COLLABORATION!

Unlike my first review ever for A Way Out, I can say I in fact do have familiarity with Josef Fares’s previous work. I was extremely lukewarm to that game for a multitude of reasons, but none more strong than I found it genuinely boring to play. I also thought the story was too predictable, too serious, the gameplay had way too much interactivity, and I wasn’t a fan that it was mandatory co-op. So what did Josef Fares and the team at Hazelight do? Fix most of the things I had to complain about.

Holy crap I think I like this game.

The plot of It Takes Two concerns a couple who have grown apart and are going to divorce, but before that can happen their daughter makes a wish that they would love each other again. It’s very Disney-esque right up until the couple find themselves in the bodies of dolls their daughter made and a magical book comes and starts shaking its hips talking about love and collaboration. My friend who I dragged along for the ride and I both knew that either the couple were going to divorce at the end or they were going to realize they still love each other because that’s the only way this story can go, but I am glad to say that the plot to get there is half magical fairy tale and half bonkers s— that we found ourselves genuinely laughing at.

PLATFORMS: PS4, PS4, XB1, XSX, PC
MSRP: $39.99
PRICE I’D PAY: $39.99

This tonal shift from the all too serious A Way Out is much appreciated for two big reasons: it allows all the mini games and references to flow better in the narrative and it plays to one of Josef Fares’s biggest strengths which is comedy. Before entering the games industry Fares was a director and writer of film and probably his best known work was the 2003 movie Kopps which has a sequence where an officer catches his gun in the fly of his pants and thrusts to shoot criminals. He very much knows how to do comedy, and that is on display in It Takes Two early on. There is one dark comedy moment I will never forget about where the only reason it is not rated M is because it involves toys and not realistic people. Not every joke hits but that’s comedy, and it’s rare to find a game that sets out to be funny be actually funny.

Oh, and the mini games were actually a lot of fun this time around and there are lots of them. I was really impressed with the variety on display. That goes for the game as well, because even though the game is a cooperative 3D platformer the game never lets that get stale. Each chapter begins with a new gameplay mechanic for each player meaning not only does it feel more cooperative than A Way Out (where one player would sometimes just stand there waiting for the other player to be done) but it also means on a second playthrough the players can switch roles to get a new experience.

The only segment where I felt it went on too long was the tree segment that played like a third person shooter. It was absurd and by no means bad, but it genuinely felt longer than any other segment in the game and it was by far the most linear part of It Takes Two. It’s also the first segment that really suggests playing with someone who either has more experience with videogames because the game only gets more difficult from here.

The voice acting is really good, except for the actress playing the daughter which is clearly an adult playing a child. I can’t tell if it’s the writing or direction the voice actor received but every time she would come up I would just roll my eyes because it didn’t sound right for a child at all. I grew to hate her while I grew to like the book, Dr. Hakim, more and more, which is surprising because I hated him at first for similar reasons. I want to say that it is clearly not the actress though, as she has credits in multiple video games and I have heard her work before.This was either the writing or the direction and it is jarring when everyone else seems to be fine. It stood out so I am pointing it out and because she is a pivotal player in the plot it’s hard to just overlook it.

Music in the game was spectacular, especially the latter half of the game in which May, the female character, can sing as her power. They did such a good job with the details in this game that she actually sings along with the background music.

Before I go into the biggest strength in this game I will talk about the issue I have with the story. I previously stated that there were only two ways the story could end…however that’s not really true and this comes down to my issue with how divorce is presented here. Divorce simply means two people aren’t married anymore and does not mean two people can’t love each other platonically, be friends, or respect one another. The game makes it very clear it sees divorce as a binary however, and the friend I was playing with said he would have preferred it to be a bit more open ended and I agree. Whether they got divorced or stayed together was not as necessary as knowing that these two people who had grown apart had worked through their problems.

Now for the best part of the game: the gameplay. This may be one of the best feeling 3D platformers I have ever played. Every part of the movement feels satisfying, from jumping to sliding to even swimming, which usually sucks in video games. Hazelight clearly understands how a game should feel while playing it, and there are parts of this game that have this semi-open world feel like the levels of Super Mario 64 that I would have loved to spend more time in doing small tasks for whatever arbitrary collectible the game would want to offer me. It makes me want to see what Hazelight can do without the gimmick of mandatory co-op attached. Not that the co-op is gimmicky here as a lot of puzzles take two players to solve, I just mean that in the way that this and their previous title have both relied on mandatory co-op as a selling point.

I am thoroughly impressed with It Takes Two. I went from begrudgingly taking this review because I was now seemingly the Josef Fares reviewer on the site to actually being excited to see what he and Hazelight do next. The hardest part of recommending this game is that it is mandatory co-op, meaning that some people are going to have a difficult time finding the time to play a 12 hour game alongside a partner who can devote that much time as well. If that isn’t the case though and there is someone to play with, definitely give It Takes Two a shot. There’s nothing else like it.

Review copy of game provided by publisher.