Orbitals Is An Antidote For Hazelight’s Miserable Characters

Something core to Orbitals stuck out to me as I played the Switch 2 exclusive. Compared to the similar co-op games from Hazelight Studios, the major difference in Shapefarm’s two-player 3D platformer was that the two main characters, Maki and Omura, actually seemed to enjoy each other’s company. While that might seem like an inconsequential detail, it was actually a breath of fresh air after sitting through Hazelight's co-op hits A Way Out , It Takes Two , and Split Fiction , which all centered on troubled, angsty, and often-combative protagonists. Maki and Omura may appear shallow on the surface, compared to the likes of escaped prisoners Vincent and Leo from A Way Out or soon-to-be divorcees Cody and May in It Takes Two, but the magic of Orbitals shows in dialogue.