Overcooked! 2

好玩爱玩

This is my #1 multiplayer game so far this year. I've played 2 players and 4 players and time just flies by. It's a very challenging and chaotic game that requires some dexterity, focus and, most of all, quick thinking. But get ready for some satisfaction one you've put the work in. Ultimately this is a game of strategy. You try out a level to figure out all the tasks that need to be done in it, and then delegate each task cleverly to the right person, trying to find the right balance where everyone is working as much of the time as possible. You have to discuss with your partners and often make concessions. You and your partners may have different ideas about how to split up the work, how to prioritize and where to cut corners--so who gets to decide? This game is all about cooperation, more so than any other game I've played. If you're not working together diligently, then you are working against each other. And with the pressure from the time constraints, frustration ensues! Your partner pushes you off a ledge, picks up the thing you just needed, takes on your tasks even though you clearly agreed to strict roles beforehand, and you'll want to punch them in the face for just ruining everything! And then you do the same thing to them unintentionally but then, of course, it's just an innocent accident, nothing to be upset about. This type of strong, yet short-lived frustration with your partners adds a lot to the game and is exactly the type of thing that gets you going. Just don't get too invested and actually upset! While the game is absolutely amazing it does suffer from some jank that affects the experience and adds to the frustration, but not in a good way. Playing online I have experienced minor degrees of random warping around when running in to people. There is also a pretty decent delay (about 0.5 seconds) between pressing a button to perform an action and actually performing it. (This is likely due to online latency since I am playing with friends on a different continent, after all.) There are also some intentionally programmed things that I disagree with, like how you can't plate things that are on the floor. The absolute best thing about this game however, is the difficulty balancing, in more ways than one. First off, the game is difficult enough that you won't beat most stages on your first try, but you rarely get stuck for more than a couple attempts either. You basically have to play each stage a couple of times refining your strategy and finding the right optimizations, big or small. This is a very good quality in a game. The other great thing about the game's balancing is the change in dynamics between a 2-player and a 4-player game. It seems like the amount of work that needs to be done in every stage is the same regardless of player count, which would make a 4-player game much easier than a 2-player game, and it is. But because there are more players there are now more people to get in your way and more people that need to cooperate. And very quickly the classic saying becomes realized: there are too many cooks in the kitchen! In other words, the game plays very differently depending on player count, which could add replayability. All in all, this game is a hard recommend for me. If you have friends to play with then play it, now!