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- Israeli Indie #7 - הרפתקאות בנצי בבנצי לנד (Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND)
Israeli Indie #7 - הרפתקאות בנצי בבנצי לנד (Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND)
Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND began as a passion project — a Hebrew beat ’em up for the classic Game Boy, and made its way onto real cartridges, into players’ hands, and straight to their hearts. Now, as Benzi heads to Steam, we sat down with three of the creators to hear how it all came together — and what’s next.
KAFKAF Studio
KAFKAF Studio is a small indie team made up of four Israeli friends — Alon, Omri, Nuri, and Terry — that took their love for retro games and turned it into something physical: a brand-new, fully Hebrew beat ’em up for the original Game Boy, developed from scratch and released on an actual cartridge. They met through Israeli retro gaming and collector groups, and what started as a fun side project soon grew into something bigger: a love letter to their childhoods and to the quirks of growing up geeky in Israel. |  Nuri (left), Omri and Alon of KAFKAF Studio |
To make the game a reality, they launched a crowdfunding campaign that quickly blew past its goal. The community’s support fueled the team to polish the game, expand the content, and package it with care. They didn’t just design the game — they physically assembled, packed, and delivered the cartridges by hand. For backers, it wasn’t just a game — it was a piece of playable Israeli gaming history — The first israeli Game Boy compatible game.
Their game, Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND, follows Benzi, a neighborhood gaming shop owner, who must defend his store from a hostile takeover by the notorious Sahtika Siblings — all in true beat ’em up fashion. It is packed with humor, local flavor, and classic gameplay. Every pixel, music track, and line of dialogue was crafted within the tight constraints of the Game Boy’s hardware — but also with a lot of joy, jokes, and late-night Discord calls.
Now, with the physical copies in players’ hands, they’re preparing for a Steam release on August 1st. We caught up with Alon, Omri, and Nuri to hear how their dream of creating a game for the Game Boy became a reality, and what they have in mind for the Steam version.
Wishlist Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND on Steam. (Hebrew)
Play the game on the official KAFKAF Studio website.
|  The physical copy of the game |
Making Adventures of BENZI in BENZI LAND
It all started with Alon Faifer (32), who got into GB Studio, a game engine made for creating original Game Boy games. “I found this amazing tool and the community around it was super helpful,” Alon says. “We started playing around with it, just messing with ideas.”
Alon (right) and Omri working on the game. Photo: Alon Faifer