Relooted: the South African video game where players take back artefacts from western museums

"Players of Relooted become South African sports scientist and parkour expert Nomali, as she leaps and dives through museums to retrieve 70 real objects. They include an Asante gold mask that was taken by the British army when it destroyed the Asante empire's capital, Kumasi, and is now in the Wallace Collection in London. Another object is the skull of the Tanzanian king Mangi Meli, which was taken to Germany after its colonial regime executed him in 1900."

"Hundreds of thousands of culturally and spiritually significant items were looted from Africa during the 19th and 20th centuries, when European countries carved up the continent into colonies. A 2018 report commissioned by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, estimated that more than 90% of Africa's material cultural heritage was held outside the continent. In this South African-made game the job is to liberate African artefacts from Western museums Berlin's Ethnologisches Museum and Cambridge University are among the institutions to have returned Benin bronzes to Nigeria,"

Relooted is a South African video game that places players in the role of Nomali, a sports scientist and parkour expert who infiltrates Western museums to reclaim 70 real African objects. The retrieved items include an Asante gold mask taken when British forces destroyed Kumasi and the skull of Tanzanian king Mangi Meli, taken to Germany after his 1900 execution. The game situates itself within broader efforts to repatriate cultural heritage looted during 19th- and 20th-century colonialism, noting a 2018 estimate that over 90% of Africa's material heritage is held abroad. Some institutions have returned objects while others resist, and the developer frames the game as offering a hopeful vision of repatriation.

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