If you and a friend are still riding the high of It Takes Two or Split Fiction and looking for your next co-op fix while Hazelight Studios’ next project stays quiet, there’s a gem on Steam that deserves your attention. Inkwellers, developed by Polish indie studio ScrumptiousSprouts and released on May 28, 2026, is a strictly two-player co-op puzzle adventure that combines the intimate teamwork formula of It Takes Two with a magical castle setting that will feel very familiar to anyone who put serious hours into Hogwarts Legacy. It costs $10, a free demo is available, and it’s sitting at 88% positive reviews on Steam.
What Is Inkwellers?
The premise is straightforward but immediately interesting. A mysterious client leaves an old, dusty journal at your shop — and as Inkwellers, your job is to dive literally into the pages of that journal to uncover what’s inside. You and your partner become miniature magical beings navigating a living, breathing storybook world, solving puzzles hidden within Celiphia’s enchanted journal and uncovering the dark tales of betrayal and corruption trapped within its pages.
The game is built from the ground up for exactly two players. There is no single-player option, no AI companion, and no way to progress without a second person. Both players must have a microphone and a stable internet connection — the game itself warns you about this before you launch. That’s not a limitation, it’s the entire design philosophy: Inkwellers is fundamentally a communication game dressed up as a puzzle game, and the microphone requirement is what makes the experience work.
The full playthrough runs 4 to 6 hours, making it an ideal one or two session experience for a duo who wants something with a clear beginning, middle, and end rather than an endless grind loop.
The Hogwarts Legacy Connection — Setting and Atmosphere
If the Inkwellers screenshot grabs your attention before you even read the description, the reason is almost certainly the setting. The game takes place in and around a magical castle that is very consciously reminiscent of Hogwarts — stone corridors, glowing green dungeons, hidden doorways that reveal themselves when examined closely, and magic woven into every surface. If you spent half of Hogwarts Legacy walking slowly through corridors just to soak in the atmosphere, Inkwellers is going to scratch a very similar itch.
The game’s journal mechanic serves as a stand-in for Hogwarts Legacy’s field guide, and magic is the medium through which all puzzles are framed and solved. The visual palette leans into stylised fantasy — Steam tags the game as Fantasy, Magic, Colorful, and Atmospheric — and the first-person perspective puts you right in the middle of that environment rather than observing it from behind a character.
The key difference from Hogwarts Legacy is obviously the co-op structure and puzzle focus. Inkwellers isn’t an open-world RPG — it’s a tightly constructed series of connected puzzle spaces built specifically for two people to navigate together. Think less “explore a massive magical world” and more “figure out what this specific magical room wants you to do, together, while talking to each other constantly.”
How the Co-Op Puzzle Design Actually Works
This is where the It Takes Two comparison earns its place. The reason games like It Takes Two, Split Fiction, and A Way Out have connected so hard with players is because they don’t just let two people play side by side — they create situations where each player has fundamentally different information, tools, or perspective, and success requires bridging that gap through communication.
Inkwellers uses the same core principle. Puzzles are regularly designed so that one player can see something the other cannot. One player might have a glowing marker showing where to go or what to interact with while their partner’s screen shows nothing — forcing the informed player to give clear, accurate directions and the other to trust and execute. If the instructions are vague, or if the blind teammate doesn’t follow them properly, the puzzle doesn’t move forward. There’s no workaround. You have to actually talk to each other and make it work.
Other puzzles split the players into separate spaces where what one person does in their area directly affects the other’s environment in ways neither can fully observe. You have to describe what you’re seeing and what’s happening in real time, piece together what the other is experiencing on their end, and coordinate a solution that neither player could figure out from their own perspective alone. For anyone who’s played Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes or any of the more demanding Escape Simulator rooms, the vibe is immediately familiar.
All Puzzle Types in Inkwellers
The game offers a solid range of puzzle categories across its 4 to 6-hour runtime, keeping the experience from feeling repetitive. Confirmed puzzle types include:
- Light manipulation puzzles
- Constellation puzzles
- Potion-crafting puzzles
- Matching puzzles
- Code puzzles
- Perspective puzzles
- Clock puzzles
- Sliding box puzzles
The variety is important for a game this short — you’re not grinding the same puzzle type for six hours, which is one of the more consistent things players mention in positive reviews. The difficulty curve is also well-calibrated based on community feedback: challenging enough that you can’t brute-force answers without thinking, but not so punishing that stuck players feel hopeless. There’s a generous hint system available if things get genuinely frustrating, and reviewers have noted that the game does a solid job of signalling when you’re on the right track.
What Reviewers Are Saying
With 88% positive reviews on Steam from over 100 ratings, Inkwellers has found its audience and largely satisfied it. The recurring themes in positive reviews cluster around the same things: the magical setting is atmospheric and well-realised, the puzzle variety keeps things fresh, the difficulty is in a sweet spot, and the forced communication creates exactly the kind of memorable co-op moments the genre is known for — including arguments.
That last point is worth emphasising because it’s not a bug, it’s the feature. When one player is giving directions and the other is executing them and something goes wrong, the resulting back-and-forth is exactly the kind of shared experience that makes co-op games memorable. Reviewers specifically praise the game for creating those moments naturally through its asymmetric information design rather than forcing contrived bickering mechanics.
The main criticisms are minor but worth knowing. One puzzle in the potion-crafting level has been flagged as buggy — the Steam Community page shows the developers have been actively patching issues with Hotfix #9 adding Portuguese support and fixing a bubble symbol bug in level 3 alongside other fixes, so the studio is clearly iterating. Some players also note that the narrative is thin — you’re essentially exploring and puzzle-solving because that’s what the game is, not because there’s a deeply involving story pulling you forward. For players who need a compelling plot to stay engaged, that could be a limitation. For players who just want a well-designed co-op puzzle experience, it’s unlikely to be a problem.
Should You Buy Inkwellers?
At $10, the value proposition for co-op puzzle fans is strong. You’re getting a polished, well-reviewed 4 to 6-hour experience specifically designed for two players, with a setting that evokes Hogwarts Legacy’s magical castle atmosphere and a communication-driven puzzle structure in the same vein as It Takes Two. The price is low enough that even if the game isn’t a perfect fit for your particular duo, it’s not a painful lesson.
If you want to test the waters first, the free Steam demo is available and covers enough of the game to give a genuine sense of whether the formula clicks for you and your co-op partner. The demo has 94% positive reviews on its own listing, which is actually higher than the main game — suggesting that the demo does a good job of showcasing what Inkwellers does well without underselling it.
The one firm requirement to keep in mind: you genuinely need a friend who has a microphone, a stable connection, and the time to sit through a session together. This isn’t a game you can pick up and put down in 20-minute bursts. It’s designed to be experienced in full sessions, the way you’d approach an escape room — and like an escape room, half the value is the shared experience of working through it together.
For more gaming news this week, check out our coverage of how Dragon Ball Sparking Zero NEO DLC confirms Whis as the strongest Angel in the Multiverse and the Pokemon Pokopia Version 2.0 update with full patch notes.
