Tchia Review: An Addictive and Breathtaking Experience (PS4)

Ever since I learned about Tchia, I’ve been looking forward to playing it for a long time. Now I finally had the chance to play it… and it was well worth the wait. I think Tchia‘s going to be up there as one of the best games I’ve played this year. Why is it so good? It just gets so many things right. It’s a beautiful open world game with plenty to do, a story you’ll get engrossed in, a memorable bunch of characters, and a gorgeous tropical setting. There’s a lot to talk about Tchia in this review, so let’s dive right in!

Tchia is available on PC via the Epic Games Store and PlayStation 4 & 5 for $29.99.

Story – There Was Once a Girl Called Tchia…

The first thing you should know about Tchia is that it’s inspired by New Caledonia, including its folklore, setting and music. The main premise focuses on a girl, the titular Tchia. Her father is kidnapped and Tchia must set out on an adventure to rescue him from a cruel tyrant called Meavora. Trust me, Meavora is not a pleasant being, eating babies and children (no, seriously) and imprisoning adults. He rules the archipelago with fear, aided by strange cloth-like beings called Maano. Meavora was one of those characters I couldn’t wait to take down.

Let’s talk about Tchia herself. She’s a great character to play as. She’s nimble, brave, friendly, resourceful, and adventurous; generally a very likeable playable character. She’s got musical talents as well, with her trusty ukelele. Tchia also has a special ability to possess animals and certain objects, and her left eye glows green. I think Tchia is one of those characters who is going to stick with me for a while.

The story of Tchia has a lot of great characters to meet.

Gameplay – The World Is Your Oyster

Honestly, there is so much to do in Tchia. Aside from following the story, there is plenty of stuff that will easily lead you to getting sidetracked. Everything you do in the game though, the things considered as side quests or collectibles, all have a useful purpose. Even when you’re going off the story, you don’t ever feel like you’re wasting your time.

Exploring by Sailing and Climbing

One thing I loved about Tchia was the open world element. I love open world games, so already this game was up my street. Tchia is based around an archipelago, so you spend some time travelling between different islands. What way to get around an island-themed world than a sailing boat! The boat is pretty straightforward to use (after some practice), and the way it moves and works feels so real. The boat in Tchia is so different to other games I’ve played where you drive boats. You don’t press a button to hop on and off, nor do you just push a button to make it go. Tchia goes a lot deeper than that. You have to jump on and off the boat to board. There’s an anchor so your boat doesn’t drift off. You’ve got a helm to steer with. You also have to manually control the speed of the boat by adjusting the sail. It’s very detailed and impressive.

Climbing is another mechanic in Tchia. It reminded me of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, except Tchia isn’t affected by rain. She can easily climb mountains and even scour walls. Providing you have plenty of stamina, she can do a lot. Another thing I loved was being able to climb up certain trees such as palm trees, swing back and forth, and then launch yourself from them. It was incredibly good fun and a great way to get around, especially combined with the glider. This is another mechanic borrowed from Zelda. However, stamina drains pretty fast while gliding, so this is something you have to use wisely.

You’ll spend plenty of time cruising across the waters on Tchia’s trusty boat.

Soul Jumping Is a Blessing

One unique mechanic in Tchia is the ability to possess certain objects and animals. Known in the game as Soul Jumping, I soon learned that this had many advantages. I learned that you could hurl explosives at enemies or destructive objects, or even just ignite them when nearby. This makes a nice change from melee combat or using guns or other weapons. You do have a slingshot, but that’s more for shooting coconuts out of trees and slingshot shooting ranges to win trophies.

Soul Jumping has other uses as well. While I love exploring open worlds, running around can become tedious, especially if you spend a lot of time going between places or are in a hurry. I found that by possessing animals, travelling could be much quicker and easier. Possess a bird and you can soar in the sky. Possess a land animal and you can sprint across the terrain. However, you have to use Soul Jumping sparingly, since there’s a meter that tracks your usage. You can expand the meter by completing totem shrines, and fill up a drained meter by eating.

Time for a Little Music

One neat activity in Tchia is playing music. This isn’t exactly a musical game, but with this mechanic, it does add some music beyond the soundtrack. It’s a nice little touch, and it serves as a break from exploring and helps you become more emotionally involved with the story. You usually play Tchia’s ukelele, but sometimes you accompany other musicians. The music-playing segment is fun, but you need to have a good rhythm about you, otherwise you might struggle to keep up. The way the music playing is set up isn’t hard exactly, you just need to focus and listen to the music, the rhythm, and the timing. One thing I did appreciate was there’s always the option to opt out of playing along. You can just listen along and enjoy the music without having to join in, and there’s no penalty whichever option you go with.

I generally enjoyed the music segments. However, I did encounter one iffy moment when I was playing one song. I don’t know if it was the busy pre-rendered sequence, but the notes coming in were very glitchy and jumping about, making it much harder to press the notes at the right times. In the end, I decided it was better to just listen, opting out of that particular segment. I don’t know if anyone else encountered this, or if it might have been different playing on the PS5 or PC version of the game. I didn’t have any problems like this with other music segments though, so I just put it down to a one-off moment.

Playing some music provides a break from the action and exploring of Tchia.

Collectibles and Side Quests With a Purpose

I’ve played lots of games where there are collectibles and side quests. A lot of the time, they’re just something extra to do to get 100% completion in the game, or a nice trophy or other form of reward. Tchia actually makes exploring and finding things worthwhile.

When I first started playing, I thought the Braided Trinkets were just that: collectibles. However, I later discovered that gathering them wasn’t a waste of time. You needed them to unlock cosmetics for Tchia and her boat. It was the same thing for gathering clam pearls.

There are other useful side quests as well. You can carve totem heads and use them to unlock totem shrines. Competing these shrines gives Tchia more power for her soul-jumping ability. Balancing rocks may seem like an odd side activity, but this too serves a useful purpose. Successfully completing a rock tower grants you a new ability with the ukelele, such as being able to breath underwater for longer, or even changing the weather. If you travel to certain high points around the archipelago, the map will be updated with the surrounding area, marking any remaining collectibles. 

Collectibles can be found on land, or by diving underwater.

Beware Meavora’s Minions

Meovora is a nasty piece of work, as I discovered playing through Tchia‘s story. The Maano, the cloth-like beings who work for him, are pretty intimidating themselves. The way they move, the way they look, how they can swarm you if you’re not careful. Initially, I avoided any kind of conflict, focusing on exploring and building up Tchia’s abilities, but after my first meeting with Meovora, I stopped avoiding the enemy and decided they must be dealt with. Throughout the archipelagos, you can stumble across camps with Maano lurking. I have to admit, I avoided these creatures to start with, unsure of how hostile they would be, what they would do to me, how difficult it would be to overcome them, etc. After I was compelled to storm an enemy base to help a desperate creature in need, I found that confronting the enemy wasn’t as bad as I feared.

Defeating a band of Maano isn’t easy, by any means, but it’s also not impossibly difficult or game-ragingly frustrating. They provide a good challenge, but they also challenge you to think with your brain. I like it when games do this. To defeat Maano, you need anything explosive to throw at them or ignite. You can find such things around enemy bases such as oil lamps, jerry cans, and explosive rocks. I have to say, I ended up having a blast (no pun intended) invading enemy territory, planning how to defeat them, looking for explosives, and ticking off the Maano and their resources one step at a time. It was very satisfying work.

With Tchia’s Soul Jumping ability, you can possess a lot of items and animals, useful for travelling or dealing with enemies.

Dressing Up Tchia (and the Boat)

There was one last thing I wanted to touch on gameplay-wise: customization! I love this in any game, and I’m very glad this option was available in Tchia. I loved changing Tchia’s outfit, from her clothes, her hair, and even face paint. You can even swap out her ukelele, bag and glider. You can get more outfits by finding cosmetics chests around the archipelago, as well as other means such as buying cosmetic gifts and claw machines.

As well as Tchia, you can also customize the boat she rides around in. You can change the sails, the flag, and even the wood. Again, as with Tchia’s wardrobe, you can find cosmetics for the boat or buy them by exploring the world. 

Graphics and Audio – Gorgeous Visuals and Music to Match

Along with the story and gameplay, I was blown away by how stunning the graphics were in Tchia. They are fairly cartoonish, but not overly so, and the world is just beautiful to look at. The rural islands are especially amazing. I don’t think I could find any fault graphics-wise with Tchia.

The music in Tchia was out of this world as well. The soundtrack was a dream to listen to, and the music segments were breathtaking. Together, the graphics and music just sucked you into the game.

I’ll talk a bit about the voice acting as well. I love the fact that the team behind Tchia sought and hired voice actors from New Caledonia, the place that inspired the game. The dialogue is spoken in their native languages, namely French and Drehu. I think this works much better than having them speak in English. The actors themselves also did an amazing job portraying their characters.

Tchia was played on the PS4 with a key provided by Kepler Interactive.