Norwood Suite dev's next surreal jazz adventure Tales From Off-Peak City gets first trailer
Ahead of release early next year.
Cosmo D, the creator behind surreal jazz-infused delights The Norwood Suite and Off-Peak, has released the first trailer for his next adventure oddity, Tales From Off-Peak City Vol. 1.
Tales From Off-Peak City, which sports the same wonderfully off-kilter aesthetic as its predecessors, is designed as an anthology series. Each volume will feature its own self-contained story, which, when combined, will reveal the truth behind the series' events.
"It's a hazy Sunday morning on the corner of July Avenue and Yam Street," explains Cosmo D (AKA Greg Heffernan) of Volume 1, "Caetano Grosso, a former saxophone player and longtime pizza-maker, is just getting his pizza oven warmed up. Orders are trickling in, and he needs someone to help with the deliveries.
"You sense an opportunity, but unbeknownst to him, what you're really after is his old saxophone, and you're going to get it one way or another. Your pursuit will set off a chain of events across the neighbourhood, taking you deep into the hidden worlds and private lives of the people living there."
Tales From Off-Peak City looks to stick closely to the first-person exploratory template established by its predecessors, with players able to roam through the game's surreal, open-ended environments, chatting to larger-than-life characters, uncovering secrets, indulging in light puzzles, taking photos, and even making pizza in order to nudge the narrative forward.
I've thoroughly enjoyed Cosmo D's previous work - Norwood Suite in particular is a dazzling affair, simultaneously strange, profound, hilarious, disturbing, and almost overwhelmingly atmospheric - and I'm genuinely excited to see how Tales From Off-Peak City compares.
And if the game's trailer above has you equally curious, you can get a feel for Cosmo D's distinctive aesthetic in the free adventure Off-Peak and via Norwood Suite's demo. As for Tales From Off-Peak City, it's due to arrive on Steam early next year.