Cheap Game Tuesday: ‘Brothers – A Tale of Two Sons’

When this little indie gem first emerged on the market all the reviews suggested checking it out yourself rather than reading about it. Naturally I avoided all reviews of the material and downloaded a copy. Then I didn’t play it for a long time because I’m more likely to play a game I know something about. Yeah, it kinda backfired.

Anyway, this dialogue free game runs on the Unreal Engine so while it looks pretty it’s not visually on the level of most triple-A titles but sits nicely with other indie titles. What makes the game unique is the control scheme. Players take control of two young brothers who live in an idyllic mountain town with their father, having lost their mother to drowning. When their father falls sick the brothers set out on a quest to find the herbal ingredient needed to create a cure.

Unlike many games that would alternate control of the characters or rely on AI, players control both of the brothers simultaneously. We ran it on the PS3, with the older brothers movement and interactions being controlled by the left analogue stick and L2 and the younger brother controlled with the right stick and R2. Needless to saw this can feel a bit muddled at times, especially if the brothers are standing on opposing sides of the screen. This is compensated for by the games easing players into the experience with pretty simple activities and interactions. As time goes on the puzzles and scenarios become more taxing and require careful manipulation and timing. The penalties are never worth stressing about, as the checkpoints are frequent.

It’s a relaxing and enjoyable experience with good character work given we rely only on their simple behaviours and actions. We haven’t played it through so we don’t know where the story ends up, but we feel like we’ve got our monies worth from this somewhat classic platformer.