Video Game Reviews: Tales of Kenzera: Zau and Harold Halibut

The eponymous Harold, with his brown shirt and tan suspenders, is an unassuming lab assistant and maintenance man who carries on his shoulders the weight of the spaceship’s population. But this isn’t “Star Trek.” The residents live together like those in a village might, with a mall called Agora Arcades and a food court as the town square.

Moving from place to place, Harold sighs. Laden by a heavy utility belt, he trudges through the drudgery. He has bags under his eyes, and even when he runs, it’s not that fast at all.

Harold Halibut, created over more than a decade with innovative motion capture, is more akin to “My Dinner With Andre” than a Ray Harryhausen creature epic like “Clash of the Titans.” Although some conversations are too lengthy, the 14-hour game rewards those who stick to it with honesty, empathy and a subtle mastery of human nature that isn’t present in many games.

Despite the burdens of constant work, the even-tempered Harold keeps going, engaging with bloviating or banal characters in a positive and caring manner. He’s not that happy about feeding the lab’s fish, cleaning filters and wiping away graffiti from gray halls. But he has a genuine affection for the varied personalities stuck on the ship with him, including Mareaux, a dutiful gray-haired scientist and mentor with a penchant for teatime.

There’s humor here that could be called Monty Python light. At one point in Agora Arcades, you stop to watch a dramatic, dancing mime with a bass drum strapped on his back — reminiscent of the Ministry of Silly Walks sketch. Elsewhere, stuffy security guards are so worried about revealing too much about All Water that they twist themselves into absurdity. The satire is eye-rollingly spot on.

It’s not all perfect. When Harold talks with a character, he makes an annoying little circle to position himself squarely in front before he begins talking. When he helps a comatose, human-size fish-being he calls Fishy, Harold spews forth with a multifaceted attraction for the ship’s pharmacist. The Woody Allen-style hand-wringing comes off as narcissistic because the being is about to become pivotal to the story. Stippled yellow and brown like a ripe banana, Fishy wears a garment as brightly fluorescent as a wrasse. She is also really quite ill.