Everybody has a story in their mind that they’d love to tell, but maybe they don’t feel like they have the ability to tell it effectively. But that’s about to change in Hazelight Studios’ Split Fiction, which launches March 6 on PS5.
In the game, the publisher Rader has a new, advanced machine capable of bringing a person’s stories to life and letting the authors live through their tales. They’ve invited some aspiring storytellers to give their tech a try–among them Mio and Zoe, two women with dramatically different backgrounds, tastes, and personalities. But when the on switch gets flipped and the stories emerge, an unexpected development causes these two’s most elaborate tales to intertwine. Mio and Zoe need to team up to survive each other’s stories–and figure out some of the secrets Rader’s been hiding from its test subjects. So begins Split Fiction: a co-op adventure about unlikely companions, imaginations running wild, and very strange adventures.
Double vision
Developer Hazelight is a studio known for creating memorable cooperative gameplay experiences like A Way Out, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, and the award-winning It Takes Two. Their games are known for unique themes, strong emotional moments, surprise gameplay twists, and a good dose of off-kilter humor. We’re pleased to report that Split Fiction offers plenty of everything players have come to love from their previous works, all while amping things up to new heights.
Players who jump into Split Fiction will take control of one of the two leading women. Mio, a somewhat cold and curt city girl, is a massive sci-fi nerd who loves interstellar battles, cyberpunk aesthetics, and futuristic weaponry. Zoe, a chatty lass from the countryside, enjoys high-fantasy tales of heroic trials, dragons, trolls, and magic. A glitch in the system is causing the pair to journey together while switching between each other’s stories: They might be cyborg ninja assassins in a dystopia one moment, only to turn into magical shapeshifters on their epic quest through the wilds the next. All the while, the machine generating these story worlds is digging much deeper into each girl’s memories and story ideas than either one expected.
You’ll start by playing split-screen co-op, with both players traversing the same route. You’ll soon discover obstacles that can’t be overcome by just one person, so you’ll have to cooperate to proceed. As the story environments they encounter change, so do Mio and Zoe’s abilities– each character will often have a different skillset where one player can perform attacks or movements that the other can’t, such as Mio being able to transform into a giant gorilla-monster while Zoe gets to be a tiny, nimble faerie. You’ll need to work together to figure out how to use these asynchronous abilities to get past the obstacles and enemies impeding you. We were able to play a boss fight against a massive robotic law enforcement machine in Mio’s cyber-ninja story that required some careful coordination: Mio had to use her gravity abilities and swordplay to expose the boss’ weak point, while Zoe had to dodge attacks and use a whip-like weapon to grab leftover objects and smash them into the enemy.
Tales to tell
Not every story players will encounter in Split Fiction involves combat. One area was a callback to classic extreme sports games where the duo had a friendly competition performing tricks on futuristic hoverboards. Another surreal story area transformed the women into a pair of portly pigs powered by springs and rainbow-colored farts–and it only got weirder from that point. Many of these areas are optional side stories that can be discovered during the main quest, giving players an incentive to explore a bit and rewarding them with unique experiences and character moments.
The gameplay in each section can change dramatically, too. While third-person split-screen action and exploration was the most common experience during our test run, there were sections with fast-paced vehicle chases, side-scrolling run-and-gun action, and even some tricky puzzles that tested players’ skills at pinball. Every new world we saw in Split Fiction felt like a delightful surprise, since we never knew what sort of theming or gameplay twist to expect.
We’re eager to see more of this odd duo’s strange adventures, and fortunately, we won’t have to wait much longer–Split Fiction will debut on March 6 on PS5. Bring a friend–it’s about to get wild.