South African video game studio Nyamakop unveiled its latest project, Relooted, at the Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles. The game is a side-scrolling puzzle platformer where players join a crew of thieves to steal back African artifacts from Western museums and repatriate them to their original communities. The artifacts in the game are based on real looted objects, such as the Ngadji drum held by the British Museum, and the missions involve heists from fictionalized museums. The studio spent two years researching artifacts with compelling stories of looting.
Relooted matters because it uses interactive entertainment to engage a broad audience with the ongoing debate over the repatriation of African cultural heritage. By grounding its gameplay in real historical injustices—like the British confiscation of the Ngadji drum in 1902—the game raises awareness of how Western institutions continue to hold looted artifacts, often in storage. It also highlights the work of African game developers, a rare presence in the global gaming industry, and offers a creative, participatory way to imagine restitution.