Is there a video game that we’d both love?
January 22, 2025 9:58 AM   Subscribe

Looking for an engrossing, feel-good video game with gorgeous visuals, an aesthetic that’s not gritty or masculine, low or no realistic violence, and more criteria inside.

My husband and I would like to find a video game to play together. I’m not a gamer, and my husband only plays ARPGs, which generally don’t appeal to me.

We want to play together, and not against one another. It’s fine if we take turns holding a single controller, as long as the person not holding the controller is still involved. E.g., we loved playing Riven together many years ago, and it had plenty of decision-making and involvement for whoever wasn’t holding the controller. If isolated parts demand mashing, I can leave those to my husband, but I wouldn’t want that to be a lot of the game.

I want to be visually wowed, but since I’ve barely seen any games, even an older game could do that. This question was prompted when I saw this video linked in a question here. I love the visuals of The Last of Us at 2:40 and 4:07 and Uncharted 2 at 16:50. I don’t like the grittier parts of either, or any throughout the rest of that video. Is there anything that looks gorgeous like those snippets do, but without much grittiness or violence?

We’re looking to play on an Xbox or Mac.
posted by daisyace to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (48 answers total) 46 users marked this as a favorite
 
Stardew Valley
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:17 AM on January 22 [5 favorites]


If you liked Riven, you might also like The Witness! The environment is stylized, not photorealistic, but I'd put it in the same category of "colorful, detailed, and larger-than-life" as the Uncharted series. No violence, lots of interesting puzzles, only one tricky timed part (you'll know it when you get there), and generally an immersive experience that I've found fun to play with more than one person watching. The puzzles are (almost) all visual so the game lends itself to contributions from everybody. If it strikes your fancy, don't read too much about it before trying it!
posted by Brassica oleracea at 10:18 AM on January 22 [4 favorites]


Untitled Goose Game has a co-op mode.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:26 AM on January 22 [13 favorites]


Gorogoa is a beautiful and brain twisting puzzle game available on both Xbox and Mac.
posted by ejs at 10:27 AM on January 22 [5 favorites]


Seconding the Witness. It's a lot like Riven in feel and structure. Great puzzles, beautiful environment. The puzzles are pretty hard - I didn't finish. But with two of you maybe it would be easier.

I'm playing Stardew Valley now, and while the visuals aren't stunning (more cartoony/cute), the game structure itself is incredibly complex and engrossing. It has a well liked co-op mode. I play from desktop computer on Steam, but a lot of people like playing on the Switch. This one takes a LOT of hours to complete.
posted by bluesky78987 at 10:27 AM on January 22 [1 favorite]


I think any of the Ratchet & Clank games, which are just super-fun, would work for you. Not sure of the platforms for which they're available; I've played them on PlayStation.
posted by Dr. Wu at 10:36 AM on January 22


Stardew is lots of fun co-op, arguably more so than alone in my opinion.
posted by Alensin at 10:51 AM on January 22 [4 favorites]


It Takes Two is made for husband-and-wife teams, and isn't gritty (though occasionally emotional).

You both need a controller/keyboard to play and there are regular button-mashing parts, where you'll both need to do your thing (and even coordinate). Fortunately, the penalty for failure is never more than a slight set-back. (I'm guessing they didn't want to cause any divorces.)
posted by demi-octopus at 11:00 AM on January 22 [7 favorites]


Pode is a cute and cozy little co-op game where a stone and a star work together to solve puzzles and bring lush colour and beauty to their world!

No bad guys or ticking clock to worry about (I don't think), just the two of you against the landscape.
posted by wats at 11:04 AM on January 22


Portal 2 is great fun as a co-op puzzle platformer which can be visually beautiful and has lots of neat stuff to do together.

Trine is gorgeous and a lot of fun, again another co-op puzzle platformer, with a fantasy theme.
posted by fight or flight at 11:05 AM on January 22 [6 favorites]


Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver is a very fun puzzley adventure from the 1990s that has suddenly been reborn on Steam and Playstation. It's all very gothy and stylized and the violence is mostly against ghosts, so sucking in souls, not blood. In college, we would take turns playing and shouting out ideas about how to solve the puzzles, and now 25 years later we're doing the same.
posted by hydropsyche at 11:05 AM on January 22


I love Stardew Valley but it's not gorgeous the way that The Last of Us or Uncharted is. The pixel art is cute and well done but... it's 8-bit-style pixel art.

Another thing to maybe try or look at videos of is No Man's Sky -- you wander around a science fiction universe doing mostly whatever you want to do. Exploring, base building, photographing every critter on a planet. There's violence in the form of shooting animules and robuts but it's easy to avoid. If you look at videos, make sure they're from the past year or so; NMS has been getting big updates.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:13 AM on January 22 [4 favorites]


Gorogoa was 100% what I came in here to recommend. It’s beautiful, gentle, and a puzzler that it definitely helps to have two brains working on together.
posted by Night_owl at 11:31 AM on January 22 [2 favorites]


Outer Wilds? Exploring a pocket solar system and figuring out what's going on. Clever, sweet, occasionally beautiful, and sad.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 11:40 AM on January 22 [7 favorites]


Tales of Arise has beautiful environments and detailed, anime-style character art, if you like that aesthetic. I play games regularly but have never been particularly good at them, and didn't find it too challenging to play.

Final Fantasy Remake/Rebirth are also really great visually but can be harder to play in terms of exploration puzzles and minigames, but maybe not a big deal if you can pass the controller back and forth.
posted by space snail at 11:44 AM on January 22


Chants of Sennaar is worth a look, too. It feels like it'd fit your criteria, and it's a very good game.
posted by wanderingmind at 11:56 AM on January 22 [4 favorites]


Third The Witness, it's gorgeous and one of the best puzzle games I've ever played. Most of the game is exploring and observing things, and there's a lot of clever (and sometimes, cleverly hidden) puzzles to figure out.

Untitled Goose Game is short and won't wow you with any graphics but it's very charming.

Toejam & Earl: Back in the Groove is a pretty faithful recreation of the Sega Genesis original.

The trouble with your request is that most AAA games (the "wow" ones) aren't typically co-op, and the ones that are do it online instead of locally. The games that do are typically indie games with lo-fi graphics.

There's apparently an app out there that will turn any online co-op game into split screen local co-op (by running two copies of the game).
posted by neckro23 at 11:57 AM on January 22 [1 favorite]


Botany Manor is one I found very enjoyable. The aim is to find out how to get a series of strange plants to germinate and bloom. Like The Witness, the graphics are stylised and not over-detailed. It's a game you'll probably finish in a few hours though. Manifold Garden is a mind-bending architectural puzzle game that I've played through several times. Really unusual game mechanics involving endlessly repeating spaces and the ability to choose which way is up. Another one I've enjoyed recently was Viewfinder, where you use a camera to duplicate parts of the 3D world. For something with prettier graphics than any of these, could I suggest Eastshade, which is a more straightforward open-world adventure type of thing?
posted by pipeski at 12:11 PM on January 22 [4 favorites]


I am a non-gamer and have been playing We Love Katamari with my husband. It's definitely not hyper realistic, but I find the visuals super engrossing and surreally stylish. The coop mode is a collaborative "we're both paddling this kayak" kind of vibe which uh, could be good or bad for a marriage.
posted by umwelt at 12:23 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


An ex-partner and I played Untitled Goose Game together, it was delightful: funny, sweet, mischievous, charming, cooperative, and a fun set of problems and puzzles to solve. The most violent part is that sometimes you have to conspire in naughtiness, like disrupting the bins of a shopkeeper in a cute village. The visuals aren't full of wow, but it's a charming setting, quite soothing. If you're open to a fun and funny game, I'd consider it.
posted by bluedaisy at 12:37 PM on January 22


Subnautica? You're a survivor of a spaceship that crash-landed on an ocean planet, you need to explore and gather resources to survive and look for survivors / rescue. A lot of the game is about exploring different ecosystems / biomes to discover new fish / plants / minerals. I love the atmosphere of the game - lots of the areas feel "alive" with all the wildlife, particularly the starting area. It's single player, but progress is self-directed towards a few goals that the game gives you, and quite often you need to brainstorm & plan how to make progress, so it might work for taking turns with the person who isn't holding the controller thinking about how to make progress on other fronts.

I mainly enjoyed the exploring and problem solving aspects of it, but it also has quite a rich underwater base-building toolkit, which can be a nice break after a long expedition into the depths.

It has some scary parts, particularly as you venture deeper.
posted by are-coral-made at 12:39 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


nth-ing It Takes Two.
also voting for Untitled Goose Game. Where even the sweetest person you know suddenly turns into a complete asshole. :D

Overcooked 2 has couch co-op. You're running a restaurant kitchen, chopping and cooking ingredients and putting orders together, while very chaotic things are happening all around you.

Moving Out is a couch co-op physics-based moving simulator. Similar feel to Overcooked (same studio!)

Drink More Glurp is a hotseat party game, where aliens have copied Earth's summer games and got everything slightly wrong.
posted by xedrik at 1:04 PM on January 22


I can't recommend Sable enough, it is beautiful to see and hear, very peaceful, it's an open world with puzzles and mysteries to uncover, and good writing! You are a young woman who can float through puzzle-platformer situations, and you're trying to decide which career/life role you will settle into once your wandering period of Floating is over. If you're into looking over the other's shoulder or taking turns, or trying to solve the puzzles together, that is ideal for this. Also it's 60% off right now.
posted by panhopticon at 1:21 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


I was noodling around on Steam the other day and saw an ad for "Farewell North," where you play as a border collie helping its human on a journey across the Scottish Highlands.

I haven't played it, but I'm intrigued, and it sounds like it might check a lot of your boxes? One caution is that they say it's ultimately about dealing with loss. Here's a review.
posted by martin q blank at 1:24 PM on January 22


These kinds of games are my favorite, but as others have said, they can be hard to come by.

Nthing again It Takes Two. And seconding Portal 2 and the Trine series.

I don't think I've seen Unravel Two mentioned, which is delightful couch co-op and it's unexpectedly pretty.
posted by rachaelfaith at 1:31 PM on January 22 [2 favorites]


Question for clarification: what exactly are you looking for to be visually impressed by? Your examples are big-budget, graphically realistic games, which is a type of game that generally does have some degree of realistic violence, for better and worse.

For puzzlers, I can offer more endorsements of The Witness and Portal 2, but I also think y'all might have fun with the JRPG genre for games that can be mechanically complex and visually spectacular, but not too gritty or reliant on reaction time. Maybe check out the Persona series (typically about teenagers solving a mystery in the waking world while battling demons in the world of the subconscious) or Yakuza: Like a Dragon (you're gangster with a heart of gold getting in and out of soap-operatic situations).
posted by jy4m at 1:55 PM on January 22 [2 favorites]


A game that came to mind was Ori and the Blind Forest (or its sequel, Ori and the Will of the Wisps). It's a Metroidvania style puzzler which looks pretty stunning, with puzzle-platformer style gameplay. If that's in your wheelhouse, maybe check it out.
posted by axiom at 2:03 PM on January 22 [2 favorites]


Response by poster: ...what exactly are you looking for to be visually impressed by? Your examples are big-budget, graphically realistic games, which is a type of game that generally does have some degree of realistic violence...

That's a good question, since most of the suggestions here don't look "gorgeous like those snippets do." When I saw the cinematic games in that video, I thought, "Whoa, that's what video games can look like now?" and that's what prompted me to post this question. The highly personal look of the two people relating in the first snippet; the photorealistic, sunlit curtains waving in front of a ruined window in the second; the wheeling camera-angle on the majestic terrain of the third -- I'd love to play a game that looked anything like that.

But, not a violent one. So it's helpful to know that great, non-violent video games that have that look may be an empty set. And it explains why so many of the responses here are going in another direction. If my ideal doesn't exist, I'll still enjoy choosing one or more of them to try, even if its visual appeal isn't the kind that initially sparked my interest.
posted by daisyace at 2:36 PM on January 22


Slight wildcard would be one of the Assassin's Creed games on exploration mode? No fighting required. Have a look at AC Origins (set in Ancient Egypt) and AC Odyssey (Ancient Greece). They're quite good for spectacle.
posted by knapah at 3:40 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


Honestly, I just wish you had a Switch so I could recommend the two latest Zelda games. They really scratch this itch for my husband & I. They are so stunningly animated, and the world is open and constantly surprises and delights you. I just love them so much (and I only love, like, 3 video games). I know this isn't helpful but it's really the only game I can think of that fits the bill.

It Takes Two is more cartoony, but it has some really impressive gameplay and design and is a lot of fun.
posted by Isingthebodyelectric at 3:41 PM on January 22 [2 favorites]


I am a nongamer, but a few years ago my interest was piqued by Stray enough to get me to buy it (and a controller to play it). You might also be intrigued by it. You play a cat trying to find its way thru a strange city populated only by robots.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:24 PM on January 22 [3 favorites]


No Man’s Sky might be right for you; there is combat, but I think you can avoid a lot of it and just bounce around pretty space worlds.

The Forgotten City is a time-loop mystery game set in Ancient Rome that looks good and might appeal to you in the same way that Riven did.
posted by Why Is The World In Love Again? at 5:24 PM on January 22


Are you hoping to avoid combat altogether or just avoid "realistic violence?" There's probably a lot more games with detailed visuals to pick from if you're okay with "Guy 1 swings weapon, some sparks fly, Guy 2 falls down bloodlessly" type of violence.
posted by space snail at 6:25 PM on January 22


Citizen Sleeper has a lot of the elements you mention but is not cinematic looking. It's a tad gritty, since it takes place in a collapsing space station, but it's not violent and I think it has hopeful bits.
posted by fiercekitten at 6:25 PM on January 22


Stylized, but visually appealing games:

Stray - as mentioned by others, you play as a cat wandering a city populated by robots.
Life is Strange - this is a whole series of games in a shared universe where you play as young women with supernatural powers. I haven't played all of them, but there are recurring characters so it might help to play them in order. The earlier games were released for modern consoles in a "remastered" package.
What Remains of Edith Finch - a young woman revisits her childhood home and you uncover stories about her idiosyncratic Royal Tenenbaums-esque "cursed" family.
Inside - primarily a puzzle game that tells a dystopic story. It's been a while, but I think I recall that you can die violently, but violence is not part of the main gameplay loop.

Trending more towards photorealism in the vein of the Uncharted/TLOU:

The Quarry - this is probably best described as a playable teen horror movie, so it contains violence, but it's not the primary gameplay mechanic.

And finally, some certainly violent games that show off the state of the art in terms of what's possible in real time graphics, if you're curious about how things have progressed since Uncharted/TLOU:

Alan Wake 2
Hellblade 2
A Plague Tale: Requiem

All of these games should be available on XBox. Unfortunately, most traditional games do not end up on MacOS in the best state (and most Mac hardware isn't capable of running it that well either).
posted by strangecargo at 7:32 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


I've played and enjoyed all these games with my family, all available on Steam:

Taking Turns as a single player:
- Botanicula: Embark on a whimsical journey with quirky plant-like creatures to save their home from parasitic invaders.
- Lumino City: Solve puzzles in a stunningly hand-crafted world to uncover the mystery of your grandfather’s disappearance.
- Ori and the Blind Forest: A visually breathtaking platformer telling the emotional tale of Ori, a guardian spirit, as they restore the balance of their forest home.
- Spiritfarer: A cozy management game where you play as Stella, a ferry master to the deceased, helping spirits find peace before saying goodbye.

Co-operative:
- Rocket League: A high-octane hybrid of soccer and driving, where players control rocket-powered cars to score goals in dynamic arenas.

---------------
Special mentions:
(may not have the visual wow factor, but are still pleasing to look at, and a lot of fun)
Single player sharing:
- A Juggler's Tale: A beautifully crafted puppet show adventure following Abby, a string-controlled juggler seeking freedom in a perilous world.
- Alba: A Wildlife Adventure: Explore a charming Mediterranean island as Alba, a young girl on a mission to save its wildlife and environment.

Co-operative:
- Unravel (1 + 2): Follow Yarny, a small creature made of yarn, through heartwarming adventures filled with puzzles and cooperative gameplay.
- It Takes Two: A unique co-op adventure where two players navigate a magical world to repair the relationship of a divorcing couple.
- Unrailed: A chaotic multiplayer game where players work together to build and manage a train track through procedurally generated worlds.
- Overcooked (1 + 2): A frantic cooking simulator where players must work together to prepare meals in increasingly bizarre and chaotic kitchens.


Disclaimer: I selected all the games, but asked ChatGPT for the descriptions (which I read and agree with)
posted by Gomez_in_the_South at 10:15 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]


Mod note: Oh what glorious adventures await this post, both on the sidebar and in the Best Of blog!
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 5:35 AM on January 23 [1 favorite]


Another vote for Unravel Two! It's been a great game to get started on as someone who had never played any video games at all. I enjoy the co-op nature of it and love that if I'm struggling in some sections, I can just hop onto my partner's back - a lifesaver! The visuals are surprisingly beautiful too.
posted by rokiabiko at 6:03 AM on January 23


Since no one else seems to have mentioned it, I recommend checking out the Riven remake if you enjoyed the original. They've made some changes to keep things fresh so it's not going to be just a rehash of all the same puzzles, and the visuals are stunning.

Also, as someone who came to Riven by way of earlier Sierra/LucasArts adventure games, the Witness was not my cup of tea. I don't consider it very Riven-like at all, beyond featuring a lot of puzzles involving locked doors.
posted by Aleyn at 12:22 PM on January 23 [1 favorite]


Haven. You actually play a couple in this game, who escaped to this alien landscape for freedom, and explore it at your leisure, but there are villains who'd want to tear you apart...
posted by kschang at 12:27 PM on January 23


Response by poster: Thank you all so much! This is a great bunch to choose from. We haven't picked one to start with yet, but we're already enjoying looking into them and narrowing them down. We appreciate all your input!
posted by daisyace at 8:29 AM on January 24


I loved playing through Broken Age (switch | steam) wit h my kids, and my partner was amused watching and suggesting ideas to solve the puzzles. Not the longest game but beautiful and clever.
posted by ancillary at 9:59 AM on January 24


I second the Witness, It Takes Two and Portal 2.
I'll add The Talos Principle and it's sequel. They are single player games, but the focus is on solving puzzles so everyone can work together.
I would start with the first one. The graphics are similar and I think the story and especially the ending are stronger in the original.
posted by the_dreamwriter at 11:24 PM on January 24 [1 favorite]


While I will go to the bat for either version of Portal, it's important to note that it no longer runs on modern Macs as Valve has not created a 64-bit version of it.   To make it work now you will need access to the Windows version and something like Codeweaver's Crossover which uses WINE.
posted by los pantalones del muerte at 9:30 AM on January 25 [1 favorite]


As a non-gamer who is occasionally coaxed into playing with my husband, I enjoyed Unravel 2, Untitled Goose Game, and The Pedestrian.

Recently i started watching him play Bonfire Peaks and now we do the puzzles together, with him controlling the character and me telling him what to do.
posted by estherbester at 8:11 PM on January 25


engrossing, feel-good video game with gorgeous visuals, an aesthetic that’s not gritty or masculine, low or no realistic violence

I really really like Infinity Nikki for this (official trailer) - it's a girl's dress up game from the Nikki line of games but it's got cutting edge Unreal Engine 5 graphics and huge open world exploration / platforming gameplay which manages to give it cross gender draw despite ostensibly being a pure "girls" game.

Seriously just the trailer in 4K alone and the catchy song was enough for me to smash the download button and I'm a guy.... I'm having an absolute blast exploring the gorgeous world and collecting the beautiful outfits - I already get "hardcore" competitive combat play through PVP games like League of Legends or Marvel Rivals, so if I'm playing a single player game I want great visuals, exploration and dress up.

There is rudimentary combat, but it's very vegan - you "purify" Esselings, kind of like bad spirits, and instead of hunting animals for materials you get to groom them and harvest their hairs or fur, so you basically go around looking for cute animals to pet.

I cannot emphasize enough how cutting edge this is - drawing millions of foilage elements in each scene like flowers, leaves, grass, etc is not trivial, and from developer interviews even UE5 Nanite wasn't performant enough so they had to devise their own system. And the clothes - best in industry anti-clipping / deformation and materials lighting - many dresses have semi-translucent layers so there would be an interplay of light and shadow when the various layers interact. Fur is notoriously hard to do visually and they've done a serviceable job, jewelry lighting effects really stand out, there's sequin type lighting effect where every sequin reflects light differently depending on the reflection angles. The UE5 photo camera and editor is also as good as I've ever seen, I'm an amateur photographer and it's like taking photos with a manual DSLR and editing the result in Lightroom, with focal length and proper bokeh.

Nikki herself is miles ahead of other open world protagonists, good voice acting, great personality, kind but assertive. And the game showers you with so much free stuff - we just got 3 new outfits over the weekend.
posted by xdvesper at 7:22 PM on January 26


GRIS - Gameplay example - A singer awakens in a barren, colorless world, unable to produce any sound when she tries to sing. As she wanders through the landscape she finds the color red... and it reveals part of her world that she had lost or forgotten. She goes on a journey to find more colors and more life, stalked and occasionally confronted by a giant pitch-black bird. It's not a violent or hard game, and it is very beautiful. It doesn't have the art style of The Last of Us, but I think it has the cinematic feeling that you're looking for. If you like this style the creators released another game called Neva which is also stunningly beautiful.

Rain World - Gameplay example - An adorable creature is separated from its family, washed away by a torrential rain. It awakens alone and must learn to survive. It's a tense game, but it's not a violent macho gorefest. It's similar to a nature documentary: brutal and beautiful things coexist. You would be a great help spotting enemies, keeping track of where you've gone, where food is, and where safe places are. It's a difficult platformer though, and if your husband only plays ARPGs it might not be fun for him. If neither you or your husband enjoy actually playing it, I recommend this playthrough. There's also a guided tour of the game.

Okami HD - Gameplay example - Play as a god/wolf to restore life and nature to a ruined world. The art style and the gameplay are based on Japanese brush work. Yes, you draw to attack and use skills in this game! You also solve puzzles with your brush. When you run flowers blossom underneath your paws, and there's a dedicated bark button. Exploration and puzzles are a decent chunk of the game. There is some mashing in combat but I don't think it's overwhelming. I think this would be fun for both you and your husband to play.

I second the recs for Outer Wilds, Stray, and Ori and the Blind Forest.
posted by tsunpei at 8:35 AM on January 27 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: An update... We looked at a bunch of these, and picked pipeski's suggestion of Eastshade to start with, and it's been great! Very pretty, peaceful, and wide-ranging exploration without mashing. For a different kind of beauty, we also grabbed Gorogoa when it was on sale for $5, so we'll play that sometime. We added Farewell North -- and, ok, the Untitled Goose Game -- to a watchlist, and might get them when a sale tempts us. I also looked at a couple of the others (Life is Strange and Infinity Nikki), each of which has really appealing visuals, but they clarified for me that anything relying on dexterity to play isn't going to be a favorite, at least to play on my own, even though they don't involve mashing. We bypassed a couple of others for now (Unravel Two and It Takes Two) when we realized we only had one working controlller, but we may return to those and others mentioned here when we run out. And on a visually different note, I think I'm going to succumb to Stardew Valley on my own sometime, too. Thank you again for all these great suggestions -- I feel like I know a lot more about the characteristics of video games than I did when I posted!
posted by daisyace at 3:10 PM on February 9 [4 favorites]


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