DESTA: THE MEMORIES BETWEEN

A whole new ballgame

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Developer Ustwo Games

Publisher Ustwo Games, Netflix

Format Android, iOS, PC, Switch UK

Origin

Release TBA 2022

Your childhood art teacher - the one you always liked but suspected was disappointed in you, especially after she walked in on that impromptu life-drawing class is aiming a rubber ball in your direction. As soon as she gets an opening, she'll fling it and knock you out of the game. You haven't got a ball, alas. But that friend from your clubbing days, the one who kept partying long after you lost the energy for it, who you worry might think you're boring these days? He does. He passes the ball, and you ping it off a wall to strike your teacher on the back of the head. And then the two of you have an emotional breakthrough.

"We make the games that we want to make, basically," game director and Ustwo chief creative officer Danny Gray says, explaining how the Monument Valley studio picks its next project. "We don't look at what the market is doing and then try and build one of those. And equally, we don't necessarily speak to a partner and ask, what's missing from your portfolio?" It's the kind of line we've heard from many developers over the years but on the evidence of the game before us, we're rather inclined to believe him. After all, it's hard to imagine that when Netflix signed Ustwo's latest for its growing mobile games initiative, the streaming giant was looking to fill some quota of turn-based tactics emotional dodgeball Roguelikes.