You’re playing Hazel’s Room. It’s colorful. It’s whimsical. Then, suddenly, there’s a wooden board with some holes in it and a couple of plunger guns. This is it. This is the target practice It Takes Two minigame that basically turns a cooperative masterpiece into a sweat-drenched competitive nightmare for about sixty seconds. It’s weird how Hazel’s Room—a place filled with giant space monkeys and kaleidoscopic portals—becomes the setting for a high-stakes shooting gallery.
Most people stumble into this minigame thinking it’s just a cute distraction. It isn't.
If you’re Cody, you’ve got the green plunger gun. May gets the red one. You stand there, looking at a wall of targets that pop up like whack-a-moles, and the game expects you to have the twitch reflexes of a pro-circuit Valorant player. Honestly, the difficulty spike here is kind of hilarious compared to the rest of the Rose’s Room chapter. One minute you’re navigating gravity-defying platforms, and the next, you're screaming at your partner because they "stole" your target on the far left. It’s chaotic. It’s loud. It’s exactly what Josef Fares and the team at Hazelight Studios intended when they designed these competitive interludes.
Finding the Target Practice It Takes Two Minigame
You actually have to look for it. It’s not forced on you like some of the boss fights. In the "Rose’s Room" chapter, specifically within the "Fortress" section, you’ll find yourself in a hub area. There’s a lot going on here—action figures, a marble run, and a general sense of childhood nostalgia dialed up to eleven.
To find the target practice It Takes Two setup, you need to keep your eyes peeled for a wooden carnival-style booth. It looks exactly like something you’d see at a dusty county fair. There are two Tambourines sitting right in front of it. Interact with those, and the minigame triggers. If you miss it, you're skipping one of the 25 minigames required for the "Minigame Megalomania" achievement. And nobody wants to backtrack through the space monkey segment just because they missed a shooting gallery.
The Mechanics of Frustration
The game is simple on paper. Targets pop up. You hit them. You get points.
But there’s a catch. Some targets are worth more than others, and they stay up for different lengths of time. The plunger physics are actually surprisingly snappy. There isn't a massive amount of projectile drop, but there is a slight delay between pulling the trigger and the "thwack" of the plunger hitting the wood. You have to lead your shots just a tiny bit if a target is moving, though most in this specific game are stationary pop-ups.
The scoring breaks down like this:
Standard circular targets give you a base point value. Then there are the smaller ones or the ones further back that reward precision. Because the camera is fixed in a side-by-side split-screen view, your peripheral vision is cut in half. You’re literally fighting the screen as much as you’re fighting your partner.
Honestly, the hardest part isn't the aiming. It’s the "Target Stealing." Since both players can hit any target on the board, it becomes a game of territorial dominance. If Cody is faster, May gets nothing. This is where the "It Takes Two" philosophy of cooperation flips on its head. It’s a zero-sum game. One winner. One loser. One person who gets to gloat for the next ten minutes of platforming while the other mutters under their breath about input lag.
Why This Specific Minigame Matters for Completionists
If you’re a trophy hunter, target practice It Takes Two is a mandatory stop. Hazelight designed these minigames to be "blink and you'll miss it" moments that flesh out the world. They don't give you power-ups. They don't unlock new abilities. They give you something much more valuable in a couch co-op game: bragging rights.
The game tracks your wins. Every time you finish a minigame, a little scoreboard pops up showing the total tally of wins between Cody and May. If you're playing with a significant other, this scoreboard can become a genuine source of domestic tension. I've seen play-throughs where people spend thirty minutes replaying this one-minute minigame just to even the score. It’s addictive because it’s fair. There’s no RNG (random number generation) here. If you miss, you missed.
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Strategies for Winning (Without Ruining the Relationship)
If you actually want to win, you need to stop looking at the whole board.
Divide the screen. Even though the game doesn't enforce it, you and your partner should subconsciously split the shooting gallery down the middle. If Cody takes the left and May takes the right, the total score will be higher, but the competition will be tighter.
Wait. That’s boring.
If you want to win, you play dirty. Watch the center. The center targets are the "contested" ones. If you can snap to the center faster than your partner, you’re essentially taking points out of their pocket. Also, don't spam the trigger. There’s a very slight recovery time for the plunger gun. If you miss a shot by firing too fast, you'll be stuck in a "reload" animation while a high-value target disappears.
Precision over speed. Always.
The Cultural Impact of It Takes Two’s Variety
Why do we even care about a shooting gallery in a game about a divorcing couple turned into dolls?
It’s about pacing. It Takes Two is an exhausting game. It throws new mechanics at you every twenty minutes. One second you're a wizard, the next you're flying a plane made of underpants. These minigames, like target practice It Takes Two, serve as "palate cleansers." They ground the experience. They remind you that while the narrative is about fixing a broken marriage, the game is about having fun with the person sitting next to you on the couch.
Hazelight, led by Josef Fares, famously "doesn't do" boring. They’ve gone on record saying they’d rather have a short, dense game than a long, bloated one. Every minigame is hand-crafted. There’s no procedural generation here. That’s why the target practice feels so intentional. It’s a nod to classic arcade games, tucked away in a corner of a child’s imagination.
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Common Glitches and Issues
Most people won't run into problems, but if you're playing on older hardware or through a particularly laggy "Friend's Pass" connection online, you might notice some desync.
Since It Takes Two allows one person to own the game and the other to play for free, the network code has to be robust. However, in high-precision games like target practice, a 100ms ping difference can make the game feel "rigged." If you're the guest player and you feel like your plungers are passing through targets, it’s probably a latency issue. In that case, the host usually has the advantage.
If you're playing local co-op, you have no excuses. It's all skill. Or lack thereof.
Beyond the Shooting Gallery
Once you finish target practice It Takes Two, don't just run to the next objective. Hazel’s Room is packed with other interactions. There’s a nearby photobooth where you can take pictures, and a bunch of environmental "toys" that don't count as official minigames but are still worth poking.
The genius of the game is that it rewards curiosity. If you see a button, press it. If you see a lever, pull it. The target practice booth is just one example of how the developers filled every corner with something to do.
Mastering the Plunger Gun
Let's talk about the actual "feel" of the gun. It’s not a hitscan weapon. In gaming terms, "hitscan" means the bullet hits exactly where you're aiming the instant you click. The plunger gun in the target practice It Takes Two minigame behaves more like a projectile. It has travel time.
If you’re aiming at a target that’s far away, you have to account for that split second of flight. It’s subtle, but it’s there. If you treat it like a real physics-based object, your accuracy will jump by about 20%.
Also, pay attention to the sound cues. The game uses spatial audio to tell you where a target has popped up. If you hear a "clack" to your right, don't wait to see it with your eyes—start moving the reticle.
Actionable Steps for Your Playthrough
If you’re currently in the middle of a session or planning one for tonight, here is exactly how to handle this segment to get the most out of it:
- Don't Rush the Fortress: When you enter the "Fortress" section of Rose's Room, slow down. Look for the wooden booth with the red and green color coding.
- Check Your Achievement Tracker: If you’re going for the Platinum or 1000/1000 G, open your menu and check the "Minigames" tab. Ensure the "Target Practice" icon is filled in. If it’s greyed out, you haven't played it yet.
- Calibrate Your Sensitivity: If you find the reticle is "flying" past the targets, dip into the settings. It Takes Two has decent controller calibration. Lowering the sensitivity slightly can actually help with the precision needed for the smaller targets.
- Play Twice: Switch sides. Play as Cody, then play as May. The perspective shift in split-screen actually changes how you perceive the distance of the targets.
- Look for the "Easter Eggs": Some targets in these minigames have unique animations if you hit them in a certain order, though in the target practice, it's mostly about the raw score.
The target practice It Takes Two minigame isn't the hardest challenge you'll face—that's probably the Cuckoo Clock section or the infamous Queen boss fight—but it's a perfect microcosm of what makes the game great. It’s a small, polished, competitive spark in a massive cooperative world.
Grab the plunger gun. Aim for the center. Don't let your partner win. That's the real secret to a healthy gaming relationship.
Once you've cleared the target practice, your next move should be heading deeper into the Fortress to find the "Baseball" minigame. It’s located just a bit further along the main path, and it offers a similar competitive vibe but with timing-based hitting instead of aiming. Keeping the momentum going with these small wins makes the longer platforming sections feel much more rewarding. Just remember to keep an eye on that win-loss tally in the menu—it's the only record that truly matters when the credits finally roll.