Kubbadang, bleeding and on the look out under the sun...
The Sun Woman is sending monsters to terrorize the land. To these ends the Yuin
send our protagonist, the thylacine Kubbadang, to ask for help in Budj Bim. Joining him and his friends Winyu and Dhurra and sister Guddity are the Gamilaraay warrior Bangalaa, the Arrernte warrior Perrurle and the mysterious medicine-woman Bina. Together, they must defeat the Sun Woman and bring harmony to the realm again.
Lands of Fire is a furry Ren'Py-based Linear Visual Novel based on the mythology of Aboriginal Australian cultures. The game, which contains violence, sexual content, dense lore from mentioned cultures, and multiple routes, can be found HERE or HERE in every platform. A supplemental wiki page can also be found HERE.
This visual novel contains examples of:
- All There in the Manual: A glossary linked here and within the game for the terminology.
- Audible Gleam: Everytime a light flashes bright it has a fire sound effect.
- Big Bad:
- The Sun Woman in the first arc.
- Marmoo in the second arc.
- Parnuen in Bangalaa's route.
- Death of a Child: Kubbadang's childhood friend Indeko died from thirst during a drought, casing a severe bad blood between him and the elders. The Sun Woman's children also died, mirroring the Wotjobaluk take on the sun's origin.
- Eldritch Abomination: The Inapertwa from Arrernte lore are depicted as this, as primal shapeless things in the remote past. A god seriously corrupted by Marmoo later shows up as essentially a magical glitch, barely recognisable as what it once was.
- Feather Fingers: Avian characters like Banglaa are depicted with feathered human hands.
- God of Evil: Marmoo, the god of evil of the Gamilaraay tradition, is the main antagonist of the second arc.
- God of Light: The Sun Woman in based on several sun goddesses across Australia's numerous cultures. There's also Baiame the sky father.
- God of the Moon: Kubbadang becomes the moon god.
- Hellhound: Among the various monsters that serve the Sun Woman are "black and red dogs".
- Hollywood Dreamtime: The game portrays the spirit world as mostly close to traditional Aboriginal perspectives, as located in the sky. However, the pop cultural Dreamtime notions are used in the sense that time and space do not exist within it, hence gods cannot die.
- Istanbul (Not Constantinople): Being a pre-colonial setting, the indigenous places are used in lieu of modern Australian names. For instance, Mparntwe, the Arrente name for Alice Springs, Iutruwita for Tasmania, and Artilla for Mount Conner.
- Kangaroos Represent Australia: Perrurle, who is an Arrernte kangaroo and the most sterotypically Aussie of the characters, being abressive and full of himself.
- Light Is Not Good:
- The Sun Woman, who seeks to devour all of humanity, or the anthropomorphic creatures in this case.
- Parnuen is the Tasmanian sun god and is just as evil, enslaving Kubbadang and Bangalaa to his purposes.
- Meaningful Name: Kubbadang means "moon" in the Yuin language. he becomes the moon god later on.
- Multinational Team: The core group comes from all over Australia, from the Yuin in the southeastern coast to the Arrernte in the desert and the Gamilaraay in between. The Gunditjamara reinforcements from South Australia also feature an Yolngu from the opposite side of the continent.
- Shown Their Work: Many of the game's lore is based on the research on the critically aclaimed Dark Emu.
- Yowies and Bunyips and Drop Bears, Oh My: The Dulagals, which the the Yuin analogues of the Yowie (otherwise absent) and Bunyips.
- Wintry Auroral Sky: Can be seen when Marmoo is wrecking shit up. Like in mythology it's an ominous sign, the aurorae compared to wildfires.
