We Happy Few

[h1][i]Baby, did you forget to take your meds?[/i] ~Placebo[/h1] K, I love this kind of fiction. [b]George Orwell[/b]’s [b]Nineteen Eighty-Four[/b], [b]Aldous Huxley[/b]’s [b]Brave New World[/b], [b]Anthony Burgess[/b]’s [b]A Clockwork Orange[/b], and, of course, [b]The Trial[/b] by [b]Franz Kafka[/b]. Totally my kind of stuff. And [b]We Happy Few[/b]? It's surely inspired by all of those, and more. From the very beginning of this review, I want to praise those who are responsible for the world of this game. Even though the writing can be arguable, the world itself? It’s downright fantastic. Despite the fact that the game begins with a pretty generic '[i]Wake up, [b]Neo[/b]...[/i]' thingy (told you the writing can be arguable), I felt like I was about to fall in love with this game. To make a long story short, we've got ourselves a world where everybody's happy. And if you’ve read the works I’ve mentioned above, you surely know that a big 'but' is coming. It surely does. See, people in this game are happy for one simple reason: a drug called [b]Joy[/b]. In other words, everybody's on meds here. And if there’s someone who isn't? They’re seen as a so-called [b]Downer[/b]. And what happens if that someone is you? Well, everybody begins to attack you. And the atmosphere-wise it works [i]perfectly[/i]. I mean, there's a good reason why people enjoy zombie fiction so much: it's that certain conflict of human nature. Humans are herd animals. Yet while being more than just animals, deep inside we're afraid of each other—afraid of society turning on us. That's why zombie movies and games work so well; they play on that inner fear. And [b]We Happy Few[/b]? It does the job even better. It makes the roles we play in the real life more obvious. Like in the real life, we go outside in this game—we’re supposed to dress accordingly (different parts of society here have different dress codes), we’re supposed to smile and say 'hi!' (in [b]We Happy Few[/b], doing that is a nice way to calm those who begin disliking you down), etc. And, of course, to make things even more symbolic, people wear masks. And yes, removing those is a part of the story, which is divided into three acts, following different characters (somewhat like in [b]Pathologic[/b]). So, is it a great game? Well... The answer is no. See, while doing the setting and the atmosphere right, [b]We Happy Few[/b] fails with pretty much everything else. The actual gameplay? It’s way too messy to be truly enjoyable. At the end of the day, it's all about two things: going to a quest marker and pressing the button there, and avoiding to irritate the other citizens while doing that. Which, while quite enjoyable in theory, quickly becomes annoying as heck. It's just that: dress appropriately and be on meds. Or else '[i]boom![/i]' The whole neighborhood is suddenly a zombie realm. Again, very symbolic, but it becomes really, [i]really[/i] annoying quite soon. And to make things worse? [b]We Happy Few[/b] comes with one of those crafting mechanics that are popular nowadays. You know, one of those that involve picking up random stuff and turning it into necessities. Now, technically, it's not a bad thing. I mean, I never liked such stuff (didn't even like the new [b]Zelda[/b] games because of all that), but technically, it's not bad. But, combined with the mechanics that require you to constantly have your wits about you? It's kind of a nightmare, really. Not because of it being hard, but because of it being annoying as heck. And it's not like you can progress without the crafting. Not only will you need to craft healing items, everything else is all about crafting, too. Here's an example: one of the tasks in the main questline requires you to collect honey. And the only way to do that is to craft yourself a padded suit. Now, where to find the materials? Well, that's yet another problem with this game. It's random. Maps are random (which leads to some really stupid things, like roads leading to dead ends), and items pop up randomly, too. It's just that: walking through streets full of potential enemies, checking the garbage bins for the things you desperately need. Then a tiny old lady begins screaming, and all of a sudden you're dead. [i]Joy.[/i] But wait for it. There's more. You'll also get tired and hungry. And in the second act? In the second act, you'll get yourself a baby. [i]A bloody baby![/i] And you'll need to constantly visit it. Just think about it: you're on the other part of the open world map, doing some really important main quest sh*t. Yet your baby is getting hungry or needs a new diaper. What do you must do? You must [i]abandon[/i] the important thing completely and go [i]a-a-all[/i] the way back, while avoiding conflicts, as usual. Because parenting. What. The f*ck. Were. They. [i]Thinking?![/i] Any parents here? Yeah, I can only imagine how much you'll 'like' that: finally getting some time to play something when your little one's finally asleep and ending up with [i]that[/i]. It's just... [i]Eugh[/i]. If you have a bad temper, you'll be triggered again and again because of all that. Now, what about the third act? In the third act, you'll need to watch your blood sugar. You'll need to craft a lot of glucose syringes, which will require empty syringes. Which, of course, appear randomly in random containers. Ah, and remember—the meds. Meds are a [i]must[/i]. What a mess... That's probably why I enjoyed the [b]DLC[/b]s way more than the main game. I mean, those are short (about two hours each), yet creative, FPS-like things. Pretty dull, very tunnel-like. And yes, I've used 'creative' and 'dull' together, but honestly, that's how those [b]DLC[/b]s are. Each one comes with its own unique gimmick ([b]They Came from Below[/b] has a multi-task gun, [b]Lightbearer[/b] has the guitar you can use as a weapon, while [b]We All Fall Down[/b] has a whip and a gun that can turn the electrics off), but at the same time, it's obvious that (despite all your rage) you're still just a rat in a cage. So... yeah. At the end of the day, [b]We Happy Few[/b] offers you a brilliantly deep and symbolic world, but won't let you have fun in it. It's one of those games that's just more annoying than fun. There's a very big chance you'll love, say, the first 30 minutes of your time there, but 20-plus hours of fighting the randomness and trying to please people who are waiting to beat the living hell out of you because you're not on meds? Like I said, it's annoying and not fun at all.

I really enjoyed this game, the story and the soundtrack especially carry it for me. The gameplay isn't that bad either however there are quite a few bugs (like NPC's sitting backwards lmao). The combat system is nice but the issue of "one person gets mad at you and now the entire population is chasing you" is annoying, especially when the person who got mad at you is because of a bug or [spoiler]running into an Uncle Jack fan as Ollie, where it can be unavoidable,[/spoiler] makes the game unfairly punishing. If this game had a patch that just did nothing but go through and fix bugs I think it would be a lot more enjoyable and feel less janky. Personally I don't mind the jank because it never broke my entire game or made it unplayable but I know its not always the case and most people will find it infuriating. The games soundtrack is very very good and you should listen to it, some of the songs have even been added into my playlist rotation.

Basically my childhood in a sense. Freaking love this game!! I've completed 2 of the dlcs and both the sally and arthur playthroughs so far. Obviously not on this account, but still. I LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS GAME AND I NEED EVERYONE TO PLAY IT!!!!

great game but 60 dollars is too much.

There are very few video games with settings inspired by 1984 and its political dystopias. Beholder 1 and 2, for example, which I loved and [u] highly recommend. [/u] Then there's We Happy Few, a video game that took inspiration from these settings and incorporated the antidepressant Joy into the lore. It was also addictive, as part of the gameplay. It was very beautiful, with wonderful aesthetics, and even reminded me a little of Bioshock, with its retrofuturism. But it fails miserably in terms of gameplay: boring, distracting, going from point A to point B, tons of missions, a weird save system, and especially terrible graphics optimization. And I tried and tried, I found solutions, I lowered the graphics, but this video game constantly drops frames or freezes. These often happen when you load new areas (?). At least the prologue was playable enough, but once you got to the first city, the drama began. I even tried to get used to it, focusing on the main mission (without exploring too much), but in the end I couldn't and my head was spinning. I think this game is a wasted opportunity. It's a shame, because the story was starting to interest me. I had chosen Arthur. I even wanted to buy some DLC, because I really love the genre, like 1984, but I changed my mind. Optimization in video games is very important.

I like the whole idea of the game but it's just boring to me, have tried multiple times on PC and even back on xbox one.

os cara tinha a faca e o queijo na mão, slk... jogo mó interessante, bonito, história legal, mas cheio de bugs, cheguei a zerar ele, mas zerei com pressa por causa da experiencia ruim, muito bugado, afeta dmais a gameplay. fico muito triste que só deixaram esse jogo de lado e n se propuseram a arrumar ele -_-

good reference for where Americas headed in a couple years, would recommend

the game has a great art style, atmosphere and plot. However there are a number of glitches and glitched quests. You seem to to need to do certain quests in a certain order and the game doesn't tell you this at all. Some parts of the game require you to have certain items, but the game doesn't tell you this until its too late. I reached a quest at a church that tells me to go get a guy in his house. I break into his house and discover a locked door that needs a hacking tool that I don't even have access to. Now I'm getting zapped to death trying to figure out why I can't open this door. Its a shame because this game could have been actually fantastic but I feel like it was rushed without proper quality assurance testing. I keep trying to enjoy it but keep getting kneecapped by constant bugs and glitches. I've had to google a couple of quests so far, only to discover that shouldn't have even been trying to complete it yet in the first place. Game quests should follow a logical order. You shouldn't give players quests that require items that they don't even have access to in the early game. The best way I can sum up this game is "haha! silly player! you're trying to do a quest you can't even complete yet! hahaha! you just wasted your time!" Update: I'm now into sally's quest line. This game is still sort of terrible. I need to constantly feed this baby, but the crafting components are scarce and there's no vendors that sell the supplies! This is a terrible system. The atmosphere of this game is great but the actual gameplay is terrible.

Takes a while to learn the mechanics, but the story payoff is worth the effort. I enjoyed the colors most, most games are very dreary, this one feels alive. very worth playing till the end.