the whole point of ZATO is that vorkuta-5 is a GUARDED small town based on just how the soviet government IS which is WHY the world feels so small and yet so big at the same time.
if theres anything the regime is good for, its being used artistically to create that sentiment.
my own country (romania) has suffered communist dictatorship due to it being a satellite in relation to the USSR and i never once thought ZATO was trying to glorify the regime or anything. especially since you yourself would be in a similar boat with your own nationality.
anyway, i honestly wrote pages upon pages of a review on ZATO that i was meant to post publicly, but i got too shy and worried i might look like a crazy fanatic… but i truly love this game A Lot. ive been a fan of your work since ~2021 and im glad that, not only were you able to make and release this game, but also that it drew in a whole lot of new fans! your art has greatly inspired my own (both in terms of art style and themes depicted) and ZATO is no exception. its encouraging to see another eastern european artist fearlessly portraying the commie or post-commie society, when i kinda grew up with the idea that it was something embarrassing to keep hidden about myself and the world i grew up in…
but anyway, i genuinely have no complaints about the game. it is a very thought-provoking and humanist narrative that i appreciate to no end. every character was written fantastically (yes including vadim even though i hate his guts), the environment was always set up nicely, and the ending can bring shivers down your spine. actually, even the first scene (past the intro) can do it too! when asya describes the universe in such a way that she seems afflicted by the overview effect, except nobody here is an astronaut. but now we have the tech available to see the earth from outside, so we still experience it. and this overview effect is something that kinda just never goes away…
i really believe theres Something to love about the game for any and everyone that plays it, regardless of if theyre already into visual novels or not.
(also, potentially stupid question, was asya written with undiagnosed autism in mind? thats the vibe i got from her while playing, though maybe i was projecting myself onto her because i already see myself in her a scary amount…)
Thank you so much!! It really means a lot to hear this from someone coming from a country that was similarly affected.
I totally get that feeling of embarrassment, even back in 2019 just giving my characters non-western names somehow felt weird and cringy:') Funny how different the culture climate is nowadays, since the whole "post-soviet depression aesthetic😍" has blown up a lot in the past few years and you see tons of slavaboos online... I have very mixed feelings on that, though.
I really hope you feel proud of your culture and don't feel discouraged from creating art that comes from your lived experiences! It's a really liberating feeling.
Regarding Asya, I do not write characters with any specific conditions in mind. I just imagine a type of person that's interesting to follow... There's been a lot of different headcannons about her, and it's cool to see how people find her relatable in all sorts of ways!
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