23rd Verzió Festival 16–25/11 2026.

Maco the bear

Maco the bear

MACO
Poster
MACO poster
Created by

Marty Müller

Slovakia | 2025 | 10 min | English
Full Synopsis

You are a hungry bear looking for food from a dumpster. Before you get there, you need to sneak past the townspeople without getting shot, driven forward by your animal instincts. As you progress, you and the townspeople start to change. You weren’t so different from each other in the end.

The game is inspired by the debate around brown bears in Slovakia, where many are culled to reduce human encounters, resulting in a huge loss of animal life. It reimagines this polarizing situation with a lighthearted twist, offering a playful perspective on an otherwise grim reality.

Format
Video game
In Cinemas Only
Marty Müller
Creator
Marty Müller

Marty Müller is a Digital Arts student at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava, specializing in hand-drawn digital animation, sound design, and video games. Müller has previously worked on audiovisual productions of films and interactive media as director, producer, writer, concept artist, animator, and sound designer. Since 2023, he has directed several original short films, which have screened at international festivals in Europe and the United States.