Cocoon: An Enchanting Adventure Puzzle Game That Will Leave You Spellbound

Genre
Adventure, puzzle

Publisher
Annapurna Interactive

Publisher in Russia
Blah

Developer
Geometric Interactive

Minimum Requirements
Processor Intel Core i7-2600 3.4 GHz / AMD FX-8350 4.0 GHz, 6 GB RAM, video card with DirectX 11 support and 2 or 4 GB of memory, for example NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950 / AMD Radeon R9 380, 3 GB on hard drive

Recommended Requirements
Processor Intel Core i7-3770 3.4 GHz / AMD Ryzen R5 1400 3.2 GHz, 8 GB RAM, video card with DirectX 11 support and 4 or 8 GB memory, for example NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 / AMD Radeon RX 590

release date
September 29, 2023

Localization
Text

Age limit
From 7 years

Platforms
PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One

Official site

After the release of Inside, the Playdead team began to fall apart. In particular, its founder Dino Patti left the studio, who subsequently created a new company that released the mediocre platformer Somerville. And shortly before this, Jeppe Carlsen, the lead gameplay designer for both Limbo and Inside, split from the team. Both projects are forever included in lists of the best games of this century, so it’s great that Carlsen has not parted with the industry and continues to work on wonderful and unique adventures. One of them – Cocoon – was released the other day, and it can immediately be designated as one of the best indie games of the year.

The new patterns are just as good

A nameless and silent character appears in a strange world where flora and fauna are closely intertwined with metal structures and robotic mechanisms. All sorts of plants with stretchy sticky “tongues” are surrounded by rigid plates, and strange buds suck in walking mini-robots. The main character is either an upright insect with wings, or a mutated person.

Variations of this riddle are found in each region – the procedure can be found somewhere nearby

Playdead games can hardly be called story-driven – not a single word is spoken in them, there is no bright introduction, and the endings raise many questions. In this regard, Cocoon is practically no different from Limbo and Inside – what is happening is not explained at all, you guess everything yourself, not knowing whether your guesses are correct. But if Playdead’s platformers were rather dark and color-poor stories, here the adventure is more “positive” – there are no scary spiders ready to kill the defenseless protagonist, and no girls chasing him underwater.

The gameplay is also different – we watch what is happening not from the side, but from above, so the locations in Cocoon are more open. The main thing that Carlsen brought here from his past works is the state of flow in which you go through the game from beginning to end. Cocoon immerses you in yourself from the first minutes and never puts impassable obstacles in your way – you just go wherever you look, press the same button (the controls are as simple as possible) and admire how intuitive everything is. How the locations are built, how the objects are arranged, how the buttons or levers that can be interacted with are highlighted – everything is clear without a single word.

There are no castles that we are used to in this universe.

Few games succeed in this, although it is obvious that not all developers strive for this. For every brilliant puzzle like The Witness, there is something simpler – like, for example, the recent Viewfinder, where there are tooltips with text and unnecessary dialogue through the roof. The work done in Cocoon is all the more impressive when you meet an object and immediately understand what can be done with it and why. You see raised symbols on the floor – you try to stand on them and press the button. You see an object that stands out a little against the background of everything else – you do the same. I’ve never had a moment where I tried to interact with something that wasn’t intended for it – there’s no need to click on everything at random.

Therefore, it is immediately clear when you have a puzzle in front of you, where you will probably have to return later, where and what objects need to be used, and so on. The riddles are very pleasant – not too complicated, but most often you won’t get through them with a click. And if this suddenly happens, there is still aesthetic pleasure from what is happening thanks to the beautiful artistic design. And the gameplay of the puzzles is very “tactile” – with one button you perform many different actions, which never ceases to amaze.

There are quite a lot of elevators and moving platforms here.

⇡#Worlds within worlds

The main feature of Cocoon is associated with balls, which the protagonist wears from time to time and places on special pedestals. Each such ball contains a large world – if you place it in the center of a small pond and hold down the button, the character will instantly be transported to a completely different location. One could call it a fancy “fast travel”, but the system is implemented a little more interesting than classic fast travel. These balls can be removed from their pedestals and taken with you when visiting other regions, and each of them unlocks gameplay features without which it is impossible to solve certain puzzles.

One of the balls, for example, shows invisible bridges and platforms – you always know in which places they appear, but without the corresponding ball you will not see the road. Another ball allows you to activate unique elevators, designed in the form of disappearing and appearing columns. At some point, you begin to almost juggle with these spheres: you visit one location, from there you are transported to another, you pick up a ball there, you return, put it on a pedestal, you take another ball, you fly with it to the next region… In words it seems confusing, but in fact, the mechanics do not cause any problems or difficulties. Each episode is thought out and tested to the smallest detail – you won’t be able to run far if you took something wrong with you, and they won’t let you fall somewhere in the wrong place without the ability to get out.

There’s no way to accidentally throw the ball, so you don’t have to worry about falling off an invisible bridge.

And this is the beauty of Cocoon – it looks like a huge cobweb (an appropriate comparison, given the surroundings), but at the same time you never get confused in it, but as if you are floating with the flow. There was something similar in Hob from the now deceased Runic Games – the same adventure, full of cool ideas, in which you very smoothly move from one riddle to another, from one region to another, and you are amazed at how skillfully it all is woven. Perhaps, from a logical point of view, not everything here makes sense – if you start to analyze and think why in this world the architects of this or that location came up with invisible bridges that are visible only if there is some kind of orange ball, the magic collapses a little. But it’s better not to go into such details.

The only downside is the boss battles – they are too easy. Cocoon itself is a very calm and measured game; there is almost never a need to rush or run away from something. And in battles with large opponents there is not much action. Therefore, you pass them either the first time or the second, and if the character dies, they are thrown back very close – you can immediately try again. But it all looks, admittedly, very beautiful, especially after the victory – the special effect that follows is impressive every time.

Are these plants real?…

***

Cocoon is a magnificent work of a master who has once again managed to create a delightful adventure puzzle game. It looks beautiful and plays amazingly – it’s impossible to tear yourself away from it, because you’re drawn into the process from the very first minutes. I think the name of Jeppe Carlsen should have long been known more widely than the names of the studios in which he worked – no matter what a game designer does, the result is something unforgettable and incomparable.

Advantages:

a wonderful visual style that combines the seemingly incongruous; excellent puzzles – not too difficult, but not elementary either; many unique and interesting ideas, and all this is controlled by a stick and one button; an original idea with movement between worlds.

Flaws:

simple boss battles – most often you pass them the first or second time.

Graphics

The environment in Cocoon is a kind of robotic flora, in which ordinary plants coexist with metal structures that live their own lives. Very unconventional and sometimes looks fascinating.

Sound

There is little music and it is unremarkable, but it complements the mysterious atmosphere of the unusual world well.

Single player game

An exciting adventure with great riddles and a ton of interesting ideas – both gameplay and design.

Estimated completion time

About 4 o’clock.

Group game

Not provided.

General impression

One of the best adventure puzzle games, impressive with cool ideas and their execution. We wouldn’t expect anything else from the gameplay designer of Limbo and Inside.

Rating: 9,0/10

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