Unravel Two
Sit down and have a good yarn with a friend.
PC, PS4, XO | $30 | WWW.EA.COM/GAMES/UNRAVEL
We admit that we never actually played the first Unravel when it came out back in 2016, but if you’re in the same boat as your humble reviewer, then you needn’t worry — Unravel Two stands up on its own woollen feet.
Couch co-op games are few and far between these days, so we were eager to give this one a whirl, especially as some of the platforming puzzles on offer actually rely on two distinct characters doing separate things. No, that doesn’t mean you have to play with a friend, but the experience is definitely more rewarding if you do.
Playing in single-player mode gives you control over both the familiar anthropomorphic Red Yarny (who now has a different shaped head) and his new friend Blue Yarny (although you can change the appearance of both if you wish), who are connected to each other Avatar-style after both their balls of wool get broken in a storm on the high seas.
In both modes, the two Yarnys can connect into one — which is useful in singleplayer, as they otherwise can only be operated individually.
The story setup for this sequel is minimal and the narrative that runs along in the background can be mostly ignored, but that’s nothing to worry about, as the puzzles and environments will have you gripped from the get go.
The visuals in this game are hauntingly beautiful, making the most mundane environments seem epic, dangerous and dazzling. The game begins with the two characters finding their way — with the help of a sprite — through a storm-drenched forest and underground stream, and the puzzles will see you pushing broken branches across the floor to create steps, wall-jumping, swinging from ledges, clambering up vines and bouncing around the walls of a well. The game soon brightens once you’re above ground and you’ll soon be traversing warehouse floors, getting shot out of steamy pipes, fleeing from fire and scurrying across grassy gardens.
The puzzles become more challenging, too, and will see you fashion bridges to drag objects to where you need them, haul your buddy up cliff faces, use your yarn as a bungee rope (think Worms), and also utilise your woolen connection as an acrobatic, winding leverage system to get first one Yarny and then the other across an otherwise uncrossable chasm. The knotted wool that connects the characters is a useful lifeline, but stray too far from each other and they’ll begin to unravel and eventually snare, making sure your co-op buddy doesn’t get too far ahead. It encourages co-op every step of the way and it’s definitely the better way to play the title. In all, it’s thoroughly enjoyable gameplay and surprisingly diverse, given you’re literally only working with a piece of string.
At the end of the day, Unravel Two comes highly recommended from us, whether you’ve got friends to play with or not. It’s a great game, encouraging us to go back and visit the original.