18 Best Story-Driven Co-Op Games
These games are great for playing with friends because they have both fun gameplay and a deep and important story.
A story that pulls players in can make them remember times when a game changed their lives. When a game’s story brings out the player’s feelings, it shows why interactive storytelling can be so much more powerful than storytelling through a passive medium.
Like with movies and TV shows, sharing the experience with other people can make it much better. This is easy to do when watching something, but in a game, both players need to be fully into the story for it to have the most effect. Co-op games have come a long way over the years, and now they can pull both players along in such a way that they have an amazing shared experience.
Resident Evil 5
Many people think that Resident Evil 5 is the game that started the series on a bad path where big action and shows were more important than scary things. After all, Resident Evil 4 was a huge hit, so Capcom chose to focus on the action and cut out a lot of the scary parts that made this legendary game such a great step forward to begin with.
Even though Resident Evil 5 has a lot of problems, many people still have a great time playing it, especially if they’ve been following the series’ main story for a while. Even though the game is missing a lot of what made the series great, the co-op gameplay is good enough to make up for its flaws.
Borderlands 2
Borderlands 2 is one of the most famous co-op first-person shooter games of all time. It is a huge step up from the first game in every way and does a great job of letting players enjoy the game’s desolate, stylized world while going on quests and killing waves of enemies. In this game, it’s fun to work together to kill monsters, and many fans still love this game even though it may not have held up well over time.
Even so, the great humor and fun fighting still work pretty well, and fans will have a great time gallivanting through the world of Borderlands 2 and enjoying everything it has to offer. There are a lot of heroes to choose from, and more than two people can go on a journey if they want to.
Child Of Light
Since many people think Ubisoft makes open-world games that are all the same, it’s easy to see why many people think Child of Light was made by this company. This game takes the best parts of platform games and role-playing games and puts them together to make a unique indie game that players will love.
The whole game is put together like a song, and almost everyone talks in rhymes. Even though this can get a little boring after a while, the game’s focus on being like a playable poem and its beautiful watercolor art style make it feel very different from most other games. Child of Light might not blow anyone’s socks off, but fans of both styles should still give it a try.
Crusader Kings 3
Crusader Kings 3 is already a pretty interesting game, and the story that develops as you play is great. Even better, this game can be played with more than one person, and each player can play a ruler who wants fame at any cost, even if it means going against their friends.
But Crusader Kings 3’s online doesn’t have to be mean-spirited all the time. Players can act as kings and their servants, which makes it fun to work together and plan how to rule well.
Dying Light
The combination of zombies and running in the game Dying Light makes it a great game. This game is great to play on its own, but the best thing about it is that players can enjoy this creation together.
In this game, it’s fun to jump around the city and find loot while killing zombies and trying to avoid them. The story of Dying Light may not be the most exciting, but the gameplay is interesting enough to keep players interested over time.
Darksiders Genesis
After the third game didn’t set the world on fire, the Darksiders series was in a weird state of limbo. This action-adventure series was turned into a top-down hack-and-slash game when the studio chose to change the formula.
Darksiders Genesis is not only a lot of fun and true to the Darksiders feel, but it also lets you play with other people! In this fun game, it’s a lot of fun to be in charge of Strife and War, especially since the battles are so much fun.
Lara Croft And The Guardian Of Light
The story changed a lot in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light. Many fans were worried that the game wouldn’t be able to handle the change to a top-down action-adventure game, but Guardian of Light did more than just make up for this change.
The addition of co-op made things a lot more fun and let players experience Lara Croft’s amazing journeys with their friends. It’s an easy and fun game that’s best played with friends.
Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons
Josef Fares has made a name for himself by making amazing stories in great co-op games. For what it’s worth, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons was made with the idea that one person could use two joysticks to handle both characters at the same time. However, the Switch version of this game has real co-op support.
Brothers is an intense story that hits players right in the gut near the end, which can be hard to handle. Luckily, if you see this movie with a friend, it will be easy.
Stardew Valley
Stardew Valley is one of the most popular farming sims right now. Which is great because farming is just one of the many things this game does well. This game is a gem from top to bottom. Because of its amazing characters and the story that runs through it.
As if that wasn’t enough, Stardew Valley also lets you play with friends, which is the icing on the cake. Stardew Valley is a great game to play with friends if you want to chill out and not be part of the action-packed games that most games have become.
Diablo 3
Activision Blizzard is one of the most shady video game companies out there right now. Their latest release of Diablo Immortal shows just how shady they are as a company. Diablo fans still have PC and console games to play, with Diablo 3 being the most clear choice.
Diablo 3 had a very rough start, but it has gotten better over time and is now one of the best dungeon crawlers. This game is even more fun because it can be played with other people.
Dead Space 3
People usually think of something very moving and emotional when they hear the phrase “incredible narrative experience.” However, it can also mean giving players jump scares and horrifying images that will make them pee their pants. It all depends on what you like.
When you play Dead Space 3 with a friend, the experience is a little different. Instead of being alone in a dangerous place, players have a person they can cling to and depend on. It means that each player gets to go first into the scary parts. While the other laughs and freaks out about what they need to do.
Trine
The whole Trine series is made up of sweet fairy-tale stories with a touch of irony and humor. Just like the best Disney and Pixar movies. The gameplay makes great use of the story parts, letting each character work to their strengths. And a good team of three can become a well-oiled machine.
As the story goes on, the heroes have to work togethe. Just like the players will have to work together as they puzzle-platform their way through the world. There’s always a great journey, whether they’re looking for a great treasure or trying to fix a prince’s broken mind.
Divinity: Original Sin 2
Both this and the original Divinity: Original Sin are great, deep RPGs. But you should really play them with other people to get the most out of them. Even if you play by yourself, it’s still a lot of fun, but some things. Like party balance and doing strange things, can only be done with friends.
MMOs have become so popular because they allow people to join a group where everyone has their own skills and sees the adventure in a slightly different way. When you put people like that in the world of Divinit. Which has a lot of history and fun quests, it’s a recipe for success.
Gears 5
Even though it’s a bit of a stretch to call Gears 5 a story-driven game. The series wouldn’t be where it is now without an engaging story to frame all the open-world shooting action. When you do something like this with a partner. It’s a lot more of a battle, which makes it a lot more fun.
Even though the story isn’t the main focus of the gameplay, Spacebar Clicker has a story that a lot of people care about, and the characters have been carefully built up to this point in the series. Because of this, neither player will feel left out of the story.
A Way Out
It would be a big understatement to say that Hazelight has perfected the cooperative story experience. Their first big game, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, was an emotional ride that made a big impression on everyone who played it. Years later, A Way Out did a lot of the same things.
A Way Out required players to work together to complete the experience. It combined the stories of two characters into a story that people are still talking about years after it came out. They came up with a unique way to set up the game so that players had to work together and then split up in one of the most remembered story moments in gaming history.
Portal 2
This may be the most well-known co-op game. In Portal 2, co-op players can play through a full game-long story on top of the single-player game. It doesn’t have as much of a story as the single-player game. But it still has a lot of charming writing.
It’s a brilliant concept that forces players to work together. But the tongue-in-cheek tone of Portal always leads to players getting into trouble. Half of the fun of this game mode is coming up with silly ways to kill your co-op partner.
We Were Here
We Were Here is an unusual puzzle game that lets players tell their own stories as they try to get out. One player is locked in a library, and the other is locked in a number of challenges. For both players to get out alive, they need to talk to each other.
This is also done well in games like Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. But We Were Here is much more engaging because of the way it feels. Also, it adds a little plot twist right at the end. Which could force players to choose who lives and who dies.
It Takes Two
It Takes Two was Hazelight’s most recent game and the talk of the town in 2021. And it took the co-op gameplay features of No Way Out and took them to a level that had never been seen before. It Takes Two has a much lighter tone and gives players a lot of chances to have silly fun and play silly games with each other.
It also doesn’t skimp on the basic game play. Players always have to work together to move forward, whether they are solving puzzles or fighting creatures. This fits right into the story of two lovers whose marriage is falling apart getting back together and learning about each other’s strengths and flaws.
