Today’s featured creatives in the spotlight: Nyamakop, the Joburg-based game studio that’s flipping the script on colonial history, one digital heist at a time.
Their new game Relooted just dropped (on Steam, Epic, Xbox – you name it), and it’s already got our attention. Not just for the action, but for the why behind the story.
About the game play… You’re Nomali. Your little brother starts some chaos (of course), and now you’re leading a crew to steal back African artifacts locked up in Western museums. These aren’t just any items, they’re real objects, of huge cultural and spiritual value, taken from their home and stashed away behind glass. Some not even on display anymore.
This game is coming at a time when the conversation around stolen artifacts is louder than ever. Governments are pushing. Researchers are speaking out. And the public is getting behind it too. Relooted taps right into that moment, giving players a chance to do what diplomacy hasn’t: take back what was stolen.
And here’s the twist: your crew isn’t made of pro-thieves or international agents. It’s everyday people. A grandma. A hacker. A neighbour. People from different African countries, all bringing something unique to the mission.
It’s a big leap from Nyamakop’s first title, Semblance. That one was a playdough-style puzzle platformer with satisfying squish mechanics and clever world design. It was well-loved, and even landed them the honour of being the first African studio to launch an original game on a Nintendo console. But Relooted? That’s a different beast.
As creative director Ben Myres explained, every artifact in the game is based on a real piece still held in a Western museum. The team spent two years researching which ones to include and choosing items not just for their historical significance, but also for the stories behind how they were taken.
“We looked for artifacts with great stories in terms of how they were looted,” said Myres in an interview with Epic. “Why were they important to people? Just anything associated with them.”
One example he shared is the Ngadji drum, made by the Pokomo people in Kenya. It was used in ceremonies and to mark the reign of a king. British colonisers took it in 1902. It’s been sitting in the British Museum ever since. Only in the 2010s did a descendant of the original king finally get to see it again, over 100 years later.
“These weren’t artifacts that were just found in the dust and excavated by archaeologists,” said Myres. “These were still active cultures.”
That’s what makes this game hit different. These stories are real. The objects are real. They were all faithfully re-created in 3D using photos, scans, and what little public access the team could get. The museums in the game might be fictional, but the emotions behind the heist? That’s all truth.
Relooted is full of parkour escapes, puzzle planning, and smart team-building but behind all the fun, it’s got real-world weight. 70 real artifacts, 70 real reasons to play.
And it’s not just a South African effort. While the studio is based in Joburg, the team includes creatives from Zambia, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. That pan-African energy runs through the entire game.
Nyamakop is one of the biggest indie game studios in sub-Saharan Africa at the moment and they’re using that platform to tell African stories, made by African people, for a global audience. And honestly? We’re here for it.
Watch the game trailer below…
The future of African gaming? Looks like it’s already here.
Check out Relooted on Steam now.
