COCOON Review
Cocoon was an interesting take one some gameplay elements that sadly felt more like a demo than a complete game. The game is sold as an adventure puzzle game, while some aspects of both of these genres are present, overall it was good but not quite great. Despite a lack of depth the game has its positives. The art style and some of the looping world mechanics are both positives which left an overall feeling of wanting more, rather than a feeling of regret.
Cocoon has no dialog. Players move through the world with a single control stick and a generic button labelled 'action'. This action button is used to interact with various in world items including the orbs that the player carriers on their back. Later in the game the move set expands slightly, unlocking more puzzle elements based on actions available only when carrying a certain orb.
Puzzles boil down to picking up and placing orbs in order to continue moving through the environment. Some are simple switches and some navigation, others make use of the unique properties of each orb. Later, once the player has more than one orb available, puzzles begin to include moving into and out of the different orbs. Each level culminates in a relatively quick boss fight which moves the story to the next stage and often unlocks a new orb.
Now, looking at where things fell a little flat. Each new stage or ability started with a feeling of novelty. One or two small puzzles to show off the new gimmick. Sadly, the complexity never really ramped up.
Each set of puzzles felt a little bit like a tutorial in a new style of puzzle. As soon as I felt I'd surely be seeing the next level of complexity, the game moved on. This left me overall with a feeling that things were unfinished. The puzzles felt linear and more like a puzzle shaped checklist of tasks.
Even at it's most complex, there never felt to be an incorrect path to take. While the environment did a good job of guiding the player without dialog, it did so without providing much in the way of meaningful decision. Placing an orb in the wrong place was typically a very quick realization and correction which meant that actually solving the puzzles didn't hold much reward.
There are a few secrets hidden within the game. Both sets of secrets added a little extra interest on the way through but neither felt meaty enough to warrant another play through. One set, some optional unlocks, called moon guardians, completed by a set of repeating puzzles around a sequence of shapes hidden in the environment. The other, a secret ending unlocked through memorization of patterns across levels. The moon guardians were never particularly hidden or difficult, without much effort in finding them I ended up finishing the game with all but one.
Overall, Cocoon is fun but left a lot on the table. Interesting ideas that don't feel like they quite managed to hit their stride. If you catch it on a sale it's probably worth picking up but I'd be unlikely to recommend it to someone looking for something to play.
Rating: 3/4 - I'd be happy if more games were like this.