Metamorphosis
In Metamorphosis you can explore identity and freedom of choice through playful interactions with prisms, colours, and gender themes, especially drawing inspiration from works by Olafur Eliasson, Andy Warhol, and Sif Itona Westerberg at ARoS Aarhus Art Museum in Denmark.
Originally created by Team Puzlerne at a cultural game jam in Aarhus and later matured in collaboration with the game studio Mothworks, Metamorphosis was selected from over 100 youth-made games across Europe as a part of the Horizon Europe funded project EPIC-WE.
Metamorphosis invites the player into a striking visual universe filled with playful interactions with prisms, colors, and markers of identity. The game explores themes such as freedom, identity, and self-confidence. The main character is a small bird, created by Team Puzlerne, symbolizing freedom and the struggle to find it—an image of “learning to fly,” or learning to be oneself.
The player follows the bird through five levels, each representing a step on the journey of self-discovery. Along the way, the bird encounters challenges that can only be overcome by acquiring new abilities and believing in itself. The game begins on the dark, eerie forest floor and ends at the top of a great, colorful, and radiant Tree of Life.
Metamorphosis is a game for culture created in the EPIC-WE project. It is the result of a collaboration between a team of young people who have participated in one of the EPIC-WE Cultural Game Jams at AroS Art Museum and the game studio Mothworks.
The Metamorphosis game is one of two cultural games that have been selected by Filmby Aarhus, ARoS, Aarhus University, and the young participants of the Cultural Game Jams from a pool of around 100 games through and for culture, created by youth across Europe in the EPIC-WE project.
The initial game for culture prototype was created by Team Puzlerne, four young people who participated in the second Cultural Game Jam in Aarhus. The game invites you into an empowering experience of "the freedom to choose who you are" and draws on artworks from the ARoS Art Museum collections. Especially, Olafur Eliasson, Andy Warhol, and Sif Itona Westerberg, to offer the player a cultural gameworld with powerful aesthetics and playful interactions with prisms, colours, and gender motifs.
The final result has been created in close collaboration between Team Puzlerne and Mothworks, resulting in a unique synergy between young people and professional game designers. It is a strong testament to the empowering and innovative potential of merging youth voices, cultural heritage, and European values, with game design in the EPIC-WE project.
