After 2021s meta deckbuilderInscryption, and enigmatic ZeldalikeTunica year later, 2023 brought usCocoon.
Set in a cryptic world of insect-like aliens and their impossible machines, Cocoon is apuzzle gameall about mystery.
Those are the optional challenges that guard the way to Cocoon’s secret ending.
Cocoons world feels viscerally alien from the word go.
Two tricks help achieve this.
If it sounds confusing, thats because it is.
Its unlike anything from this Earth, which is why it feels so alien.
But Geometric Interactive had another trick to add mystery to this story.
Put simply, it doesnt have any.
It has no text at all.
So why abandon words if they make things so much simpler?
As art director Kho explains, its more fun.
Theres a fun design challenge inherent to only using visuals to convey a backstory," he says.
A secret ending that reveals almost no new information, mind you, but thats fine.
Secret endings are going through some kind of golden age.
Tunic featured two distinct and optional secret languages, one hidden entirely in its soundtrack.
Even an alternate ending as tame asSignaliss involved an obscure image-to-video encryption method called SSTV.
But is this a movement?
Is there anything special binding those secret endings together?
Or do we just now have the online communities necessary to turn puzzle-solving into a group activity?
As a matter of fact, the team might have underestimated how difficult those puzzles can get.
But beyond that, this final section of the game is incredibly varied.
This isnt a single, hard final puzzle.
The worst offender expects a keen ear instead.
This is already a big ask for non-musical players, but Cocoon manages to make it even harder.
The melody isnt clearly labelled, and every sound is muffled by the surrounding soundscape.
And if that wasnt enough, the sound itself is harsh and metallic, not very melodious at all.
This self-imposed silence made Cocoon more interesting, but it made its toughest puzzles even less forgiving.
Or at least thats the case for solo players.
So the music puzzle might be impossible for one unlucky person, but not for a community.
It only takes one player to spot the weird sound, maybe another to figure out the melody.
In the meantime, everyone else can find where to input the solution or work on other puzzles.
Thats the thing about communities and puzzles.
They found the secret ending after only a week of research, but their work didnt end there.
But as it turns out, the secret hunters' thread isnt just for the players.
Kho seemed particularly interested in reading about the players progress.
A good secret hunt can spice up pretty much any game, as was the case with Inside.
No plot element remains shrouded in mystery, until the last cutscene fills in the details of the backstory.
Cocoon’s mystery remains unresolved even after the games second ending.
