After a stunning showing at Microsoft’s 2016 E3 press
conference, Compulsion Games’ We Happy Few was suddenly on everyone’s
radar. The trailer made it look like
the second coming of BioShock in 1960’s England, so our excitement was pretty
much through the roof. What the trailer
showed, and what the game actually seems to be, however, are two vastly
different things, which is somewhat disappointing. What do we mean? Read our
full We Happy Few preview for details.
We Happy Few is currently available as part of the Xbox GamePreview program for $29.99. Keep in
mind that this is not a finished product and has bugs and issues and the
content can change before the final release.
This particular build also doesn’t have any story elements outside of
the initial sequence that was shown in the Xbox E3 trailer. It only focuses on gameplay.
After playing the Xbox Game Preview release of We Happy Few
our expectations are lowered a bit. It
turns out that the game, or at least this build of the game, isn’t really
anything like most people thought it would be.
It isn’t a trippy jaunt through a creepy dystopian world and is,
instead, a fairly clumsy and clunky survival game.
The story concept of an alternate reality 1960’s England
where the masses are kept happy through a drug called Joy, and those that don’t
take their Joy are booted out of town to live in the slums, is absolutely
fascinating. With the government
censoring anything that might agitate the people or make them unhappy and also
secretly eliminating anyone that steps out of line, We Happy Few is a fresh
take on an Orwellian dystopia that has a ton of potential. It is a shame you don’t actually get to see
any of that story outside of the opening sequence in the Xbox Game Preview version.
Instead, you’re just unceremoniously dumped into an open
world survival sim. You have to eat,
drink, sleep, and otherwise maintain your health while exploring an open world
and avoiding conflicts with the residents – known as Downers because, like you,
they stopped taking their Joy – and the police. Act too happy and the Downers attack you. Act too suspicious and the police come after
you. Or just sneak around so no one
notices you instead, which is what the game really wants you to do. So, quick check up – We Happy Few is an open
world survival sim stealth game and not a BioShock clone.
While the stealth actually isn’t too strict or too hard and
isn’t that big of a problem - and you can just fight your way out of situations if you want -, the survival aspect of the game seems really,
really, really weird and out of place and wholly unnecessary. Your meters for hunger and thirst and sleep
deplete ridiculously fast, so it is a constant struggle to scrounge up food and
water and other items. The day / night
cycle is also stupidly fast, to the point you can barely walk down the street
before you have to run back to your base and sleep again. On top of the annoyance of having to
constantly monitor the survival aspects, We Happy Few also has an extensive
crafting system where you craft new items out of the crap you find all
over. Honestly, it is a mess.
We Happy Few just has too many mechanics and systems and
fluff all crammed together at this point and could really benefit from being
simplified a bit. Ditching the survival
aspect entirely would be a start because I don't understand why it is here in the first place.
You have to keep in mind that this is just a preview version
of a game many months away from a final release, but I think that is also part
of the problem. I honestly feel like We
Happy Few was a poor choice for Xbox Game Preview and it was particularly
unwise to not include any story features in this version especially after the
E3 trailer showed something totally different from what the game actually
is. Perhaps the gameplay mechanics make
more sense when you have the story to give them context, but in this preview
build the game is just mundane and bland and not very fun. Even if it turns out to be great, this Xbox
Game Preview release may have done irreparable damage to the public perception
of the game, and that’s a shame. I’ll
say it again; We Happy Few was probably a poor choice to be part of the Game
Preview program.
On a happier note, the presentation is actually quite good
even now in We Happy Few. The game
looks fantastic and the outdoor areas are lush and bright and colorful and pretty
great.
There is still a long way to go in the development of
We Happy Few, thankfully, so things can change. Part of the fun of the Xbox Game Preview program is being able to
see first hand how games can change and improve during development, so I’m not
going to count We Happy Few out just yet. You can also, of course, buy the Xbox Game Preview version and try it out yourself as well, though we don't really recommend it. At least not yet. We’ll try to keep this article updated over the course of development. Disclosure: A preview code was provided by the game publisher.
