Duo Quest: a card game that asks whether you really know the person sitting next to you

Duo Quest's villain is called the Demon King and his evil invention is called the Bondbreaker.

On paper that is a gag. In practice it is the clearest possible statement of intent: in this game, your weapon is your relationship.

How it works

You are two adventurers, the kingdom's last hope, wielding Duo Energy, a weapon whose strength is tied to the bond between its users.

In practice it is a co-op deckbuilder with a mechanic on top: over a thousand questions are put to you, and you and your partner have to match your answers to defeat enemies.

The studio advertises over twenty question themes, and every choice shapes your strategy and unlocks combo cards.

So this is not a quiz sitting beside a card game. Guessing what the other person will answer is the combat mechanic.

Why it is clever

Because it solves a problem nobody solves: getting somebody who does not play games to play.

The studio says it openly, the game is designed so players can drag their non-gaming friends and partners in front of a screen. And the mechanic suits that perfectly, since the skill required is not dexterity but knowledge of the other person.

Your partner who has never held a controller starts with a considerable advantage over you: they know what you would answer.

That is also why the game is two-player only, in split screen, with no solo mode. The constraint is owned and it makes sense.

What surrounds it

The rest is an honest roguelite: procedurally generated levels with randomised routes, bosses, secrets to find by replaying levels, and cards to unlock.

The presentation is a deliberately offbeat 8-bit fantasy that does the job without taking itself seriously.

What to know

The game launches today, developed by 1+1 Studios and co-published by Rising Tide and Electronic Sheep Games. No price displayed as I write, no reviews.

Two sincere warnings.

There is no solo mode. If you have nobody to hand, this game does not exist for you. It is stated plainly and it is not an omission, it is the project.

And the questions can sting. A game that tests your relationship with provocative questions will raise subjects you had not planned to open on a Tuesday evening. That is the salt of the concept, and it is also the risk.

That said, in a year saturated with co-op games that settle for putting two people in the same room, this one understood that a two-player game ought to be about what happens between the two.

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