Moon Studios dev says if Ori was its “Mario,” its next game is its “Zelda”

Moon Studios, developer behind Ori and the Blind Forest, is working on a new game, with the studio’s creative director saying it’s like its “Zelda.”

Coming up to a decade ago now, Moon Studios released its first title, Ori and the Blind forest, a Metroidvania that was instantly well received by critics and fans, going on to release a sequel in 2020, Ori and the Will of the Wisps. Earlier this week, Moon Studios creative director Thomas Mahler touched on the developer’s next game, an action RPG, where he compared Ori to Mario, and the next title to Zelda.

“Ori was our ‘Mario,’ this is our ‘Zelda,'” Mahler wrote on his personal Twitter account. “That was my first thought when I first started prototyping our new project back in 2015. We then committed to Wisps, which allowed us to give this project more time in the oven so that we’d then be able to turn it into a full-blown ARPG.”

Mahler also responded to a number of other Twitter users who had questions about the next game, with one user asking if this next unnamed game will have a similar art style. “Yes. It’s important that our games have a unique artstyle where you know that this is a Moon Studios game even if you just see a thumbnail,” responded Mahler. “There are too many games out there that look the same. Art direction matters. A lot.”

Another user noted they hoped it would come to PlayStation, presumably because the Ori games were previously Xbox exclusive, later launching on the Nintendo Switch, though haven’t released on PlayStation at this point in time. Mahler confirmed that it would, citing that having the game available on all platforms was the main reason the developer signed the game with publisher Private Division.

Nothing is known about this upcoming game as of yet, but any comparison to Zelda is a bold one to make, so we’ll have to wait and see how it turns out.