Josef Fares is a man filled with an unbridled passion for co-op games, and I truly appreciate his presence in the triple-a space. A Way Out may have felt a little hamstrung by its Telltale-y filmic “your choices matter!!” structure - it ends up working out pretty well in that game, but all throughout were glimpses into small, fun 2-player mechanical concepts in the interactive moments in-between the cutscenes.
His excitement to explore the possibilities of co-op is on full display in It Takes Two’s rambling, playful adventure, repeatedly plunging the two players into unique scenarios with asymmetrical toolsets.
The game features constant genre and mechanic switching. Levels boasting third-person shooting, top-down diablo-esque combat, flying, sailing, karting, and all kinds of bizarre puzzles in-between; reinforced by how they simply never feel under-developed and are tossed away the second they wear out their welcome. Many of this can be chalked up to EA funding, I suppose; many of the ideas this game conjures and then swiftly casts aside would essentially make up the sole backbone of a smaller-scale indie title. It’s consistently inconsistent. A driving force in our playthrough was an element of excitement to simply see what the game has in store for us next.
Very charming how the game is a hulking toybox, absolutely littered with interactive elements and versus minigames. It truly has everything, from a fully-fledged chess board, to musical chairs.
I say that because the narrative certainly wasn’t a driving factor for me, personally!! Cody and May’s bougie divorce story feels the need to throw a child in the mix for any sense of jeopardy before wrapping up with a neat, tidy and highly derivative bow. I simply sleep. The writing is, on the whole, very unremarkable - unfunny, a frankly unbelievably high “wooaaaah” count.
Very very gorgeous 2 look @ though. Whenever they’re not in photorealistic mode with Cody’s Seth McFarlane looking ass, it’s always a stunningly realised Honey I Shrunk The Kids environment. A significant portion of my playtime was spent boring the pants off my co-op partner as I stared doe-eyed at everything. From the sweeping picturesque vistas to the minute graphical details like specular maps and shaders to the unique illustrations adorning every corner. So sikk!!!! The character mo-cap feels like a blunder imo. It looks fine on the human characters where the discerning gamer eye almost expects it to look like shit, but the problem is expounded with the more cartoonishly proportioned characters. Never is it worse than with Fares’ own Dr Hakeem character, a fiendishly fucked talking book that looks and acts like a Facerig preset. Cody and May just seem like theme park mascot costumes with faces that are barely permitted to emote. Hand-touched stylisation with cartoony characters goes a long way - squash and stretch some more. The motion data should be a reference point, not the final product.
Anyway, idk. A very cool game. It’s nice to play a co-op that is oodles more creative than a looter shooter. I like its purchase model where only one person has to buy the title, allowing the other player to download the full client for free - spitting in the face of remote play. More of that, please.
His excitement to explore the possibilities of co-op is on full display in It Takes Two’s rambling, playful adventure, repeatedly plunging the two players into unique scenarios with asymmetrical toolsets.
The game features constant genre and mechanic switching. Levels boasting third-person shooting, top-down diablo-esque combat, flying, sailing, karting, and all kinds of bizarre puzzles in-between; reinforced by how they simply never feel under-developed and are tossed away the second they wear out their welcome. Many of this can be chalked up to EA funding, I suppose; many of the ideas this game conjures and then swiftly casts aside would essentially make up the sole backbone of a smaller-scale indie title. It’s consistently inconsistent. A driving force in our playthrough was an element of excitement to simply see what the game has in store for us next.
Very charming how the game is a hulking toybox, absolutely littered with interactive elements and versus minigames. It truly has everything, from a fully-fledged chess board, to musical chairs.
I say that because the narrative certainly wasn’t a driving factor for me, personally!! Cody and May’s bougie divorce story feels the need to throw a child in the mix for any sense of jeopardy before wrapping up with a neat, tidy and highly derivative bow. I simply sleep. The writing is, on the whole, very unremarkable - unfunny, a frankly unbelievably high “wooaaaah” count.
Very very gorgeous 2 look @ though. Whenever they’re not in photorealistic mode with Cody’s Seth McFarlane looking ass, it’s always a stunningly realised Honey I Shrunk The Kids environment. A significant portion of my playtime was spent boring the pants off my co-op partner as I stared doe-eyed at everything. From the sweeping picturesque vistas to the minute graphical details like specular maps and shaders to the unique illustrations adorning every corner. So sikk!!!! The character mo-cap feels like a blunder imo. It looks fine on the human characters where the discerning gamer eye almost expects it to look like shit, but the problem is expounded with the more cartoonishly proportioned characters. Never is it worse than with Fares’ own Dr Hakeem character, a fiendishly fucked talking book that looks and acts like a Facerig preset. Cody and May just seem like theme park mascot costumes with faces that are barely permitted to emote. Hand-touched stylisation with cartoony characters goes a long way - squash and stretch some more. The motion data should be a reference point, not the final product.
Anyway, idk. A very cool game. It’s nice to play a co-op that is oodles more creative than a looter shooter. I like its purchase model where only one person has to buy the title, allowing the other player to download the full client for free - spitting in the face of remote play. More of that, please.