Split Fiction Review: A Finely Tuned Co-Op Adventure for Pals and Partners

EA’s Hazelight Studios has earned its reputation for engaging gameplay and well-written narratives in games that require two players — the last of which, It Takes Two, won Game of the Year at The Game Awards in 2021. Their next game, Split Fiction, is an evolution of their house style and approach to collaborative video game storytelling. Any couch or online co-op fans should take notice, especially since its Friend Pass feature lets buyers bring a friend to play for free.

Split Fiction, out March 6 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC, tells the story of two writers: the tight-lipped science fiction fan Mio and the friendlier, freewheeling fantasy aficionado Zoe. Both meet for the first time at the invitation of a fiction publishing house keen on testing their new immersive machines that realize creators’ stories in virtual reality. 

Players take on either Mio or Zoe, who get their own unique gameplay mechanics in each stage that complement each other, requiring them to work together. Both characters also have their own backstories that unfold as the game progresses and the two strangers become friends — a traditional arc amplified by all the delightful, inventive and engaging puzzles and fights Hazelight throws at players.

By and large, Split Fiction is another success in Hazelight’s oeuvre, showing how no other studio quite delivers the tailored cooperative experience like they do. A game built out of successive fantasy and science fiction short stories that switch up the setting and mechanics every hour or two could be seen as too frenetic to be cohesive. But playing through enough of each vignette’s climactic finales makes it clear how closely Hazelight fine-tuned its set pieces to give players the thrill of close escapes after escalating stakes.

And all of that pays into the growing relationship between Mio and Zoe, who share more about their lives deeper into the game. Each chapter brings one of their creative fiction stories to life as a setup to peel back a layer of backstory; early on, Mio denies that her personal experiences end up in her stories, but even she later admits how much of her psyche and trauma spills onto the page — or in this case, gaming levels. 

“Every [one of our] games has a word to it: Brothers is ‘sorrow,’ A Way Out is ‘trust,’ It Takes Two is ‘collaboration,’ and this one’s about friendships,” Hazelight cofounder and Split Fiction director Joseph Fares said at a preview for the game in February, describing it as a “buddy movie” featuring two strangers who grow closer throughout the game. “We’re going to go deep into their trauma, their back stories and learn more about them.”

Since the game is built on the premise of strangers becoming friends through novel gameplay and shared storytelling, we thought it would be appropriate for our review to include the voices of both CNET writers who played through the game together: Senior Mobile Reporter David Lumb and Contributor Oscar Gonzalez. We’ve played around seven hours of the game together, taking on main and side stories, and are heading toward the end of the game. Since the game is so reliant on each player supporting the other, we’re reflecting the highs and lows of Split Fiction through conversation. 

Split Fiction is a dialogue between cooperating players

David Lumb: First, I want to say it’s been really fun to play this game with you. Much like Mio and Zoe, we hadn’t worked together much before firing up Split Fiction — do you feel we know each other a little more after playing together? How have you liked the story?

Oscar Gonzalez: I think we’ve bonded a bit more like Zoe and Mio did. As someone who’s been reviewing games for a long time, this was my first co-review and one review where you had a bit more experience than I did since you handled the preview for the game. 

As for the story, I liked it since it revolves around two strangers learning about each other as we watch it play out as the game progresses. There were some clear telegraphed moments as the stories laid out during the levels provide hints to what’s motivating the characters. 

DL: I really enjoyed the pace of each chapter, with new mechanics slowly developing into more complicated gameplay. Often, we’d start a level opening doors or hitting switches for each other, only to end up having to hit our respective mechanics in high-stakes boss fights. How’d you feel about these? I kind of liked the level of difficulty the game sets — just enough stakes, just enough tension.

OG:  You explained it perfectly, and it was clear that was the developer’s intentions. I think I said while playing is that the game clearly doesn’t want you to feel dumb. The developers are guiding us by making it very clear on what to look out for with each sequence to a point where the new mechanic is starting to feel like second nature. 

DL: I also really dug the variety of levels — one chapter an action-packed science fiction adventure, the next a slower puzzle-filled fantasy section. What stood out to you? 

OG: Side Stories — optional smaller levels found in each chapter — were a great distraction but in a good way. Usually, side quests in a game give you something, whether it’s money, experience points or an item, but these Side Stories were clearly there to kind of excite the brain by changing things on the fly. What’s great is that they’re short, say 10-15 minutes, they’re full of excitement or some weirdness, and some are intended to spur up some past gaming experience. My favorite was the futuristic snowboarding that was a definite nod to the old SSX games. 

DL: That’s a great point — in my preview, Fares mentioned nods to other games are sprinkled throughout Split Fiction. It felt like every few levels we’d get a wink at a popular game franchise, from diving into a haystack from a great height (Assassin’s Creed) to a Black sergeant barking an inspirational speech at a group of sci-fi soldiers before a drop (Halo). The references kept the tone light-hearted but not too distracting — and as you noted, were pretty fun when combined with brief gameplay vignettes. 

But how could I not love those Side Stories — where else will I get to play a pig and, later, a hot dog bouncing myself onto a grill?

Writers on in-game writing: Split Fiction’s idea of creativity

DL: Okay, let’s acknowledge the elephant in the room: we’re games writers who are writing about a game that…is all about the creativity in writing stories. How do you feel this translated to a narrative while we played? I thought it was pretty novel (har), but I’m pretty sure I’m biased. I think players will enjoy its broad commentary on creativity.

OG: I mean it’s a stark contrast to the last game where you played a writer telling their story: Alan Wake 2. What really stuck out was how much the message of having this grand sense of wonder when the real world may not be the happiest of stories. 

DL: Agreed, it’s pretty grounded for a game about imagination. I was worried Split Fiction’s focus on creativity could get a bit navelgaze-ey and indulgent, but so far, the “writer” elements are mostly used to explore Mio and Zoe’s backstories. 

OG: Right, and what really helps is that they’re both each other’s foils. Some of the funniest moments are when one looks at the other and says what most players are thinking, “Why on Earth did you come up with that idea?” Then there’s an explanation involving something in their background, and it all makes sense. 

DL: It really focuses on the power of creativity and what it can do for people who need to process their lives. The foil to these creators in the game is, of course, the evil publishing company whose CEO wants to steal their ideas and control storytelling. As Fares told me at the game preview, it’s a bit of a reference to AI, which some tech companies are using to harvest created material for profit (OpenAI used web-crawling datasets that reportedly scraped fan-fiction site Archive Of Our Own when training ChatGPT, for instance). So Split Fiction lionizes the human power of creativity amid corporatized exploitation, a great and timely theme (and something far, far different from Alan Wake 2’s thoughts on the power of writing).

How’s Split Fiction stack up to Hazelight’s other games?

DL: I’ll come clean: this is my first Hazelight game. It was still fun for me, but I know I’m missing out on the studio’s older games. To help shed some light on how it stacks up to Hazelight’s earlier games, we’re bringing in a ringer to our review, CNET Video Producer Sean Booker. Sean, how did you like Split Fiction? How’s it compare to It Takes Two and earlier games?

Sean Booker: I’ve played Fares’ debut game Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons along with all three of Hazelight’s titles and, recency-biased-aside, I think Split Fiction is my favorite of the group. What I like so much with Split Fiction is the variety of gameplay segments. It Takes Two is the closest comparison point but I felt like both of the protagonists were pretty much the same outside of their personalities (and specific set pieces where the characters were separated).

Split Fiction gives each player a completely different set of abilities and options for the entire game. It then switches these up every time a new stage or side story gets introduced. This gives the game a much better incentive to play through it a second time and get access to all the areas and powers that only your friend had. As someone who rarely has time to replay games, this is the first time I’ve really wanted to go back for a second dip.

I also feel like Split Fiction is easier, or more forgiving, than It Takes Two was. As much as I love co-op games, sometimes you want to play with someone who isn’t very familiar with the medium. It Takes Two felt quite hard at times, especially the boss fights, and this made it challenging for me to play with someone who, for example, struggled with using both analog sticks at the same time. Split Fiction does get challenging but I felt it had a smoother introduction and ramp up than its predecessor. This is particularly great for me since I’m hoping my second playthrough will be with someone less comfortable with game controllers.

OG: I remember when It Takes Two came out, and I didn’t see the appeal. Hazelight’s previous game, A Way Out, was a title permanently in my backlog, so I figured their second game would join it. Then I was with my girlfriend on a quick weekend trip, and she always says how much she likes watching me play games, so I decided, why don’t we play a game together. It Takes Two came up as the top game to play co-op with someone who is a novice, and she certainly was. 

She struggled at times as she could barely wrap her head around the idea of 3D controls, but we worked through the game slowly, and that’s when I saw in real time what Hazelight was trying to accomplish. It was about creating this experience with a partner, and it was special. I get a similar feeling when it comes to Split Fiction, while at the same time, it feels like Hazelight wanted to also play around with the formula they created. That instead of having a puzzle every ten minutes that you and a partner have to figure out together, maybe there are some times when you just want to shoot stuff together. 

In summary, does Split Fiction live up to its promise?

DL: Okay, I’ve enjoyed both playing and writing together — I think what strikes me most about Split Fiction is that it’s a great co-op experience. I’ve had higher thrills surviving bug swarms with friends in Helldivers 2 or finishing a particularly devious end-dungeon boss in Destiny 2. But in Split Fiction, I’ve had a rich time just playing through these levels, seeing evocative landscapes, tickling my brain with puzzles and ekeing out wins over spicy bosses. What’s your take on what this game is whether it lives up to its promise? 

OG: It definitely lived up to its promise. What I love seeing is when a developer creates a genre that’s distinctly theirs, and they build off of it, kind of like FromSoftware, which started what we call the Soulslike genre with Demon’s Souls back in 2009 and kept at it with Elden Ring. 

DL: I do think Hazelight is great at what they do, and there’s a lot of very subtle game craft in here that makes it clear they tinkered carefully to make sure these cool set pieces and story climaxes are memorable and unique. Fares told me at the preview that they’d spend around 18 months on a sequence like parts of the dragon level that might take ten minutes of player time, then move on without bringing it back: “If you look at a great movie, you have a great scene, you don’t repeat that scene, because it takes the edge out of it,” he said. I’d say that Split Fiction is full of moments that are memorable for being great without overstaying their welcome.

OG: And you can really feel the effort taken when it came to developing certain sequences. I think I said while playing that I can just imagine those team meetings where they were figuring these sections out because it didn’t feel like they were crammed together with no rhyme or reason.

DL: Rather than write a traditional review, I wanted to format it this way to reflect how much playing this game felt like a dialogue between us as we played. Not just our characters exchanging lines and building their friendship from scratch but working through increasingly tough challenges as the game pushed us to collaborate more precisely. I’m recalling that ape-and-fairy shapeshifting puzzle along with taking down a giant cat boss by alley-ooping each other’s signature abilities. How do you feel about our playing styles after playing through most of the game together, as compared to if we’d played any other co-op game? 

OG: It was pretty clear that I was happy to get myself killed over and over again. I’m sure you heard me say plenty of times “Oops, I died,” but that’s because I could lean on you to be the patient one who was still alive. What’s different about Split Fiction than other co-op games is that we weren’t in competition with each other except for those sequences when that was intentional. I wasn’t competing with you for better items or more kills, we just needed to solve puzzles and progress further, which we did. 

DL: Totally — thanks for playing and glad we could get to know each other as coworkers as our characters went from strangers to friends. I think it’s safe to say Split Fiction is a fun game for anyone who’s got another player ready to try it out. Whimsical, lighthearted, action-packed and thoughtfully-made, it feels ready for any co-op team from strangers to best friends.

Split Fiction releases on March 6 for $50 on PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC. 

CNET’s Sean Booker contributed to this story.