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Reviewed On: PS5
Also Available On: Xbox Series X/S and PC
Price: $49.99 USD
Developer: Hazelight Studios
Publisher: EA (Electronic Arts) Originals
Release Date: March 6th, 2025
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Hazelight Studios has been on a terrific trajectory regarding its game releases. Directed by the wonderfully funny Josef Fares (“F*** The Oscars“), they have now released their third title, which is a Co-Op only adventure and they are not stopping yet! A Way Out from 2018 was pretty good for their first big project. It Takes Two in 2021 was fantastic, and I personally had it in my top games of the year list. Now, Split Fiction in 2025 takes the Co-Op fun to yet another level… most of the time. I played this game with the same person I played the other two titles from Hazelight Studios (CasualNoobGamer; henceforth will be mentioned as Casual in the article), and we had many thoughts about the title. Split Fiction is a co-op game where you need to work together, and it only felt right to work together on putting our thoughts out for this game. Did it live up to both of our expectations, or did it fall a bit flat here? Read the review to find out!
The story takes place at a book publishing company called Rader Publishing. This was where Mio, Zoe, and a bunch of other writers were trying to get their books and stories published as new writers. The head of the publishing label, Rader, placed each of the writers who showed up into their chambers to be hooked up to a machine. Unfortunately, Mio didn’t think it looked safe, and she decided against doing it since something seemed off. Rader and his team wouldn’t let her leave, and unfortunately, she went into another person’s chamber by accident. This happened to be Zoe’s, and this is where the plot begins.
Zoe and Mio were now trapped together in the machine, and they needed to find a way out. Unfortunately, they couldn’t escape, but they eventually began jumping through stories. Mio is more into science fiction, while Zoe likes the fantasy genre. You will be going back and forth between these kinds of worlds. Zoe is more outgoing, raised in the countryside, and optimistic. Mio is much more closed off, pessimistic, and is a city person. They are almost opposites of one another at the beginning of the game. Casual played the game as Zoe, and I (Nick) played the game as Mio. Throughout their journey together to survive in the worlds they find themselves in, they start to find glitches in the machine. They decide to go after these glitches to see if that will help them escape, but while the pair goes after these glitches, they learn of Rader’s true intentions and what the machine is doing. The publisher and machine are stealing all of the stories from the writers, both submitted ones and ones in their minds. Zoe and Mio decide they need to shut down the machine to save everyone and their stories.
There are many themes and ideas that are within the game. One of the big ones is the concept of stealing ideas from individuals for a company to use. The way in which they can use these ideas to create other stories based on concepts, visuals, plots, and more that were fed into the machine. Does this sound like something massive in this day and age? It is a reference to the concept of *cough Generative A.I. cough* and I loved the way they did it in the game to show the current dangers we are in. There are many other themes in the game, from loss, depression, love, happiness, joy, creativity, progress, failure, and more. I loved the concepts and themes that they showed in the game, especially the more powerful ones. The story of Mio and Zoe was great, and it gets their hooks in you quickly. I found it more powerful and better than I originally thought it was gonna be.
One thing that Hazelight does, which I find absolutely terrific, is that while you need to have a real friend to play with, both players do not need to own the game. Only one person needs to actually own the game, while the other can use what is known as the friends pass. It is a way to play the entire game without spending the $50 (although I absolutely think the game is worth the price of admission). There is a downside to this, though… the person on the friends pass cannot gain trophies from the game. A big thing to note about this game is that it is cross-play, the first time in Hazelight’s history.
Okay, so if you have played It Takes Two or A Way Out from Hazelight, this one plays in similar ways. There are platforming sections where you will have to work with your Co-Op partner to traverse different worlds and locations. Besides platforming, some puzzles are sometimes fairly easy to solve. Other times, you will be raging with your buddy to finish a stupid captcha system that features auto-correct. Be warned if you play as Zoe, as this is on you; Mio can’t help with it. Sometimes, you both will have similar weapons that include guns to attack enemies and open pathways to navigate a factory. Other times, you will have unique powers like manipulating gravity, transforming into magical creatures, riding on top of dragons, and others that I don’t want to spoil. One problem I personally had in the game was how many slide sections there were in some of the levels. I like them, but there are a lot more of them than I anticipated. To progress through the puzzles and platforming sections, you will need to work with your co-op pal to progress through the game. You cannot leave them behind, no matter how hard you try… believe me, I know. There are a bunch of main levels in the game, but there are more than just the main ones if you go off the beaten path.
In Hazelight’s previous games, there were side mini-games and activities to complete. In Split Fiction, there were side stories that were not part of the main levels. These are smaller works of creativity from Zoe and Mio. Both of us, Casual and I, thought that we had to save these stories that were being taken away from Zoe and Mio just on the principle and ethics of not letting a company steal them from creative individuals. We were going for a Platinum trophy in the game, but even if there wasn’t a trophy for completing all of these side stories, we would have done it since it felt morally right to protect the two characters.
There are 12 of these side stories, and we each had our favorite moments and also annoyances in these areas. I personally liked a lot of them, including some highlights of Farmlife, Collapsing Star, Slopes of War, and Birthday Cake. Casual liked a lot of them too, with some standouts of Train Heist, Moon Market, and Space Escape. Casual hated Farmlife because Zoe’s power wasn’t as good as Mio’s, and he also hated Kites because of what you needed to do in this story. I didn’t personally like Mountain Hike since it felt too basic for me, and I also didn’t love Space Escape since it just felt underdeveloped for what it could have been. Both of us agreed that we didn’t love Notebook as it felt weaker compared to the other stories, but we understood what was trying to be shown to the player with its simplicity. We both loved the Gameshow level, because while we got annoyed when trying to get the “Cold Potato” trophy for at least 40 minutes, we felt a terrific sense of accomplishment once we got it! This one really makes you work with your partner in a big way and should be attempted by players if they can!
We both really enjoyed the voice acting of the cast. We connected with the characters from how they delivered their lines. There was emphasis on certain scenes that really connected with both of us, especially in the more serious times closer to the end of the game. In terms of music, the first time that Casual seriously noticed the overall music and audio was at the end of the seventh chapter of the game. He said that a good movie is a good movie, but an epic movie is epic because it has a soundtrack that takes hold of you. For myself; I absolutely loved the music and audio design in the game and noticed different changes from level to level. There was disco when dancing with the monkey, crazy and intensive music when fighting bosses, techno in Neon Revenge, and much more.
The overall audio design, voice acting, and music were good, but the art and visuals in the game were even better. The art and colors seriously popped on the screen with the different worlds, characters, visual effects, and designs. The world designs were stunning, where they each had their own color pallets but also kept a strong cohesiveness throughout the title. The absolutely bright and vibrant colors of the Birthday Cake level to the more simplistic black and white visuals in the Notebook level. The gigantic feelings of the dragon realm to the more realistic city lights and vibes. None of the worlds felt unpolished in a visual aspect, and with how many different level designs there were, we were both thrilled that they all looked great.
In terms of bugs, issues, and performance, the game as a whole was very polished. In terms of framerate, there was only one time I saw a big framerate dip, but it didn’t last very long and wasn’t game-breaking in any way. In terms of bugs, there really weren’t any bugs that I experienced, but there was one that my friend experienced that I remember. I got one of the trophies, but he didn’t get it at the same time. I did the objective for the trophy again, and he got it the second time. There weren’t any other trophy bugs, which is good. Overall, the game is definitely very polished, even more than some juggernaut games in this day and age.
After the amazing work that they did on It Takes Two, we both had extremely high hopes for this game. Well, thankfully, the game didn’t disappoint us most of the time. There were moments we both really loved and moments we both didn’t like as much. The plot and themes were fantastic as they were shown and told to us. The gameplay was a blast to play with a friend, especially completing some of the more challenging trophies. The art, visuals, performance, and voice acting did the job terrifically. We didn’t necessarily agree on the music in terms of how good it was, but as a whole, it worked well. I am looking forward to seeing what Hazelight cooks up next. Split Fiction should be played by anyone who loves platformers, adventure titles, and games with a great story. Just make sure that you have a friend to play the game with. For a 20ish hour adventure, it is currently both of our GOTY as of this review. You can grab a copy for you and a friend here.
Review Score: 9/10
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