1001 Threads of Mizan takes players on a flying carpet ride

The first title from the Saudi Arabia-owned MBC Game Studio presents a story not usually seen in western gaming.

Saudi Arabia's MBC Group has been bankrolling entertainment endeavors for the Middle Eastern nation and its surrounding region for decades, but now it has expanded its focus to video games. One of the more unexpected reveals from Gamescom Opening Night Live was a new title from new subsidiary MBC Game Studio, a team comprised of remote developers from around the world. It presents a setting rarely seen in Western gaming, which is Arabian fantasy based on the stories of One Thousand and One Nights. As part of my time at Gamescom 2026, I took a first look at 1001 Threads of Mizan.

The story of 1001 Threads of Mizan follows three heroes (Yusra, Malik, and Sufyan) facing down the threat of an ancient jinn king. The jinn are rising again and looking for vengeance against humanity and it's up to the three heroes to stop them. Players will face multiple jinn over the course of the game, some placing them in the middle of colossal-scale battles.

For this demo, I was thrown into a fairly open linear stage with two other players, playing as the archer Yusra. The objective was to track down a rogue jinn across the desert. The game unfolds like a standard action game with its three characters acting as unique classes against a series of undead enemies. Combat flows quickly, with characters able to seamlessly flow from light and heavy attacks to their charged ability, which in Yusra's case was a flurry of arrows.

While a majority of the game takes place on the ground, Mizan sets itself apart from other action games quickly once its characters jump aboard their flying carpet. Every character can take out a flying carpet at any time, shifting to 3D flight. For the first part of this demo, the flying carpet was mainly used for traversal, getting to an objective point fast. Later on, the carpets are used in actual combat, where players can get up close to their targets and strike and avoid incoming hits by doing barrel rolls. The flying carpet mechanic proves essential during Mizan's massive boss battles. The jinn took up nearly the full screen and was able to strike large sections of the battlefield with one blast. I had to make good use of my boost and barrel roll abilities before going in and striking through a string of quick-time event prompts. QTEs were similarly used to reflect some of the jinn's blast right back at them, weakening them just enough to trigger the battle's final phase, which was where the demo cut off.

While Mizan is meant to be played cooperatively, it's not mandatory. It's possible to approach this as a single-player adventure or with one other player, but the development team notes that the best way to experience the game is with a full party. If nothing else, the setting has me interested, because Arabic lore isn't commonly explored in Western video games. It'll be interesting to see how the game's development progresses, but it's still in its early stages, so there's no release window for it just yet. Whenever it is ready, look for it to come to PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch 2.

This preview is based on an early PC build played during a behind-closed-doors meeting at Gamescom 2026. The final product is subject to change.

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