It’s not easy finding games to play with other people in the same house. You’ll know this if you’ve tried. It’s one of the reasons I was so impressed with It Takes Two earlier in the year. It’s not only playable in local co-op but entirely designed for it, which means gameplay solutions two people rather than by two people. For instance, one person throws giant nails into a wall while the other person uses the head of a giant claw hammer to swing on them. It’s just one example and there are many – the ideas keep changing and they keep coming – and it’s brilliant. It Takes Two is probably the best example of dedicated local co-op gaming in years, if not ever.
But playing together isn’t always about defined co-op. It can also mean two people – or more – contributing to a game even though only one person is actively playing it. The Dark Pictures series does this really well, and it’s become a defining feature of it. The newest game, House of Ashes, came out this year, and in it, you can assign different characters to different people in the room and then pass the pad when their sections come up. And having a quick break while someone else is pulled in and takes over – at their own difficulty level (a neat feature) – works really well.
As far as I know, developer Supermassive almost stumbled into this niche. It wasn’t until people talked about playing Until Dawn with other people, and treating it a bit like a collaborative movie – “No, don’t go down to the dark cellar alone!” – that Supermassive realised what it had. And it’s actually this instinct to shout out and participate that you can see right across games.
One of the most magnetic games in this regard, this year, was Microsoft Flight Simulator. By moving from PC to console, and therefore onto a big TV near a sofa, the game opened itself much more to passers by. There’s a lovely part in Martin’s Microsoft Flight Simulator Xbox review where he shares a picture of his family gathered excitedly around his TV while someone plays the game. I can almost imagine what they’re saying. “Fly there!” Or, “Oh I remember going there!” It’s an effect I saw first-hand when I flew to my partner’s home town in Bulgaria – a place I don’t think has ever been mapped for a game nor ever will. She was glued to the screen, sharing memories as we flew. Those common experiences of flying and home: they’re incredibly powerful things to pull on.