It Takes Two

 PC
User Score
8.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 665 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 595 out of 665
  2. Mixed: 24 out of 665
  3. Negative: 46 out of 665

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  1. respwn
    Jun 26, 2021
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I can't really add to the hype. Even though its clearly one of the greater couch coop games, as a game itself it has three flaws:

    a) the replayability The game is very, very narrow. It's basically a movie, where you press buttons at the right time. Every playthrough is almost the same. Sure, you can miss a jump, but thats it.

    b) the difficulty
    This game is ultra casual. It's designed to let noone ever fail. Difficult jumps and scenes get heavy assists from the game. Being a little correct on a button press usually is enough. There is no real challenge, which adds to the "coop movie feel" and also removes replayability.

    c) the story "The story?" you ask? Yes, the story. Even though it seems like the strong point of the game, it has holes, that killed my enjoyment of the game a lot. If you don't want to read spoilers, stop here. Ok.

    The thing is, that the game is based on the story of parents, that lost themselves and their love to become pretty egoistic and ignorant. The game is the story of them discovering love again. That could be amazing. The problem that destroyed that for me was the "cutie scene". The writer said, that the scene was meant to show the parents state of mind. I get that, but it's incredibly over the top. Instead of making them look egoistic and unloving, it makes them look like psychopaths, that should be imprisoned for life to protect society. In an attempt to break the spell, they get the idea of making their daughter cry by destroying her most beloved plushy. That alone is pretty weird for parents, but ok. It turns out the plushy is alive. It doesn't stop them thinking its a great idea to kill it. They plan the murder attempt for hours, lie about their goals, kill hundreds of plushies to get access to the victim, don't stop when the plushy elephant is nice to them, begs for her life, swears she will help them break the spell instead, runs in panic from them. They mutilate the victim, torture it, and finally kill it. At one point they even recognite they might be the villains, but continue. To top that up, when it finally makes their daughter cry in emotional pain, they literally bath in the tears of her daughter while dancing and laughing.

    This felt so unrealistic for parents who just lost their mojo temporarily, but can find back being supportive and loving mum and dad. There was no empathy, no remorse. The game doesn't even pick up that scene later.

    I had a hard time to continue playing, because I couldn't see why these parents could possibly achieve a happy ending. Even when they stop getting a divorce and become human again, they still shouldn't be the guardian of a minor. It also didn't feel good to continue trying to have them succeed as the player.

    Even though it's just that scene, that really creates that plot hole, I think its a serious one and takes a lot from this game. It felts like lazy writing to achieve emotions, without making it fit.

    I don't have a problem with torture scenes in Videogames, because I liked the GTA V torture scenes. They were fitting the story. In this game it doesn't. It basically makes the happy ending dull and pointless. I decided to try to ignore this scene and play on and it was technically fun, but the story was broken for me.    … Expand
  2. brandwitch
    Dec 9, 2021
    1
    Weak game, limited to 2 players and with a clichéd and predictable story. Poorly optimized and boring over time.
  3. jeanphilt
    Feb 14, 2022
    1
    So overrated !! The controls are just so bad, so clunky and the camera so annoying. "Puzzles" are too easy, no challenge except for the bosses and trying to jump with these weird controls. I've played hundreds of games and I just don't get it. The rest is not that bad and if the controls and camera were not that bad, it would not be a great game but not a bad game either.
  4. danuffo
    Dec 9, 2021
    1
    Le doy baja calificación por esa burla hacia México y el resto de Hispanoamérica al no incluir textos de nuestra región, y nos obligan leer lo de España.

    Hasta Brasil tiene una traducción propia, que es solo un país en el continente.

    No recomiendo el videojuego si quieres algo de single player, y obviamente tampoco por hacernos jugar en inglés o el español ibérico.
  5. Trumby
    May 16, 2021
    2
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Since the dawn of time, man has asked: What if Knack was pretentious? What if Psychonauts was boring? What if the mach speed sections of the 3D Sonic games were sluggish plods devoid of challenge? Unfortunately, Aristotle was not able to see the answer to these mysteries. More unfortunately, I was. It Takes Two comes to us from EA, a company most gamers know is a bunch of evil pricks, until they publish a game like this, the kind of indie title that people used to only pretend to like because its existence leant a veneer of artistic credibility to the medium of gaming. "Look, look!" they cry, fingers pointing, jaws slack, "it's not a sensory-overloading gorefest or barely disguised pornography! It's a game about something! Please take my hobby seriously so I can feel less like a loser."

    To say that ITT feels like a game that only exists so its creator could show it off at GDC for indie cred and convention **** would be burying the lede. The game comes courtesy of Swedish-Lebanese film director, game developer, and douche, Josef Fares. A quick glance at Fares' creative portfolio reveals a true wellspring of imagination. Fares is a man who immigrated to Sweden from Lebanon as a child to flee the Lebanese Civil War, and his most mainstream successful film is "Zozo", about a Lebanese boy who flees to Sweden to escape his country's civil war. The reason I credit it as having the most mainstream success of his filmography is because it was actually chosen to represent Sweden in the 78th Academy Awards "Best Foreign Language Film" category. Notice I did not say it was nominated for an Academy Award for "Best Foreign Language Film." I bring this up only to mention that Fares is infamous for a deranged speech at The Games Awards where he (in addition to screaming "this is my time to shine" and correcting Geoff Keighley on the number of films he's made) said F- the Oscars." It's a sentiment I agree with, but one that unavoidably hits different coming from someone who was explicitly rejected BY the Oscars.

    But back on topic: The creative sterility reveals itself before you even load up the game. Following up his previous two games of "Narrative-based co-op puzzle platformer" and "Narrative-based co-op generic 3rd person action game", ITT is a narrative-based co-op puzzle platformer. You play as Cody and May, a couple on the verge of divorce who become doll versions of themselves in a magical representation of their house because their daughter is sad about it. Throughout the game, you platform through obvious metaphors as the game repeatedly assaults you with scenes of our heroes finding random objects, saying "oh, remember how you used to play music? Remember how we used to go out and dance? Remember when we were young? Do you think we did a good job of unsubtly signaling to the audience that the story being told here is how we've drifted apart because our passions and youth have dwindled over the years?" once every 5 minutes.

    If you've made it this far into the review (thanks for that) and you're curious about the gameplay, it's fine. As I said three paragraphs ago, much of the game feels like the auto-scroller segments of a 3D Sonic the Hedgehog game had been slowed down to the point of childish simplicity, as if Hazelight found out the same secret Nintendo did, that you can take the same kinds of gameplay as a 3D Sonic title, tighten the controls by 20%, and slow the scrolling down to the point of zero challenge, and trick people who'd otherwise keep dying, get frustrated, and declare it bad game design into thinking that it's a masterpiece. (Also, tightening the controls is a lot harder than it sounds, because it means longer development cycles and more money for QA testing, and only companies with AAA money like, conveniently, Nintendo and EA, can really afford to eat the costs.) If the idea of Trine crossed with Mario Party excites you, you'd probably love this game. If that's what you want, then go for it, but I'll guarantee you there's a game like it already on Steam that's cheaper, longer than 15 hours, and doesn't force you to use Origin.

    But it's not the gameplay giving this game "Best Game of 2021" cred, it's the story. It's a twee, melodramatic indie game. In the minds of a certain demographic of male gamer (Funko collectors who still eat kid's cereals in footie pajamas while watching cartoons) this kind of game is the closest thing you get to cultural legitimacy. As a story goes, it's trash. The parents spend 95% of the game not even giving a F- about their kid, killing its sentient stuffed animal to make her cry for the purposes of breaking the spell, that NOT WORKING, and they not even feel bad for her. The stupid book explicitly telling you "I'm only halting your progress to pad out the story." The climax is her singing a made up song without lyrics to arouse her husband into kissing her. These people are awful parents who clearly resent their child's existence. Seriously, F- this game.    … Expand
  6. guilder
    Aug 17, 2021
    1
    Horrible storytelling, just bad writing disguised as dark humor that makes no sense for this type of game. If you think this is funny you are just a bad human being. The game play is amazing, however the terrible writing makes the game unplayable.
  7. Torreno
    Dec 31, 2021
    0
    I hope the guy who typed in the story for this game loses his fingers. Disgusting.
  8. LilJordan
    Dec 13, 2021
    0
    Deplorably Annoyingly Boring; the story/cutscenes are literally as bad as it gets, this being GOTY means that every game this year is absolutely crap "masterpiece" of crap is still crap i cannot comprehend why people like this garbage, literally a game about toxic parents forced to stay together. annoying af story
  9. alex_fan
    Apr 5, 2021
    0
    even though I played it with my wife we both got bored fast. even our kids got bored fast
  10. sereg
    Apr 4, 2021
    0
    Гениально! Захватывающе! Потрясающе!
    Одна из тех игр, где на немногочисленные минусы (местами проседает фпс при стриминге другу,скучноватый сюжет и некоторая неравноправность механик) спокойно закрываешь глаза.
    Это как если бы персонаж Supraland пытался сбежать из Psychonauts в стиле A Way Out. Займи денег,ограбь банк, обмани казино - но купи. Научи свою бабушку играть, найди себе    Гениально! Захватывающе! Потрясающе!
    Одна из тех игр, где на немногочисленные минусы (местами проседает фпс при стриминге другу,скучноватый сюжет и некоторая неравноправность механик) спокойно закрываешь глаза.

    Это как если бы персонаж Supraland пытался сбежать из Psychonauts в стиле A Way Out.
    Займи денег,ограбь банк, обмани казино - но купи.
    Научи свою бабушку играть, найди себе друга, напиши рандому из сообщества - пройди.
    Коопа всем и каждому, и пусть никто не уйдет обиженным!    … Expand
  11. abudamak
    May 4, 2021
    0
    First of all, if someone buys this game, the other friend does not need to buy it + it earns points. The gameplay in the game is great, the story is bad.
  12. shadowbroker
    Apr 4, 2021
    0
    it takes two to realize this game sucks hard ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎
  13. genesisboy
    Apr 5, 2021
    0
    I only have one person to play this game with and he is a bad gamer therefore it would be great If this game had single-player mode.
  14. kuehnau
    Jun 9, 2022
    0
    Terrible writing torpedoes what would have been an otherwise acceptable co-operate game.

    The parents are so awful they make me want to call CPS.
  15. tolexto
    Dec 25, 2021
    0
    We were need this. It was a wonderful adventure. It's a masterpiece. Thank you Josef Fares!
  16. morbs
    May 23, 2021
    0
    The game didn't recognized my logitech F310 on steam (even though I use it on other games), so I got myself an xbox controller but the game doesn't recognize the Top Right button.
    Waste of money and time for me and my wife.
    Only buy the game if you are 100% sure you have a controller that actually works for the game.
  17. Aridano
    Dec 26, 2021
    0
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Это за смерть слонихи, бесчеловечные сволочи!… Expand
  18. tehlers320
    Nov 16, 2022
    0
    Unfortunately this game breaks constantly because the publisher, EA forces their launcher on you. Its probably good but most people will just get frustrated with the EA launcher, which constantly changes to new launchers and breaks all the time.

Awards & Rankings

6
#6 Best PC Game of 2021
23
#23 Most Discussed PC Game of 2021

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
89

Generally favorable reviews - based on 20 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 20 out of 20
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 20
  3. Negative: 0 out of 20
  1. LEVEL (Czech Republic)
    Feb 16, 2022
    100
    It Takes Two manages to combine cooperative acting in the level of many game genres, perfectly dose the pace and tell a serious story about parenting with a successful exaggeration. All this beautifully in a detailed fairytale-fantasy world, the exploration of which makes it a double joy.
  2. Edge Magazine
    Apr 22, 2021
    80
    True, there's no single moment to touch the climax of his heartbreaking 2013 debut, Brother: A Tale of Two Sons, but Fares's third - and best - game as director suggests the Oscars' loss is very much videogames' gain. [Issue#358, p.108]
  3. Telegraph
    Apr 7, 2021
    80
    Tonally it is all over the place, never seeming quite sure what type of game it wants to be and audience it wants to court. At times it as sweet, warm and sharply enjoyable as any family film. May and Cody’s jibes at each other swerve from affectionate to cutting in a believable and often touching way as they pick at the rifts in their relationship. You may even start to root for them, until the game swerves into a task involving the excruciatingly drawn-out murder of a toy elephant to make their daughter cry.
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