The Joy of Cooperative Gaming
A look at what makes my favourite co-op games such amazing experiences
Cooperative games have always held a place in my heart. Couch co-op was one of the main ways I connected with my brother and close friends growing up. And as an adult, online cooperative games help me keep in touch with friends who are no longer nearby. My love of co-op experiences has made me wonder: what are my favorite co-op games, and why do they work so well as cooperative experiences?
OUTWARD
Outward is not the most popular RPG out there. Its graphics aren’t great and, despite a number of patches, it can still be buggy. Nevertheless, it has been one of my favorite games of this generation (and of all time). I think part of the reason is the freedom it affords the players and the pretty extreme lack of hand-holding.
In Outward, you are not some amazing hero or some kind of superhuman, but a commoner living in a random village. There are no objective markers in the game, nor does it show you your location on the in-game map. Instead, the player has to navigate using their compass and prominent objects in the environment. There are no classes, rather the player purchases skills they want from trainers spread around the game world. Instead of having a main story, you get to choose primary quests from three factions, and those seem more focused on facilitating exploration than a fleshed-out narrative anyway. You don’t even get a mana bar unless you trek to a certain in-game location! Combine these features with a survival system that measures your character’s sleep, hunger, thirst, and temperature and you get a game that truly makes you feel like an adventurer facing the wilderness.
The two-person cooperative play is actually enhanced by the immersion and roleplaying aspects of the game. Unique weapons aren’t dropped twice and other rare armors or weapons are hard to come by, so you need to decide which of you gets what loot. The same goes for consumable items. So many times one of us would be dying and the other would need to share their already scarce resources for the team to survive. Character progression is slow, but each new item or skill provides a fairly significant jump. This made developing our unique and complementary builds a treat. One of my favorite parts of Outward’s co-op experience is the collective fear and anticipation we experienced every time we would run into a boss or even just a particularly difficult enemy.
I am honestly not sure whether I would enjoy Outward in single player. The graphics and animation are pretty mediocre in my opinion. The characters in the world are barely fleshed out and, while I appreciate that the game doesn’t hit you over the head with lore, I feel like there could be a bit more worldbuilding. Nevertheless, the co-op experience is a fantastic exploration of how to make the player truly feel like an adventurer on a journey with their friend. The freedom it gave us was refreshing, and it allowed our own stories to emerge as we made our characters stronger and made our mark in the game’s countless dungeons. Overall, I think it is those features that make it a great co-op experience.
SAMURAI WARRIORS 2: EMPIRES
Continuing the theme of letting stories and experiences emerge from the players’ actions, I move on to the PS2 era Samurai Warriors 2: Empires. In this game, player-led storytelling is a bit more intentional and overt. Like most “warriors” games, SW2E puts the players in the shoes of an officer on a historical battlefield, in this case, from the Sengoku period of Japan. Victory comes from either defeating the enemy side’s leader or defeating so many footsoldiers and taking so many bases that you destroy their morale. The twist, however, comes from the “Empire” aspect of the game. The turn-based empire mode lets you lead a clan aiming to unify Japan. In this mode, the game alternates between managing the provinces you own and entering the standard battle mode whenever you try to conquer new territory.
The best part of SW2E, at least for me as a kid, was that you were able to set up empire mode’s fictional war however you want. Combined with the custom character creator, my brother and I would set up anime-esque storylines where our homemade samurai would take back Japan from an overwhelming and evil empire. As cheesy as this sounds now, at the time, it was a great way to let our imaginations run wild. It also allowed us to play the game over and over again, always finding it interesting. This replayability and opportunity to create our own stories made it unforgettable in my eyes.
DIVINITY: ORIGINAL SIN II
Divinity: Original Sin II is the first Western turn-based RPG I have played, and what an introduction to the genre! In Divinity, you control a party of up to four characters in a medieval-inspired fantasy setting. Up to three friends can join, with players being able to control more than one character if there are any left over. Exploration occurs in real-time, but the game switches to a simple yet deep turn-based system for combat. One of the primary focuses of this combat is how you combine the strengths of your characters, and this is probably my favorite part of the co-op experience.
There are many things to praise about the cooperative play in Divinity: Original Sin II. Players are able to explore opposite sides of the map, even different dungeons, independently of each other. The story is thrilling and does a good job of making you feel like all party members are involved, not just the host of the game. There is also great variety in character customization, both from a roleplay and combat perspective. For me though, finding the right tactic for each encounter with my friend was the best part. A number of times we would enter a battle, get steamrolled, then try again with a new tactic and dominate the AI. You can often combine your abilities in fascinating ways as well. The game puts an emphasis on using the interaction of different elements like fire or water to win battles. These elements are both in the environment and arise from your abilities. One example would be having my archer break the water barrels near the enemy, then electrocuting that water with my mage to stun the whole group. Another is my mage using a rain spell to put out a fire to let my friend’s warrior and assassin characters walk through.
The game’s armor system also encourages communication and team tactics. When you start a battle, you have an armor meter that must be reduced to zero before you start losing health (although armor-piercing skills can override this). This armor also protects from you from certain ill-effects, like being “knocked down” or “petrified”. I remember a number of times where the boss monster’s next attack would surely wipe out the team and I had to pray that my archer could drop their armor to zero so my mate’s warrior character could knock them to the ground, taking away their turn. The great thing about all of this is that the difficulty was balanced just right so that we needed to use these tactics to win. My friend and I have yet to explore another Western turn-based RPG, but if the others are anything like Divinity they will undoubtedly be an amazing experience.
EARTH DEFENCE FORCE
A series that I consistently enjoy due to its co-op gameplay is Earth Defense Force, better known as EDF. I have played all of them since 2011’s Insect Armageddon, and all have been great cooperative experiences (although EDF 5 has to be my favorite). In this series, you play as a part of the Earth Defense Force, a military organization fighting against hordes of bug-like aliens and their robots with a crazy number of different weapons and equipment. Like Outward, the dated graphics and animations mean little because the co-op gameplay is so enjoyable! The enemies range from giant ants and spiders to robots and spaceships. Your weapon might be anything from an assault rifle to a laser sniper to a laser pointer that calls an airstrike. There is also a similar variety in your character’s mobility depending on the class you choose. The wing diver has their jetpack, the air raider can call a number of air and ground vehicles, the fencer walks slowly in their exoskeleton but gains access to a dash ability, and the ranger moves like a standard third-person shooter protagonist.
All of this variety in terms of weapons and classes means that you and up to three friends can find a way of killing bugs that suits your playstyle. I particularly love how this works within the game’s epic scope. I always tend towards the air raider who specializes in summoning vehicles, and it never gets old shooting giant ants off the side of a building from my helicopter, while one of my mates holds off the horde with dual-wielded chain guns and the other rains laser fire down from the top of a building. There are also a number of great interactions between classes. For example, the exoskeleton wielding fencer can fire missiles, but it requires the air raider’s laser guidance kit to aim it. Aside from canned class interaction such as this, team composition and working together are often essential for survival, especially on higher difficulties. For example, the high mobility of the wing diver is great for sniping or quick escapes, but you have to be careful not to leave the much slower fencer behind. As another example, the air raider can summon some mighty artillery and airstrikes, but, because weapons can damage the user and have friendly fire, one misplaced support call can kill the team.
Conclusion
I certainly have not listed all of my favorite co-op games, nor have I gone into full detail for any of the creations on this list. Such an article would probably end up taking hours to read! What I wanted to do here was take a brief look at a few of my favorite co-op games and why I love them so much. Looking back at what I wrote, there are a couple of features that I clearly find important: the ability for stories and experiences to emerge from the players’ actions; a good amount of variety between the different player characters and a good amount of choice in customizing them; the ability for you and your friends’ interactions to have interesting gameplay consequences; and a level of difficulty that makes it feel like your team has truly overcome the enemies, not just relied on the strongest weapons.
For me, the most powerful thing is not just the gameplay, but the co-op experiences it facilitates. Getting immersed in the world with my friends, having memorable moments that we talk about months down the line, connecting with each other, and expressing ourselves through the game world. These are all things that cooperative gaming allows and these experiences are why I love it so much. For me, co-op games so often miss the mark because they don’t allow for these kinds of great social encounters that make up part of our relationships with others. With multiplayer such a vital part of contemporary game design, I hope developers continue to push for these stellar cooperative experiences.
