A Guide to the Best Family-Friendly Co-op Games of 2014

The 2014 holiday season offered a strong lineup of cooperative, family-friendly video games, particularly for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Several established franchises returned with new installments that refined their gameplay, expanded their worlds, and provided excellent opportunities for parents and children to play together. The year was marked by the continued dominance of the toys-to-life genre, the persistent popularity of creative sandbox games, and the reliable fun of the Lego series.

Creative Co-op: Minecraft and LittleBigPlanet 3

Minecraft had already established itself as a global phenomenon, and its arrival on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in 2014 was a significant upgrade. While the core experience of survival and creation remained the same, the versions for the newer consoles offered substantial technical improvements over their PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 counterparts. Most notably, the worlds players could generate were significantly larger, allowing for grander exploration and more ambitious building projects. The games also supported up to four players in local split-screen co-op and up to eight players online, making it an accessible and affordable choice at a launch price of $20. Cooperative play is central to the Minecraft experience. In Survival mode, players can work together to gather resources, build a fortified shelter against nocturnal monsters, and embark on dangerous mining expeditions. In Creative mode, the game transforms into a limitless digital building set, where families can collaborate on constructing anything they can imagine, from simple houses to sprawling cities.

LittleBigPlanet 3 continued the series’ “Play, Create, Share” philosophy on both PS3 and PS4. While the previous games were developed by Media Molecule, this entry was handled by Sumo Digital. The game introduced three new playable characters alongside the familiar Sackboy, each with unique abilities designed to facilitate cooperative puzzle-solving. OddSock was a fast, four-legged character who could run up and jump off walls. Toggle could switch at will between a large, heavy form to weigh down platforms and a small, light form to fit through tiny gaps. Swoop was a bird-like character who could fly freely and carry other characters or objects. The main story campaign was built around using these characters’ distinct skills in tandem. Beyond the main game, LittleBigPlanet 3’s greatest asset was its backward compatibility. At launch, it provided access to the millions of user-created levels from LittleBigPlanet and LittleBigPlanet 2, offering a virtually endless supply of content for players to explore together.

Toys-to-Life Adventures: Skylanders and Disney Infinity

The toys-to-life market, where physical figurines are scanned into a game, was a major force in 2014. Skylanders Trap Team was the fourth major installment in the series that started the trend. The game was released on a wide array of platforms, including PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Wii, and Wii U. Its central innovation was the Traptanium Portal. After defeating one of the game’s trappable villains, players could place a physical Traptanium Crystal toy into a slot on the portal. This action would “trap” the villain, who would then become a playable character that could be switched to on the fly. The villains would even speak to the player from inside the crystal, thanks to a small speaker built into the new portal. This added a new collectible element, the Traps, and a fresh gameplay mechanic of turning enemies into allies. The Starter Pack included the game, the portal, two Skylander figures, and two traps to get players started.

Disney’s direct competitor, Disney Infinity 2.0: Marvel Super Heroes, leveraged the immense popularity of the Marvel universe. Like its predecessor, the game was split into two modes: Play Sets and the Toy Box. Play Sets were structured, story-driven campaigns set within a specific franchise. The Marvel Super Heroes Starter Pack included figures for Iron Man, Thor, and Black Widow, along with the Avengers Play Set piece that unlocked a campaign set in New York City. Other Marvel Play Sets, for franchises like Spider-Man and Guardians of the Galaxy, were sold separately. The Toy Box mode was a creative sandbox where players could use any character from the entire Disney Infinity line to build their own worlds, create mini-games, and share them online. All figures and Power Discs from the original Disney Infinity were compatible with the 2.0 Toy Box, ensuring that players’ existing collections retained their value.

Block-Based Heroics: Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham

By 2014, developer Traveller’s Tales had perfected its formula for Lego games, and Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham was another high-quality entry. Released for PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Wii U, the game offered the series’ signature drop-in, drop-out cooperative gameplay. The story saw the villain Brainiac using the Lantern Rings to shrink worlds for his collection, forcing the Justice League and the Legion of Doom to form an uneasy alliance to stop him. As the title suggests, the action moved beyond Gotham City into outer space. Players traveled to various Lantern Worlds like Oa and Zamaron, providing a welcome change of scenery from the urban environments of previous games. The character roster was massive, featuring over 150 playable characters from across the DC Comics universe. Co-op puzzle-solving remained a core mechanic, requiring players to switch between characters and use their unique suit abilities, like Cyborg’s Demolition Suit or Robin’s Illumination Suit, to progress through levels.