Last month I asked you all for your favourite couch co-op or competitive multiplayer games – that is, games that you play together in the same room, rather than online. It was the biggest response I’ve ever had to a Pushing Buttons newsletter. Thank you to everyone who sent me their heartwarming memories of MegaDrive sessions accompanied by 90s indie music, pushing siblings into lava, and post-pub Tekken grudge matches. Special shout-outs to the reader who credited playing It Takes Two with helping her execute the “most amicable divorce ever” in real life, and the reader who fell asleep in a bowl of pasta on their 14th birthday because they’d been up all night playing TimeSplitters 2.
You also sent in a wealth of recommendations for modern(ish) split-screen multiplayer games, which I’m delighted to share. Pushing Buttons readers have eclectic taste. I hope you’ll find your next smash-hit party game among them.
Boomerang Fu
A last-man-standing arena style game where you control cartoonish food-based characters armed with boomerangs and tasked with killing each other. Basic controls mean kids and adults can easily pick this one up, one-hit kills mean it can feel very tense, and even the most skilled gamers can be taken out by novices. Michael
Overcooked
I have never had more fun playing a game with my sister than when we discovered Overcooked on the Switch (and we can trace our multiplayer origins to Smash on the N64). Watching the other player set the kitchen on fire, while being unable to do anything about it and with the music accelerating as you reach the end of your time is truly a bonding experience! We laughed so much it made the game even more difficult. Olympe
Alpaca Ball
I’ve added this one mostly for my nephews, who absolutely adore it. Think Rocket League but instead of cars you control a group of alpaca. It’s a fairly simplistic game but kept the kids amused for hours and simple controls mean non-gaming adults can pick it up. Michael
Ultimate Chicken Horse
A platformer that has you building the map as you go, laying traps for other players (and avoiding them yourself). Liam
Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime
You can have up to four players on screen (above) trying to pilot a circular spaceship, moving between shields, weapons and the cockpit. Not everything can be operated at the same time so you have to work together. Scott
Crawl
One that I love playing with my siblings over the holidays. One player is the main character exploring a dungeon and the other players work together as ghosts trying to kill them by possessing monsters and items in the rooms. Whoever kills the main player becomes the main player in turn. Florian
Jackbox
This American series of party quiz games never fails to amuse me, [you just need to] have the correct crowd for it. Gwen
Very Very Valet
Similar to Overcooked, except instead of running a kitchen you and your team run a valet service. Wonky controls and obstacles provide the chaos in Very Very Valet (pictured at top). It also has a party mode that encourages you to steal each others’ cars – whoever is driving the car that crosses the line first wins. Michael
Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled
The 2019 remaster of the 1999 classic. It has been the go-to for me and my wife whenever we feel the need for some relaxing split-screen high jinks. It got us through some of the toughest lockdown times and continues to be an amazing way for us to connect. When a job abroad forced me to spend over a year apart from her, the game was the main motivation to buy a second console so we could continue to play together. Kwinten
SpiderHeck
Can be utter carnage at times but SpiderHeck (above) is always a good laugh. Frustrating to control, but that only adds to the chaos. Ben
As Dusk Falls
A very different take on multiplayer: friends use their phones to vote on story decisions in this interactive thriller. Martin
GigaBash
My son has started to enjoy beat ’em ups, so play this, where we battle as ridiculous Kaiju beats or the superheroes who try to defeat them. Robert
Knights and Bikes
A whimsical co-operative game about two kids exploring a run-down holiday island on bicycles. Characterful art and madcap situations that raise a smile. Andy (and their daughter)
Unspottable
Hide from your friends in a crowd of AI-controlled characters who all look identical, and see if they can seek you out. It’s relatively non-violent, very accessible, and each stage is original and distinct. Pedro
What to play
If you, like me, have fond memories of the Game Boy Advance, then Advance Wars 1+2 Reboot Camp (out 20 April) is an essential purchase. It is a remake compilation of two characterful and compact strategy games, in which you command tiny, cute little armies across small, superbly designed battlegrounds. It has huge “one more try” energy and heaps of personality, which makes it stand out in the war-game genre even 20 years since these games’ original release. Feels like an arcade game, looks like a beautiful cartoon, and has enough going on to entrap you for hours.
Available on: Nintendo Switch
Approximate playtime: 40 hours
What to read
Sega is buying Rovio, the Finnish mobile-game studio behind Angry Birds, for $775m. This follows a trend of big legacy games publishers buying up social and mobile-first developers: Zynga (Farmville, Words With Friends) is owned by 2K Games, and King (Candy Crush) will soon be owned by Microsoft.
I was shocked by a GamesIndustry.biz report on Zynga’s “VIP” strategy – that is, how it encourages its highest-spending players to spend more and more on its mobile games. The company hired an executive straight from the gambling industry, and its tactics have followed that lead: the company assigns personal account managers to call its highest spenders if their engagement dips, to “keep them on track”.
Horizon: Forbidden West developers have adapted the game to cater for sufferers of thalassophobia, fear of deep bodies of water. I’m one of these people – I have to play underwater sections in games through half-shut eyes. I’ll be testing it out to see if greater underwater visibility and infinite underwater oxygen will make a difference.
The Sims 4 has added 16 million players since it went free-to-download last October. It has reached more than 70 millions players, says EA – making it the most widely played game in the franchise.
Niantic, of Pokémon Go fame, is making a Monster Hunter mobile game. Sign me up!
Dark Souls and Elden Ring mastermind Hidetaka Miyazaki was named as one of the most influential people of 2023 by Time magazine. He is one of only two developers to ever make the list (the other was Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto). The entry justifying his inclusion was written by Neil Druckmann of Naughty Dog, who I did not know was a FromSoftware fan. Good taste, that guy.
What to click
Dead Island 2 review – rollicking zombie hack-n-slasher has missed its moment
‘A space to feel at ease with dying’: how video games help people through grief
My son is moving out – but we had time to play one last game
A beginner’s guide to Super Mario
Super Mario Bros theme to become first video game music in US Library of Congress
Question block
Reader Mark says he has a busy job and only so much time to devote to gaming. He asks:
“I’ve played most Zelda games over the years, but I always find the same problem: eventually I run into a boss battle that’s too tough. I never complete them. Now I’m enjoying Tunic on your recommendation – it has a sort of invincibility mode where I can temporarily hack and slash my way through the really difficult foes. Afterworld had a similar feature. Both games allowed me to explore and do the puzzle solving parts, and not be destroyed by impossible enemies. Are there any other games like this?”
A BioWare writer once expressed the rather uncontroversial opinion that players should be able to skip boss fights if they want to. Years later, some of gaming’s most toxic “fans” dug this up and sent the writer a barrage of death threats over it. Such was the fragile masculinity of the worst parts of the gaming internet at that time. Thankfully, plenty of games now have various kinds of accessibility modes. Most of Nintendo’s platformers give you an invincibility suit if you’re struggling to complete a level. Grand Theft Auto V let you skip annoying combat sections after a few failures. God of War Ragnarök offers the option to check-point all its boss fights, even on easy mode.
Plenty of games offer a “story” difficulty that dials combat right down, as Guardian games columnist Dominik Diamond discovered with Horizon Zero Dawn. The brilliant Psychonauts 2 has an invincibility mode, as does the famously challenging (and touching) platformer Celeste and the paranormal shooter Control. Even if they don’t let you skip boss fights, many games let you tone them down so that they’re achievable. And now that game developers are finally understanding the importance of accessibility, more and more of them will in the future.
