It Takes Two review – joyful family adventure for socially distanced duos

Electronic Arts, PS4/5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, PC
Inspired by family-in-peril adventures like Frozen, this engrossing if didactic puzzler uses old-fashioned teamwork to great effect

One of the big cultural stories of lockdown is how friends are staying in touch and having fun through game worlds. The time is right, then, for the latest two-player adventure by the Swedish-Lebanese designer Josef Fares, whose games blend puzzles, synchronised action and emotional narratives into co-op challenges that require more from the participants than simply pulling two levers at the same time.

The story in the Fares-directed It Takes Two is clearly inspired by family-in-peril animated adventures such as Toy Story, Frozen and Madagascar. A young girl is upset that her mum and dad are divorcing and, when she cries on two dolls she has made, her parents' minds are transferred into these miniature cloth and clay bodies. Guided by a talking relationship self-help book named Dr Hakim, they must work together to get back to their daughter, save their relationship and reverse the spell. It is, in effect, Honey, I Shrunk the Marriage Counselling Session.