REVIEW | BOKURA

Running away from home is supposed to feel simple, but BOKURA turns that moment into something far stranger and more personal. Two boys wake up to find their worlds no longer match. One sees nature, the other sees machines, and each player’s screen shows a slightly different version of reality. Because BOKURA can only be played online with another person, I teamed up with Benny for this review. We spent each session describing what we saw, comparing our mismatched worlds, and working out how to navigate the landscape and puzzles together.

That design gives the whole experience a close, thoughtful feel. You’re constantly talking through obstacles, trying to understand the other perspective, and figuring out how to move forward as a pair. Those quiet moments of cooperation create a gentle emotional pull that stays with you long after you stop playing.

With that said, now let’s take a look at what worked and what didn’t.

Things I liked!

• Co-op is a Must | BOKURA is built entirely around cooperation. Every puzzle and moment of progress depends on communication between two players. Each person sees a different world, and the only way forward is to describe what you see and trust your partner to guide you.
  
  At times you have to listen carefully as your co‑op partner tells you to walk or jump in a certain direction, even though you cannot see what is happening. At one point during our playthrough, Benny was giving me instructions, and I had to listen closely and press the buttons he told me to. Things occasionally went wrong, sending us back to the last checkpoint, but those moments made the teamwork feel even more real.
  
  There is no solo option here. You cannot play alone, and both players must own a copy of the game to connect. Luckily, BOKURA is a budget‑priced release, which makes that requirement easier to manage. It’s a quiet reminder that understanding someone else’s perspective takes effort, and BOKURA captures that feeling beautifully through its cooperative play.
  
  
• Visual Style | BOKURA uses a chunky pixel art style that feels simple but immediately striking. The clean, storybook look makes it easy to focus on what matters most: each player sees a different version of the same world. One side is warm and natural, the other is colder and mechanical, and the contrast is clear from the moment you start playing.
  
  That difference becomes the heart of the experience. You’re constantly describing what’s on your screen, comparing details, and figuring out how your partner’s world changes the puzzle in front of you. The visuals stay readable and uncluttered, supporting communication rather than competing with it, and they give the adventure a calm, reflective atmosphere that fits perfectly with the cooperative design.
  
  
• The Music | The sound design in BOKURA is gentle and understated, matching the calm pace of the adventure. The music has a simple, chiming quality that instantly reminded me of a glockenspiel from school, with metal bars in different sizes struck by a soft, wool‑headed mallet. Some of these little melodies stayed in my head after playing, but in a comforting way rather than an annoying one, adding to the game’s quiet charm.
  
  Dialogue appears through speech bubbles, and each player can read through the text at their own pace. The audio stays quietly in the background and never rushes you, letting your communication take centre stage. There’s also a small, delightful surprise for anyone who finishes reading early while waiting for the other player to catch up, and I’ll let you enjoy finding that out for yourself. It’s one of those little touches that made me smile. 
  
  
• The Puzzles | BOKURA contains some rather difficult environmental puzzles. I like these because it isn’t the usual, find a key, bring here to unlock the door scenario, or to find a code somewhere. They are genuine puzzles. Playing through the game, we found time and time again that by dying, we found a slight clue on what to do next. Some puzzles took us a single try, and some took us over twenty tries. But the process of elimination was fun. Benny would go up, only to realise we needed him to be down, and so we had to undo all of our progress just to repeat.
  
  It even went as far as only showing Benny some things, and myself other things. So when Benny was telling me to, “just climb that chain”, I was surprised that it added yet another layer of difficulty to the mix. So not only did we HAVE to communicate using voice chat, it was the type of communication that relied on successfully getting through each puzzle. Despite being environmental puzzles only, there was always enough of them to go around so that each area felt new and exciting. Nothing repeated, yet the difficulty spiked.
  
  
• A Dark Story | During the story segments of BOKURA, you are usually put into two different scenarios. Player A will be taken to one section of the game, and player B will be taken to the other. Both of you are exposed to different events, and I guess ultimately you are to do two playthroughs to get the full context of the story. However since Benny and I used Discord, we were able to fill each other in on what was going on.
  
  
• No Hand Holding | One thing we both appreciated is that BOKURA never holds your hand. There are no big hints or glowing markers telling you what to do, and the game trusts you to talk things through and figure each puzzle out together. The controls are simple and easy to pick up, which makes the focus fall entirely on communication rather than mechanics. It led to some great moments where me and Benny pieced things together purely by describing what we saw, and experimenting until it clicked.
  
  
• Replayability | Because each player sees the world from a completely different perspective, there’s real value in playing through BOKURA again as the other character. Experiencing the puzzles and story from the opposite side adds a fresh layer of discovery, and seeing how your partner’s version of events unfolds gives the game a surprising amount of replayability. It’s something Benny and I plan to do later, just to see how differently the journey feels from the other side.
  
  

Mixed & disliked!

• A Short Experience | BOKURA comes in at around three to four hours total. By the end of the experience, I was feeling extremely satisfied giving how many of the mind boggling puzzles Benny and I had overcome. I wanted more. I wanted more puzzles. More of the story that was being weaved into a seemingly simple puzzle game, (something I would never have imagined).

• Confusing UI | When Benny and I first fired up BOKURA, it wasn’t entirely obvious on what to do. There were a couple of icons to choose from, and after finally selecting the right one, sharing the room code, we hit another wall. In fact, the same button you press to connect to another players room, is also the same button you press to confirm your room code entry. The icon doesn’t change, there are no helpful on screen guides telling you what does what. Just some random icons.
  
  The same goes for during gameplay. I don’t mind this one too much, but there were times where I couldn’t see an object in the world, and there were no icons highlighting that you can interact with certain objects. I understand this might be part of the allure of the game, but the initial interactions with this game did leave me feeling confused, and at some points frustrated.
  
  
• A Costly Checkpoint | There was another moment close to the end that tested our patience a bit. One player has to raise and lower the other using a chain‑like rope, and the placement has to be absolutely perfect. The other player then has to climb the chain and move through small holes in the wall to reach the end point, and it was far more complicated than it should have been. Even worse, the game doesn’t save after you reach that end point.
  
  After many attempts we finally made it through, only to hit another puzzle on the other side. We slipped up, died, and were sent all the way back again. It felt a little infuriating, especially so late in the adventure when the pacing had been steady and cooperative up to that point.
  
  
• A Break in the Flow | There was one puzzle near the end that broke the flow a little. Benny had to work out a solution on his side, describing what he was seeing while I waited with nothing to do. It felt quite one‑sided and slowed the pace of the game for about twenty minutes, leaving me twiddling my thumbs until he finished. It’s a rare moment where BOKURA’s cooperative balance falters, and while it doesn’t ruin the experience, it does stand out against the otherwise well‑shared sense of teamwork.

• How long did I play the review before publishing? 4 hours
• How long to beat the story? 4 hours
• How many Achievements did I earn before publishing? n/a
• How long to get 100%? | 4 hours
• You’ll love this game if you like these | We Were Here, The Past Within, Farewell Planet

Score: 68/100

 BOKURA shines brightly in its opening hours, delivering a clever and heartfelt co‑op experience that kept me and Benny talking, comparing perspectives, and enjoying the surprises in how the story unfolds. Its dual‑world design feels fresh and engaging, especially early on. As the adventure continues, a few frustrations start to creep in and slow the momentum, but the journey remains memorable and absolutely worth sharing with someone you enjoy playing alongside.