Adorable point-and-click adventure Machinarium was released 17 years ago, telling the heartwarming story of a beautiful little robot named Josef and his attempts to save a robotic city from the explosion of the Black Cap Brotherhood. It was created by Amanita Design, the Czech studio responsible for a series of successful games, Samorost has Botanical, Chuchel has Crunchesand more recently this year Phonopole. Today, the team announced a surprise return for perhaps their most memorable game, inevitably called Machinarium 2.
“Seventeen years later…” Amanita posted on her X account, “the time has come to Machinarium 2“, accompanied by a short video showing off the studio’s familiar, stunning cartoon illustrations and animations. There’s also a link to a Steam page for the freshly announced game.
This belated sequel picks up where the first game left off, with Josef and his friend Berta escaping the city of Machinarium and now crash-landing in a place called the Barrens. They will discover a “hidden and lush valley, home to two special tribes of robots”. One lives in an elevated monastery, the other in the valley below, and both apparently lack electricity.
In the sequel, this time we will play as Josef and Berta, able to switch between the two whenever we want, with the two men working together to solve puzzles. And they will do it without a word, communicating in the form of thought bubble pictograms.
Amanita’s games are distinguished by both their hand-drawn illustrations and animations, as well as the incredible soundtracks created by long-time collaborator Tomáš “Floex” Dvořák. Additionally, they almost never use written language, which makes the games immediately more accessible and much more intriguing.
This isn’t the first time the studio has surprised gamers by reviving a long-time favorite: in 2016, a third game from the Samorost the series appeared after an 11-year absence. Which means I hope for a Botany 2and above all, a Chuchel 2. The original Chuchel is an incredibly funny game and one of my all-time favorite memories of playing games with my child when he was young.
There is no word yet on a release date for Machinarium 2.
Gn tech
