What Rivalry is
Rivalry is a two-player hotseat game where each of you takes turns moving your rag-doll character's limbs and weapons with the mouse until one of you wins. It mixes turn-based strategy with a side-scrolling fighter and adds rag-dolls on top. The opening of a match plays like careful swordplay — you're choosing angles, positioning blades, thinking a move ahead. As damage accumulates and limbs come off, the whole thing drifts into something much more absurd, in the spirit of Monty Python. The game is in Early Access, so expect it to still be taking shape.
How a group plays it
Two people sit at one machine and pass turns back and forth, which is the core of the hotseat setup. Everyone else in the call can watch and react — a match of Rivalry makes a good spectator round while the group decides what to play next. Since the game supports Remote Play Together, one person who owns it can bring a friend in over the internet to share the session. The mouse is the input for controlling your character's limbs and weapons, so a mouse is what you need on hand.
Before you start
Go in knowing this is a duel, not a party mode — the design is built around two players trading turns. The tag list includes Gore, and limbs do get taken as the fight goes on, so that's worth flagging for anyone in the group who'd rather not watch that. It's also tagged Local Multiplayer, which matches the hotseat play. Because it's Early Access, mechanics and presentation may change between sessions. The game comes from Kew McParlane, who built it as a young developer after a successful Kickstarter that got the game shown at PAX.