Cocoon is a game I really looked forward to playing, but fell a bit short of my expectations. On one hand it is very clearly a graphically and artistically beautiful game. The environments are gorgeous and extremely varied. I particularly liked the almost H.R. Giger-esque blends of biology and technology. The worlds felt like they had an extremely long history and the technology you interact with reminded me of Arthur C. Clarke’s adage “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Early in the game you reach a point where you can enter and exit a little pocket dimension and the visual and audible transition between dimensions is extremely satisfying. You see it a lot since it’s a core gameplay mechanic so I’m glad they got it right. The sound design was very subtle, but very effective. The pitter patter of your little bug feat through rough sand, across metal platforms, and puddles behind an ominous otherworldly melodic hum made the world feel very dreamlike. The buttons, platforms and other pieces of technology through the game all sounded very advanced and alien.

The game is very deep on a conceptual level and you can tell that through the puzzles it throws at you. I was convinced a handful of times that I’d broken the game and didn’t have all the pieces I needed to progress only for that “aha!” moment to strike and humble me. The game is extremely fair and thoughtful of your time. You are given the puzzle pieces you need in front of you and the rest of the environment is locked off to prevent backtracking too far and becoming overwhelmed by a large explorable space. One of the most amazing parts is it gives you these puzzle pieces and new gameplay elements without any text or dialogue through the entirety of the game. The visual language of the world is so strong and easy to read and it was never a question of what I could interact with, but more what order I needed to interact with it in order to progress.

There are no traditional enemies throughout the environment, nor is there any type of ‘fail state’. You can’t fall off platforms to your death or be killed by the environment in any way. This is where one of my primary complaints comes from. I never felt a sense of urgency or pressure from the game to do anything. I knew I was safe at all times which seems counterintuitive to finding yourself in such an alien world. There are a handful of boss battles which have “death states”, but even then there’s little consequence to “dying.” I use quotations because even in these scenarios you aren’t killed in battle, the boss generally boots you out of the arena to right outside the entrance where you can just try again. Though the boss battles were each extremely unique and all introduced interesting gameplay mechanics. I liken them to 2D Zelda bosses in difficulty and gameplay.

Where I think the game falters primarily is the emotional impact it has. For me, I felt basically nothing while playing it. I enjoyed the puzzles and boss battles as a game, but seeing as this game has absolutely zero dialogue, story set up, or indication of what your end goal actually is, I just could not get emotionally invested. There is obviously some deep history and lore in this world, but you don’t interact with any living creature that tells tales of what used to be or remembers “a time before.” There are no stakes in saving anyone or anything because you are the only living thing that isn’t a god like creature. There is only you, the lowly worker and the bosses, particularly the final boss, who are clearly higher beings than you. I don’t make this comparison just because both games feature bug-like creatures, but there are a lot of similarities to Hollow Knight. You are mysteriously thrust into a decaying foreign world with a clear long lost history. In Hollow Knight you come across small pockets of society, or lone survivors who remember the kingdom before it fell which really feeds you empathetic drive to fix that world.

All in all, I think the art, sound and gameplay are top notch, possibly among my favorite indie games. However, I wish there was more meat on the bone lore wise to dig into and to get me more emotionally involved in the what or why I was navigating this world. I spent maybe 5-6 hours and managed to unlock all achievements using the level select to pick up missed collectables after completing the story. If you have access to this game on Xbox Gamepass, it's a no brainer. Though replayability is probably pretty limited since the pathway is so linear and puzzles only have one solution.