UZU is an interactive film project launched by TTC Studios in collaboration with film director Chia-Hsin Liu and supported by the ‘2022 Future Content’ initiative provided by Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA) The film stars emerging Taiwanese actress Sushi Tian, actor Huang Shinzhu, and voice actress Liu Chu-Ping. The project itself represents an ambitious undertaking, allowing viewers a unique viewing experience through a combination of mobile gaming, interactive technology, and an overall immersive approach. Instead of following the linear plots typical of most film narratives, each individual participant is given the power to shape the protagonist’s choices, ultimately leading to a diverse range of possible narrative outcomes.

The Story

Though at first it might seem to resemble such a story, UZU’s narrative diverges from the kind of teenage love tale that might unfold in a typical high school setting. After Jie's suicide, his classmate Ai cannot help but relentlessly seek after what it was that might have led to his death. In the midst of the numerous mysteries that Ai uncovers along the way, she also unearths many painful memories the two of them have shared. As this story unfolds, the game UZU, which had always served as Ai's escape from reality, also performs an important role, gradually eroding the boundary between reality and the virtual world.

Interactive Film

During each 40-minute session the audience actively engages by making choices at crucial junctures of the story, steering its development via their smartphones. Through the making of collective decisions alongside fellow attendees, audience members guide the protagonists' actions, ultimately influencing the outcomes of the film’s possible narrative endings.

Immersive Installation

UZU is also a site-specific installation situated inside a traditional Japanese building, adding further contextual layers to both the forms and content of the film. Employing a dynamic multi-channel audio and lighting system, the project achieves a greater sense of perceptive depth by stimulating an array of sensory illusion—the subtle echoes of footsteps, resonating claps of thunder, lingering breaths—to extend the perceptual presence of characters beyond the cinematic realm.

This integration of audio-visual elements transcends the mere simulation of environmental ambiance; it curates an immersive experience. Participants are enveloped within an environment that evokes the sensation of characters meandering through the various corners of the building itself. The dynamic interplay of sound and lighting blur the boundary between the virtual world of the film and the reality in which it is being played.

The Video Game

At the same time, TTC Studios has released a director’s cut version of the video game 'UZU,' in which the protagonists of the film, Ai and Jie, find themselves reimagined as anime characters. Set in 1990s Taipei, players experience the narrative from the viewpoint of Jie, a high school student. The game navigates through diverse scenes, ranging from bustling electronic markets to bookstores vending pirated DVDs and erotic magazines.

The game is divided into three weeks, for a total of twenty days of gameplay. In the first week, the protagonist, Jie, meets a girl named Ai and embarks upon a love story. In the second week, the protagonist's feelings for Ai gradually deepen. However, the game starts to experience various system abnormalities, and at the same time, Ai's self-awareness grows stronger, causing her to rebel against the decisions made by the player. By the third week, Ai begins to harass players, sending increasingly angry messages and causing their phone functions to switch on and off uncontrollably. Players start to feel as though their lives are being taken over by Ai.

In this way, the game UZU attempts to explore the relationship between humans and technology by raising certain questions: are people playing games, or are games playing with people? Are they using the internet, or is the internet using them?

Photo by ANPIS PHOTO

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