Zozo and the Lost Dreams brings Saturday-morning-cartoon charm to metroidvanias

Metroidvanias and I don’t tend to get along very often, perhaps thanks to a lack of enthusiasm for backtracking, a desire to keep pressing forward and exploring, or simply an absurd fear of getting lost in a needlessly complex map. Zozo and the Lost Dreams didn’t give me much reason to feel any of that, though; if there’s one thing this demo isn’t, it’s frustrating. Games like this are perhaps what the genre needs more of, serving as a good entry point for those who haven’t quite managed to click with it yet.

Developed by Red Dunes Games and Agate, Zozo and the Lost Dreams leans into a Saturday-morning-cartoon feel, all bright eyes and even brighter colors, and it’s a look which took me a moment or two to adjust to before I settled into it. It is evident that the core vision for the game was to be a love letter to the cartoons the developers grew up watching, and that sense of childlike wonder shows itself rather earnestly.

The game’s protagonist, Zozo, is a 13-year-old with lofty dreams of becoming a superhero. His neighbor, who just so conveniently happens to be a mad scientist, helps him to live out his fantasy through her Dream Machine. Zozo ends up trapped within his own dreams as a result, a premise that could read as rather unsettling from an adult’s perspective, but which Zozo treats as an opportunity for a marvelous adventure rather than a problem.

Zozo’s attitude carries over into the game itself, with the gameplay backing up that tone well. Enemies are placed thoughtfully throughout rather than thrown at you in swarms, and the map manages to avoid feeling overly convoluted without becoming dull. Movement feels genuinely good, with a smooth bounciness that feels almost tactile, especially once you find the gum gloves. Combat, meanwhile, stays on the simpler side, with Zozo’s go-to weapon being a particularly powerful pillow. It is indeed powerful enough to be used in the boss fight which the demo culminates in. The fight itself is fairly straightforward, though, and I hope future encounters ramp up the challenge a little further as the game goes on.

My reservations are minor at this stage. Some of the characters’ lines aren’t voice acted while the rest are, and the inconsistency is a little jarring, as I’d rather lean fully one way or another. The soundtrack is pleasant, but a little more repetitive than I’d like, and an encounter with a mini-boss or two, rather than a small horde of regular enemies, would give the game a bit more variety. The story also feels a touch hasty; I’d like to know more about why a mad scientist lives next door to a teenager, and whether Zozo’s waking world is meant to be read as entirely commonplace.

I’m happy to wait for the full game to answer those questions, though, as the complete version is set to expand further on the worlds already shown in the demo.

Zozo and the Lost Dreams is set to release in 2027 and can be wishlisted on Steam.

Daniel Butler