Hakuna Matata Part I

Would you believe it: there’s actually a game titled “Hakuna Matata” and its theme about wild animals frolicking on the African Savannah. The game is more commonly known as Afrika (Hakuna Matata is the title for the Japanese equivalent), and is the second of the two PS3 game titles I picked up for Ling.

Like Aquanaut’s Holiday which I blogged about the other day, this game’s entirely non-violent and no killing of animals is necessary or even allowed. Rather, you play a photographer and throughout the game campaign, are given missions via email to take pictures of the African animals in action. E.g. a headshot of a plains Zebra, or a giraffe taking a drink at the pool, or hippos fighting, or a herd of wildebeest. The photos you take get rated and you get cash for them, which gives you access to better equipment, other animals, and areas to explore in the Savannah.

Now this isn’t the first game of course to have included photographic elements as part of the game. But Afrika’s really special because the entire game’s oriented around photography. The lenses and camera bodies from the Sony line of SLRs including DSLRs from Sony’s α line are in it, and there’re even shutter and aperture settings. Now how deep that goes and if it’s at all possible to tweak shuttle and aperture settings in order to create a better picture I’ll have to play a little more to find out. But if there ever was a game for photography enthusiasts, this is it.:)

A trailer for the game courtesy of Youtube. The award wining soundtrack in the game is performed by the Hollywood Studio Symphony Orchestra.:)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuEQMDyZSmg