It seemed obvious after the first couple of hours of volleying frantic choreography instructions with my pal that Split Fiction will go down as one of the most beloved co-op games of this generation. There are so many moments in this split-screen adventure to savor with a companion, so many spectacles that make you pick your eyes up off the floor, that it’s hard to knock its shortcomings.
The latest title from the Swedish developer Hazelight (It Takes Two, A Way Out) is a manic mash-up of science fiction and fantasy that brings together space marines, trolls, cyberninjas, dragons, robots, magical cats and other stock figures. Over eight chapters, players hopscotch among settings to help two aspiring authors escape a computer simulation that has turned their imaginations against them.
From the beginning, Zoe, a fantasy writer, and Mio, a science fiction writer, are presented as a classic odd couple — the former is bubbly and optimistic, the latter curt and wary.
When they first run into each other in an elevator of the tech company Rader Publishing, Zoe tries to lure Mio into a light conversation only to be rebuffed. The two then meet the company’s eponymous founder, who says they’re about to take part in a pilot program that will allow them to live out a simulation of their creative work that will then be repackaged for sale to the public. Zoe embraces the proposition while Mio bristles.
When the time comes for the writers to climb onto platforms that sprout enveloping pods connecting them to a machine, Mio refuses and gets in a physical altercation with Rader, who inadvertently pushes her into Zoe’s pod. The mishap causes a glitch in the system.
Early stages find the pair in a bucolic forest and a neon-lit cyberpunk city. In the forest level, the two work together to solve environmental puzzles by shape-shifting (Zoe transforms into a fairy and an ambling tree, Mio into a gorilla and an otter). The “Blade Runner”-esque city sports some fantastic vehicle sequences that find Mio and Zoe dashing about on motorcycles, zipping up walls and over surfaces bedazzled by lights and glowing advertisements. All of this is accentuated by camerawork that moves smoothly from angle to angle, hinting at some of the astonishing kinetic sequences to come.
Spread across the levels are incandescent globes that whisk the pair into side stories featuring some especially memorable moments. One of my favorites sees Zoe and Mio transformed into rainbow-farting pigs. Let’s just say that by the end of that tale, which recreates one of Zoe’s earliest storytelling efforts, my friend John and I were beside ourselves over its final, culinary twist.
Another gorgeous side story, which John pointed, out may owe something to the famous Daffy Duck cartoon “Duck Amuck,” finds the women — rendered as pencil sketches in a notebook — at the mercy of a child artist.
I’ve always believed that some of the most potent sensory pleasures video games can offer are sharp transitions between radically different environments. Split Fiction delivers that in spades. While absorbing the many play styles thrown our way, we kept a loose tally of game influences: Contra, Marble Madness, Metroid, Portal, Mario, Halo and more.
John and I were mindful of Split Fiction’s penchant for pastiche, groaning when the inevitable Dark Souls allusion popped up. The game’s obvious character arcs did little to move us; we had no trouble figuring out the tragic back story behind one character, or what the villain would do in the final chapter.
We also found it ironic that a polished piece of entertainment indulging in some of the most obvious tropes — big guns, big swords, big dragons! — was structured around a story of a big corporation trying to steal ideas from creators. Over text, John noted, “The game is a blast but, in the end, doesn’t it commit the same sin as its antagonist? Corralling the various mechanics of past games and representing them as something made radical by the moniker of cultural progress.”
By the penultimate level, however, our nit-picking grew silent. Piloting a two-headed insect through various platforming challenges was an experience unlike any we had encountered before. We were floored by the final level, which crosscuts between realities in ways so sublime that even as we gushed we admitted that an entire game like this would be too much.
As far as major big-tent games that desperately want to please everyone go, Split Fiction is one of the best I’ve played in a long time. Take that, Astro Bot.
Split Fiction was reviewed on the PlayStation 5 Pro. It is also available for the PC and the Xbox Series X|S.
