Tales of Kenzera: Zau Director and Home of the Dragon star Abubakar Salim is an unapologetic gamer. We had the prospect to sit down down with him and get caught into his ideas on the event course of and the place he feels the trade is true now.
In between bumming across the ground of Australia’s largest gaming conference, the staff at Dexerto was in a position to steal a while with the multitalented Abubakar Salim throughout his packed PAX schedule.
Identified finest for his roles as Alyn of Hull in HBO’s Home of the Dragon and Bayek of Siwa in Murderer’s Creed Origins, Salim additionally based Surgent Studios in an effort to break into recreation improvement. The studio’s first launch; Tales of Kenzera: Zau was a delight to play and our personal evaluate referred to as it “not possible to not advocate”.
Abu is at present in Australia to talk at each PAX and SXSW and he was type sufficient to make a while for the staff at Dexerto. Throughout our interview, we probed him about his perspective on video video games as each a pastime and a career.
HBOAbubakar Salim as Alyn of Hull in Home of the Dragon.
A brand new perspective
Salim first launched the world to Tales of Kenzera: Zau throughout The Recreation Awards 2023 and the sport exists as a type of meditation on grief knowledgeable by the lack of his personal father. Throughout a panel at PAX Australia, he mirrored on the function his father performed in nurturing his ardour for video video games and the way they shared their experiences.
Being a self-professed Gamer with a capital ‘G’, we wished to see how the expertise of growing a online game from the bottom up modified how Abu engaged along with his favourite pastime.
“It’s made me have a a lot deeper appreciation for builders and the work that really goes into it,” he defined. “I all the time have seen and recognized that video games are an artwork kind and an expression however seeing really how the sausage is made is I believe so essential.”
This mindset of Abu’s extends into the realm of movie and TV now that he’s labored a couple of initiatives in that house. He talked about having a “deeper appreciation and understanding” of the work that goes into these huge endeavors, particularly the place interactive media is anxious.
“I believe like there’s a, there’s a actual type of magic to be realized about it and I believe, having now developed a recreation, I simply take a look at video games so otherwise,” he elaborated.
Advocating for video games as artwork
Suprisingly, after we requested Abu about whether or not or not he’d been in a position to share his love of video games with co-stars on initiatives like Home of the Dragon or Raised by Wolves, he revealed there weren’t an entire lot of die-hard avid gamers within the house, no less than not that he’d labored carefully with.
“The very first thing they consider in relation to video games is FIFA,” he joked. Whereas they might not have began out as enthusiastic about video games as himself, Abu did let slip that he loved bringing individuals in.
“Particularly with Home of The Dragon, what’s actually thrilling is you say ‘I’m taking part in video games or I’m making video games’ and so they’re like, ‘What does that imply?’ And then you definitely open them to this new world.”
His Home of the Dragon co-star Steve Toussaint, recognized for his function as Corlys Velaryon, joined Abu on Tales of Kenzera: Zau. Toussaint introduced the character of Bomani to life along with his voicework however regardless of taking the function and showing in Disney’s movie adaptation of Prince of Persia, he wasn’t immersed in video video games as a pastime.
“It’s actually humorous, he didn’t actually know a lot about it, however after I informed him about it and received him concerned in it, he began actually having fun with and appreciating the artwork type of all of it,” Salim defined.
He elaborated on his personal shock that folks concerned in a narratively centered medium hadn’t been launched to video video games as a car for storytelling.
HBOSteve Toussaint is nicely on his technique to turning into a licensed gamer due to Abu.
For the love of the sport
“It’s a captivating one as a result of it’s a kind of issues the place I believe the storytelling side of video games nonetheless hasn’t hit house for extra basic audiences,” Abu contemplated. Based on him, it’s as much as individuals contained in the video games trade to bridge that hole.
“The one factor that I’ve realized in regards to the trade as an entire is that video games are nonetheless very a lot handled as a enterprise slightly than essentially as an artwork kind,” he clarified. “I believe it must be seen extra as a creative expression slightly than as a enterprise as a result of then it permits extra daring video games to be celebrated for his or her boldness slightly than being a distinct segment.”
Like several leisure trade, video video games signify the potential for lots of monetary acquire and it turns into pure for bigger organizations to pursue that. Based on Salim nonetheless, it is a detriment to the notion of gaming from these exterior the trade and pastime.
“There’s a cause why like a number of these large recreation publishers and corporations are going for the video games as a service mannequin. They wish to try to recreate the subsequent Fortnite as a result of it’s going to make them more cash,” he posited.
“Video games shouldn’t be about that. It shouldn’t be about cash, it needs to be about expression, it needs to be about enjoyment, about storytelling, about connectivity, about interactivity as a result of that’s the factor that movie and TV have actually hit the mark with. It’s about story, it’s about leisure,” he continued.
“I believe as soon as that’s embraced, video games might be seen extra as a medium for storytelling slightly than a enterprise or product.”