“Kanna is a magic island that offers a life of fantasy, magic, and adventure,” developer Hillside Studio tells me on Twitter. “You want to be a tyrant? Go for it. You want to be a hero? Kanna will see if you’re up for the challenge. Your choices matter.”

While equine mounts are not a rarity in open world games, the Kanna team assures me their horses are central to the gameplay: “On a scale of 1-10, mounts are probably around a 7 in the game,” they say in response to my question about just how important horses are planned to be.

“Kanna offers a lot of mounts for an open world indie game,” says the team. “Different types of horses are one of those options. They can be part of your quests as companions and help make your adventure more exciting.”

They cannot yet share the details of what exactly their horse mechanics will look like. “But we are hoping to have more than just riding!”

In any case, Kanna promises to take their equine NPCs seriously and puts work into their background research: “The writers and creative team for Kanna have put in a lot of research about things, ranging from horse-to-human-companionship to saltwater corrosion effects on imitation gold. Of course, we can’t share everything, but one of our writers spent some time learning about how some horses are used as service animals, and that a bond with a horse has been often related to the bond of two best friends. We hope players take the same joy we have in the game and grow lasting friendships with all of their mounts.”

Although open world indie games are always risky projects, and not a lot of the promised horse features are visible yet, I am definitely looking forward to seeing more. If you want to help let Hillside Studio know how exciting such extended horse features sound to many of us, I recommend following their social media.

Kanna is currently in development. A release date or target platforms have not been announced yet. You can follow the game’s progress here.