Adventure · 2024 · Anegar Games · local · online
Chained Together
Two people, one chain, one tower upwards. Whoever falls takes the other one with them.
What it is about
Two figures hang from a chain and have to climb out of hell. The tower consists of platforms, ledges and gaps, and the chain between them is a real object with length and weight: it goes taut, it trails, and it pulls.
The whole task grows out of that. A jump only works if the other one anchors you or jumps at the same moment. Slip, and you take them down with you, to somewhere you already were half an hour ago.
You play with two to four people, split screen with one copy or online. There are additional modes with rising lava, where the pressure comes from below rather than from your own clumsiness.
Our verdict for couples
The chain is not a metaphor but a physical object: it has length, it has weight, and it pulls. Jump and you drag the other one along; misstep and you take them down with you — not symbolically, but a hundred laboriously climbed metres. Everything is built for that, right down to the five-euro price and the four to five hours of play; this does not want to be a project but a Saturday night of shouting at each other and laughing afterwards. Whether it works for you comes down to one question: can you both laugh at the other one's mistake when it costs you half an hour? If you hesitate there, take Escape Simulator instead.
Pros
- One copy is enough on split screen
- Very cheap for two full evenings
- Understood within a minute
Cons
- One person's mistake costs both the same half hour
- It is over after five hours
- Neither German text nor German voice
Suitable from
Hobby
- Conflict potential
- Relationship test
- Cosiness
- Draining
- When you can stop
- Only after an hour or more
- How long it lasts
- Under 5 hours
What other co-op fans say
Rarely is a community so united on what a game does to you: there is laughter, there is swearing, and an unusual number of reviews say in so many words that friendships were reconsidered. Praise goes to the low price and to the discovery that a rage game works when the rage is fairly distributed. The recurring objection is the flip side: land with somebody who does not listen and you play the same passage ten times — and several write that they gave up after a few hours.
- “Very fun coop game. If you want to spend two evenings full of laugher with your friends, you won't be dissapointed.”
- “Perfect level of difficulty for a rage game. Havent laughed this much playing with friends in a long time. Highly recommend.”
Summarised by machine from 60 Steam reviews, not written by our editors. The quotes appear verbatim in those reviews.
If you like this one
Runs on the same devices as this game.
Two wobbly rubber figures solve puzzles in dreamlike landscapes — though the falling off takes up the larger share.
Terraria
Dig out a two-dimensional world, build it up, and clear its bosses one at a time.
Turnip Mountain unreviewed
A climbing game where the two of you share one character — an arm each.
A hand-painted platformer where missing a jump costs nothing but a second.
Related in the magazine
- Guide
Two hours, that's it
How long a game is tells you almost nothing about whether you can start it on a Tuesday night. The question that matters is a different one — and it leads to surprising picks.
- Guide
When you're both good at this
Almost every co-op recommendation is written for uneven couples — including our last one. For two experienced players the problem inverts: difficulty isn't what's missing. Needing each other is.