Huni Kuin: Yube Baitana

This game was developed together with the Huni Kuin (Kaxinawá) Indians from the Jordan River, in the Amazon, Acre, Brazil, in order to address the culture of the Kaxinawá indigenous people (or Huni Kuin, as they call themselves). It enables an experience of exchanging indigenous knowledge and memories through the language of video games. A couple of Kaxinawá twins were conceived by anaconda Yube in dreams and inherited his special powers. A young hunter and a small artisan, throughout the game, go through a series of challenges to become, respectively, a healer (Mukaya) and a master of drawings (kene). In this journey, they will gain skills and knowledge of their ancestors, the animals, plants and spirits; enter into communication with the visible and invisible beings of the forest (yuxin), to become, finally, real human beings (Huni Kuin). This game was devopeled with the aim of addressing the culture of the Kaxinawa People (or Huni Kuin as they call themselves) in order to provide an exchange of knowledge and indigenous memories with the use of the language of the videogames. The idea is to provide an immersion in the Huni Kuin universe, where players can approach the indigenous knowledges – as songs, graphic patterns, stories, myths and rituals of the people – enabling the knowledge to circulate in a wider network. In this sense, the production of the game was conceived as a collective creation of researchers, technicians, storytellers, indigenous designers and singers who made a permanent effort of translating cultures, medias and formats.