hundreds of others, and this list only applies to me. Keen would not be the same if it wasn't for Super Metroid's influence on Juliane's music; the love Nando has for tabletop RPGs set in ancient Japan; or how Super Mario World, Zelda and Donkey Kong made exploring the overworld an adventure on its own for Marcello, Frango and Doug.

On behalf of the whole team that brought this game to life, we invite you to experience this intriguing blend of genres. We sincerely hope Keen - One Girl Army (which is out now on the Nintendo Switch eShop) can be a small part of another game some day.

Caio Lopez
Game Designer

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