A Space for the Unbound is a slice-of-life pixel art Adventure Game set in 90s Indonesia developed by Mojiken Studios and published by Toge Productions about the bonds between others, cats, and the end of the world. The main feature of the game is Spacedive, where Atma uses a magical red book to dive inside people's hearts and solve puzzles. The game also features many cats and other animals that Atma can pet and name.
Atma, an Ordinary High-School Student, is in his last year of school. Together with his girlfriend Raya they made a bucket list to do before their school days are over and then skip school to start doing them. While doing so, Atma discovers that Raya has a superpower that allows her to create objects or places. However, things start to get weirder as Raya uses her powers, and there's a threat of the end of the world approaching.
The game was released on January 19, 2023 and is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S and Nintendo Switch. It is available in 7 languages: English, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese, Chinese (Simplified), and Chinese (Traditional). A physical version of the game by Serenity Forge is set to be released on March 31, 2024.
A Space for the Unbound provides examples of:
- 100% Completion: Completing the bucket list, which requires you to, among other things, collect 20 bottle caps and pet all the animals you come across.
- Abusive Parents: Nirmala's father is shown to be abusive, yelling at his daughter for locking herself up and skipping school. According to Nirmala's memories, he wasn't always like this: in the past, he used to play guitar and sing along with the family (until he sold it later) and took them to Bali for vacation. The pressure of working and debt caused him to lash out, becoming abusive afterwards.
- Accomplice by Inaction: This turns out to be the reason of Raya's enmity to Marin. They were childhood friends, but Marin was too spineless to stand up to protect Nirmala from her issues and bullying despite Marin herself being more accepted and having the power to stop the bullying. Add up with how Nirmala kept Atma's existence a secret from her, it only serves to drive further wedge between them.
- Action Commands: In the fighting minigame, after attacking, you need to press the button when a moving bar hits the green area to defend yourself. Later there are multiple green areas and moving green areas.
- Adventures in Comaland: The entire game takes place inside Raya's mind. Chapter 5 ends with Raya waking up in a hospital bed.
- All Just a Dream: In every chapter, Atma dreams about spending time with a girl named Nirmala, then suddenly wakes up in the classroom.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Raya was bullied by her classmates for being a freak that likes to draw and write stories. This happened ever since she was still a kid. Marin is the only kid who didn't bully her, but since she didn't stand up for her, she's considered an enabler for the bullies by Raya.
- Ambiguous Situation: It's left to the player's interpretation on how Raya fell into a coma in the first place.
- Arc Words: "It is time. The world has ended. The whole planet will crumble into dust."
- Asleep in Class: After Chapter 0, every time a new chapter starts, Atma finds himself waking up in the classroom. It stops starting in Chapter 4.
- Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: When Atma confronts Raya in Chapter 5, she turns into a giant.
- The Atoner: Erik tries to make amends with Raya about accidentally killing Admiral in Chapter 2 by offering her a Black Gateau Cake, which he steals from Atma. Both Raya and Atma aren't pleased with his way. Turns out, this has happened in the real life and Raya hasn't gotten over Erik's accident with the real world 'Admiral', which is her actual reason of how she's pissed rather than how he stole from Atma, along with his bullying attempts. In the epilogue, Erik shows that he's still trying to make amends of the real life incident by being much nicer to cats.
- Bland-Name Product: All over the place, especially with the bottle caps. There are things like Koala Kola (Coca Cola), Manta Soda (Fanta), and so on. These are based on actual products sold in Indonesia that existed in the 90's and a lot of them still sold in the present day.
- Calling the Old Man Out: Near the end of Chapter 5, Raya, with the help of her mother, confronts her father. She calls him out for being awful to her, her mother, and everyone, before saying that she will move forward and leave him behind.
- Chekhov's Gun: The Magic Wand. It is first introduced in Chapter 0 where Nirmala asks Atma to get it from her house. It was lost when Atma tried to rescue Nirmala. Then it doesn't appear again until Chapter 4 where it enables Atma to Time Travel.
- Collection Sidequest: Two of them, which are collecting 20 bottle caps and getting all 5 letters of YOMAN.
- Coming of Age Story: The game describes itself as "A coming-of-age adventure where you follow two high-school sweethearts on a journey of self discovery at the end of their high school years while facing the end of the world." It shows Atma and Raya at school doing things like filling future counseling forms and organizing a festival. It's revealed near the end of the game that this game is actually one to Raya, as it deals with her past and emotions.
- Content Warnings: The game warns that it contains depictions of depression, anxiety, and suicide that may not be suitable for all audiences. It also suggests contacting professional help in your area if you're experiencing a mental health problem.
- Crack in the Sky: After every chapter, the screen pans towards the sky to show a crack being formed and enlarging. It is assumed to be caused by Raya using her powers.
- Dead All Along: Turns out Atma actually drowned in Chapter 0 and the current Atma is a memory in Raya's world.
- Drunk with Power: After initially using her powers for benevolent means, Raya begins to use them immorally to remove any imperfections in her reality, including people.
- Due to the Dead: In The Stinger, Raya visits the place where Atma drowned and puts flowers along with the red book.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: It takes considerable effort for Atma to save Raya and reunite her with Nirmala. In the end, Raya reunites with Nirmala, makes peace with her emotions, and wakes up in the real world, ready to move forward in life.
- The End of the World as We Know It: There are multiple characters saying that the world is going to end, and in each end of a chapter, there is a Crack in the Sky that grows larger.
- Evil Knockoff: In Chapter 4, there's another Atma running around the city, trying to prevent the real Atma from reaching Raya. Later in Chapter 5, Atma fights several copies of himself, including the Dark Atma from Chapter 4.
- Fetch Quest: Atma will often need to find items in order to advance the story. For example, he needs to find a missing dog toy, which he obtains by trading a pack of cigarettes.
- Finger Poke of Doom: As a giant, Raya uses this to attack Atma. Later on she stops and uses Ground Punch instead.
- Fisher King: Raya's mental world, and the people in them, change based on her emotions.
- Forced Transformation: Erik, Lulu, and Marin are forcibly transformed into a weredog, a swan, and a snail, respectively. Bosque reveals that this is due to Raya's perception of their true forms.
- Friend to All Living Things: The game lets you pet (and name!) cats, and other animals. It's even part of a sidequest.
- Go Out with a Smile: In the game's conclusion, Atma (as in, the memory) fades away with a big smile on his face along with the crumbling world as he sends Raya away and makes her wake up in real life.
- Good All Along: The demonic form of Bosque is intimidating and always shoos Atma out of the Spacedive and making the focus character of the chapter experience a Forced Transformation. Turns out, he's just trying to help Raya and Nirmala reunite and move on rather than keeping her in her own dream. He ends up being Atma's 'main ally' in Chapter 5.
- Good Parents: As opposed to the deadbeat father, Nirmala's mother is shown to be caring and concerned with her state, but cannot find the strength to stand up against her husband. In Raya's final walk to confront her past, her mother is instead shown to be comforting and supportive. And later, it turns out that she Grew a Spine and filed a divorce against her husband, successfully taking Raya to her custody. They actually live a much stabler life without the father's income, and the mother is completely supportive of Raya's writing hobbies.
- Given Name Reveal: In Chapter 5, Raya's full name is revealed to be Raya Fitri Nirmala.
- Hate Sink: Raya/Nirmala's father, being a deadbeat father who constantly beats up Raya/Nirmala for pursuing her interest of writing stories, calls her useless, and is never sympathetic to any of her problems. He's also one of the big factors of Raya's mental state that form up the whole game. In Chapter 5, as Raya starts forgiving her transgressors (Erik, Lulu, Marin) due to misunderstandings, her father gets called out as horrible instead since his issue isn't born from a misunderstanding. It's later revealed that sometime before Raya wakes up from her coma, her mother, who was an Extreme Doormat beforehand, Grew a Spine and filed a divorce; Raya and her mother live more or less normally afterwards. With the abundance of Abusive Parents in Indonesian media not portrayed sympathetically, it's clear that a father like that is meant to be disliked.
- Heel–Face Turn: In Chapter 4, one gang member suddenly switches side to fight on Atma and Soebandi's side because Atma space-dived on his past self to make him join Soebandi's dojo.
- I Know Mortal Kombat: Just by watching someone play Future Fighter, Atma learns martial arts and immediately beats a gangster.
- Intergenerational Friendship: Atma and Nirmala. Atma is a high-school student, while Nirmala is in grade school. They play and write stories together.
- It's All Upstairs From Here: Towards the end of Chapter 5, to reach Nirmala, Atma and Raya walk through a rising pathway made from floating rocks. While going up the background is filled with gorgeous scenes of the crumbling world.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Erik acts like a complete ass especially towards Atma because he's jealous at being in the love triangle. Even in the past, he used to take turns in bullying Raya. However, he's only bullying her out of peer pressure and a case of Cannot Spit It Out, he's just doing it to grab Raya's attention because his crush is genuine. While he cultivates a bad boy persona, he's also capable of genuine remorse and still tries to sincerely apologize to Raya after he accidentally killed Admiral, both in real life and her dream world. By the epilogue, he has shed his 'Jerk' part.
- Journey to the Center of the Mind: The main feature of the game, called Spacedive. Using the Magic Red Book, Atma Spacedives to people's hearts, solving puzzles and resolving problems deep in their heart.
- Literal Split Personality: In Chapter 4, Raya is revealed to be Nirmala, and pushed Nirmala away after Atma drowned, blaming the latter for it.
- Living Memory: Atma turns out to be this, having died at the river and only existed because he is part of Raya's memory.
- Lovable Alpha Bitch: Lulu is the popular girl of the Loka High, and she's also academically gifted, though most of her callousness only appear in her Spacedive realm as the judge of cases. She's considered a rival for Raya because she used to bully her like the rest, and she's considered to have stolen a place meant for Raya. However, she's charismatic and kind on her own part, since she genuinely befriended a lot of the locals on her own. And later on, it's revealed that Lulu has a legitimate reason for stealing Raya's place, since Raya was wasting the budget for Lintang Festival just to prep up her new 'model student' image and Lulu had to usurp her position to save the Festival. It worked, but negatively impacted Raya's view on her. In the end, while Raya no longer wants to bother with Lulu's posse, she still makes peace with Lulu and accepts her offer to join her for coffee at times.
- Love Triangle: One involving Atma, Raya, and Erik. Atma and Raya are dating, while Erik has feelings for Raya.
- Memento Macguffin: The Magic Red Book is actually a storybook that Atma and Nirmala used together to write their stories.
- Mental World: The entire game world is within Raya's mind as she tries to avoid coping with her emotions and past.
- Moving-Away Ending: After all that she has been through, Raya and her mother are preparing to move away. Raya decides to have a short walk before she packs everything.
- Not Himself: In Chapter 3, some characters are acting very strangely, thinking they are a different person. Atma and Lulu team up to snap them back to their former selves.
- Ominous Visual Glitch: These happen whenever Raya uses her reality warping powers.
- Parental Neglect: Doomsayer's son left him because he only cared about getting more money. After completing his Spacedive, he declares that he doesn't want the money and leaves to find his son.
- Permanently Missable Content: Anything missed in chapters, such as bottle caps or petting animals, can no longer be returned to and collected once the chapters are beaten. The YOMAN letter final quest cannot be initiated if you just miss out one letter beforehand.
- Point of No Return: In each chapter, there are points where the game will ask if there are other things to do before moving forward. Continuing past this point will lock out all sidequests and missable items. Frustratingly, Chapter 1 is the exception, and there is a missable part of a sidequest over there.
- Reality Warper: Raya's "superpower". She can make money appear in Atma's pocket, create Cat Wonderland, and alter the movie being played at the cinema, to name a few. However, she gets tired every time she uses her powers. Later, it turns out that the entire world is actually inside Raya's mind, which explains why she can alter things as she pleases.
- Recurring Dreams: In each chapter, Atma keeps dreaming about a girl named Nirmala and how he spends time with her before waking up in the classroom.
- Scenery Gorn: In Chapter 5, Loka City is turned into a wasteland because of Raya's powers, with rocks, buildings, and other objects floating all over the place.
- Scenery Porn: The game has breathtaking sceneries of 90s Indonesia in pixel art form.
- Sheathe Your Sword: When Atma fights the strongest Dark Atma, any attempt to attack the latter will be blocked and instantly countered. Atma will say that violence won't work and he needs to find another way. The solution is not to attack at all and keep defending.
- Shout-Out:
- Future Fighter is a parody of Street Fighter. There are parodies of Ryu and M. Bison, with Ryu performing his special moves and Akuma's Raging Demon.
- When several thugs harass the arcade and are stopped by civil servant Mr. Soebandi, the thug cheers for his friend with "LET'S GO, JASTIN!" and then Soebandi proceeds to parry all of Jastin's attacks before knocking him out with an uppercut. This is an homage to the famous EVO Moment #37
, where Daigo Umehara parried Justin Wong's perfectly before winning the match while the commentator yelled "LET'S GO, JUSTIN!" - Chapter 3 is one to Ace Attorney. The main puzzle of the chapter is proving that a person's assumed identity is fake. Atma gets to gather evidence, cross examine the defendant's testimony, and present contradicting evidence with Atma yelling Objection! and pointing to the defendant.
- Skipping School: The plot of Chapter 1 starts when Atma and Raya decide to skip school.
- Snake Oil Salesman: The Doomsayer sells overpriced gemstones claiming it has the power to avoid disasters.
- Solve the Soup Cans: Many puzzles when Spacediving involves this. Some examples are figuring out the right combination of food to replace a child's favorite chocolate dessert, or finding a lock's combination by searching for hints from a comic book.
- Split-Personality Merge: When Raya and Nirmala are reunited, the two of them hug and Nirmala disappears to merge with Raya.
- The Stinger: Only available with 100% Completion. After the credits roll, Raya visits the place where Atma drowned, and offers flowers and the red book while she says to Atma that she's moving forward.
- This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself:
- In Chapter 2, Erik calls his gang to block Atma from going anywhere, then taunts Atma that he can't do anything without Raya. Admiral suggests that she will go get Raya but Atma refuses, stating that this is his fight and Raya doesn't need to get involved.
- In Chapter 5, while Atma and Raya walk to Nirmala's place, they pass through a dark cloud. Upon entering, Atma disappears and Raya asks where he is. He assures that he is right there with her, but tells her to keep moving forward and face whatever is inside there by herself.
- Time Travel: In Chapter 4, Atma is able to open rifts and travel through time with the Magic Wand.
- Trash the Set: The whole setting is turned into a chaotic mess in Chapter 5, with rocks and buildings floating in the air.
- Wham Episode: Chapter 4 is one. The world is in chaos as if it's ending. It also shows the true nature of the world, Atma's fate, and the connection between Raya and Nirmala.
- Wham Line: Towards the end of Chapter 4.Raya: I'm not Nirmala! I can't do it!
Marin: Huh? Wait, what are you talking about? You are Nirmala. - "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: Raya has recovered from the hospital and is preparing to move away. Marin is taking an internship with a publishing company. Lulu has been keeping in touch with former schoolmates and invites Raya for coffee someday. And finally Erik is seen petting a cat and being much nicer.
- You Will Know What to Do: In Chapter 5, Atma gets a key from Bosque, but doesn't know what it is used for. Bosque just says that Atma will need it later. It is used to open Raya's room in her Spacedive.
