It Takes Two

Hazelight's 2021 platformer cannot be played alone, and that constraint is the entire design. Two parents on the edge of divorce are turned into dolls, and each level hands them a different asymmetric pair of tools: one gets a nail gun and the other a hammer head to swing from it, one grows plants while the other detonates them, one rewinds time while the other clones themselves. Nothing repeats. A mechanic appears, gets used for twenty minutes of genuinely inventive puzzles and set pieces, and is then thrown away for the next one, which is an absurd amount of content to build and discard. It also keeps interrupting itself with competitive minigames, a snow-globe boss fight and a musical number. The script about the marriage is the weakest part and it knows it. The Friend's Pass lets a second player join for free, it won Game of the Year in 2021, and it remains the best argument that couch and online co-op design still has unexplored territory.