1 player
Available on PC or Nintendo Switch
With this month’s game, we offer you a method for moving from the screen to a creative activity, ending with learning digital skills linked to cinema. Not bad, eh ? Quiet on set, camera rolling, ACTION !
It’s a wrap is a French game, developed by the Chanko studio in Lyon, which mixes the platform and puzzle genres. Each level is divided into two stages: the first resembles video editing software, letting you scroll through a scene that has to match a script you have received. We then have to move the elements to trigger them at the right moment. For example, when should this rock fall? Before or after the mine train goes past? Once everything looks right, the film’s director calls action and we then have to “play” the scene by interacting with the sets we have put in place, in the form of 2D platforms, in the manner of a Super Mario.
Trailer : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoE66sKJJvw
In other words, you play a poor stuntman who must be spared the worst mishaps. From the bridge collapsing above a group of hungry crocodiles, to the cavern caving in, via the killer robot’s laser eyes that you must escape by hiding in the scenery; not sure the union would approve these working methods! After each failed attempt, the director will get angry and ask for the scene to be reshot. A chance for us to readjust our timing. While the head is put to work in the first part, the second calls on dexterity.
It’s a wrap draws on 1980s cinema, in a cartoon atmosphere full of humour and tributes to Indiana Jones, Blade Runner and other cult action films. About ten hours should take you to the end of the game and it is best played by two, especially for the puzzle phases. Fortunately, a built-in hint system can come to our aid, either as a clue in the script, or by locking an element in the right place in the sequencer. For the game is not always easy and some passages risk testing your nerves. But what satisfaction to see our hero finally escape a threat at the last moment in a little animated sequence.
It’s a Wrap offers an innovative, clever and very entertaining concept. Once the three films are finished, your children will have been able to get an idea (even a vague one) of how a scene is built and been made aware of the principle of editing. Why not use it to create something together ? Suggest to your children that they invent the next adventure of our unlucky stuntman, write a script, then pull out your smartphone to film them performing the scene and finally, dive into editing software to make a family creation ! From video game to cinema, it is only a short step. And it’s in the can !
