Left? Right? A Biped Review

Is it left first, or right first? No, it’s both ata the same time! Trying to sync your movement with all four feet as a pair is going to be a challenge, and this chaotic footsie is what you get from NEXT Studio‘s Biped. This is a co-op title focused on the collaboration between a duo.

You play as a pair of cute robots named Aku and Sila, who will be going on a thrilling journey with many obstacles to overcome. These robots work are part of an intergalactic crew tasked to bring the light back to Earth. As suggested, the game is best enjoyed with a partner, but there is a solo mode should you find yourself alone and social distancing.

First steps

Biped is a 3D physics-based action game that focuses highly on the collaboration between two players. You’re practically guaranteed to have quite a few laughs as you tangle your feet together working through the game. Biped utilizes only the joysticks of the Dualshock, so it might be a little awkward to get used to at first. With both joysticks, move Aku and Sila’s feet to skate, grip, break or fling items for coins. Once you get past the tutorial, you’ll be greeted with a large variety of vistas, from forests to the dreaded icy levels and more, with the various obstacles truly wanting to test your friendship or marriage.

Onward with Aku and Sila

The little square and circular pair will be your characters, with all actions controlled only with the Joystick, while the directional keys are for emotes. You’ll have to learn to move in a rhythm with since some platforms will only support 2 or 3 feet, then others still will need specific colours for you to move through. Platforms will shrink and disappear from under you, or some will be moving about and you’ll be spending time dancing along and crying/laughing as you work on a proper rhythm with your buddy to make it through.

The cutesy design belies the difficulty even as you get more cosy with the controls. You can’t stray too far from your partner, since they’d die and return to you. Cooperation, cooperation, cooperation! There will be points of necessary separation, taking turns, and what not with Sila or Aku needing to stay behind on buttons and such. You’d likely know the deal, and you’ll have to figure out how to deal with it when you come to it.

Besides the whole tap dance, you can collect coins from all over the place. There’ll be barrels, cactus, carrots, bones or closed off areas that you can try to access by breaking, pulling about to find the treasure. If you find a turquoise coin, you’ll trigger a timed mini game where you’ll have to collect as many of those turquoise coins before the time is up, to get showered with regular coins.

There are roughly 30 maps to frolic (?) around for the main story, with each stage having an optimal time to achieve. A light tap on your partner could send them careening over the edge, so you can just pluck some carrots and smack your partner around for a bit. Along the way, you can assist other robots as Aku and Sila according to their needs, and of course, be rewarded by them. Solo players will go through the same story maps, but the gameplay is slightly different as you’ll find a buddy along the way to help you progress. It is still a co-op game at its core, so a partner is very recommended!

Graphics and visuals

Graphically speaking, Biped is bright and cheery with clean maps that are really pretty. As mentioned, there are a large variety of biomes you’ll be trekking across, and your robot buddies will be leaving their mark on the land with their footsteps.

Biped will probably remind you of plenty of 3D animated films, like that of Wall-E (since they’re robots). The various tools you see all look suitably futuristic, being from space. The robots speak their own language, but they all sound adorable so who needs to understand them. Any NPCs you take quests from will have their requests translated in speech bubbles, which may disappear a bit too quickly.

With that all said and done, you can smack about some NPCs since a number of them actually dispense coins. Handy…?

Verdict

There are few important points when you get into playing Biped:

1. Be near your paratner
2. Communicate, plan and work together as a team
3. Get into a rhythm!

As a whole, Biped is highly entertaining and will be a good barometer for your relationship with your co-op partner. This cute game hides various challenges, while still remaining fair that you’d persevere. If you can get a buddy, then wrangle them with you and march on to a beat through this cheery world!

FINAL SCORE

8 / 10

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