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"Hey baby, guess what I got for us?"
"Did you get me a kitty?!"
"Ah… no, but I got us a game!"
"A game about kitties?!"
So my girlfriend is constantly dropping hints that she needs a cat, but that's only because she loves adorable things. Like, crazy loves them. So when I got Okabu, a PSN title about two fluffy whale clouds who clean their world of pollution, it only seemed natural for us to play it together. What I didn't foresee was that the game demands players to stick together the entire time in order to progress at all.
Okabu's gameplay consists of solving puzzles in order to progress to the next area or defeat evil polluters. Such challenges range from having a townsperson press a button to leading a bull to break down a door. Most of these tasks require one player to solve it, yet the game requires both people to be on the same screen at all times. This leads to many instances where one person is completing a puzzle while the other waits.
The problem is that I'm not very good at waiting.
Throughout my life, I've played a large amount of fast-paced games including Mega Man and Devil May Cry. My girlfriend enjoys more casual franchises, such as Scribblenauts and Harvest Moon, where she can play at her leisure. Every so often we'll tackle something cooperatively like Castlevania: Harmony of Despair, where we'll run through the castle halls killing deadly foes. I can stay ahead and hack down legions of monsters, while she takes her time on one or two.
I can't rush ahead in Okabu.
My girlfriend and I frequently run into puzzles, and we usually take turns solving them. During her turn, I spin my character around in boredom as I wait for her to clean a river of oil or pull a boat to safety. If I do anything else, I cause trouble.
Here's a typical scenario: She has to shoot an acorn at a statue for extra points, but in the corner is a devilish robot polluting the air. While she's picking up ammunition, I decide to go Captain Planet on the little fiend. Unfortunately, even something as simple as defeating an enemy requires you to find water, so that you may spray it to death. I go to a nearby lake only to have the camera follow me, leaving my girlfriend's character out of frame. She looks at me in frustration for not letting her enjoy her game about cumulus cloud whales. I'm forced to return and let her shoot an acorn at a statue.
After going through this type of routine about 30 times during first hour, I actually start getting the hang of it. After another 40 screw-ups the following hour, I stop leaving her side. My goal for the game shouldn't be trying to beat it in a short amount of time. It should be about enjoying the experience with someone I care about. The question after a five-hour playthrough shouldn't be how far did we get but how much fun did we have playing a game about whales wearing hats.