Image courtesy of Compulsion Games

Bryce Fraser
Staff Writer

Compulsion Games has done a complete change of the survival game formula that we have seen in other games. Instead of a post-apocalyptic land the game takes place in a dystopian 1960’s London and instead of zombies the player must fight off people addicted to happy pills known in the game as Joy. The game takes place in Wellington Wells where people who don’t take the pill known as Joy are known as Downers. The people of Wellington Wells even wear a white face make up of some sort representing the mask they put on when using their happy pills. The player who chooses not to take the pill, ends up a Downer themselves and must survive by finding food, water, and must sleep.

The game takes place in Wellington Wells where people who don’t take the pill known as Joy are known as Downers. The player ends up being a Downer and must survive by finding food, water, and even sleep.

The game is still in early development with some features that may end up in the finished game might be missing and bugs are also a strong possibility. The main story is not available yet but they tease of things to come. When you start the game you get an option of playing the character prologue The game also promises that later in development you will have a choice of their characters.

In the prologue you play as Arthur Hastings, who works as an information redactor censoring information that would bring the population down. When a newspaper clipping comes in about the Hasting brothers bad memories flood Arthur’s mind of his brother Percy and then he is offered the choice of taking a Joy pill or remembering. Hilariously, if you take the Joy pill the game goes to credits and then back to the main menu If you choose to remember.

As Arthur walks to the conference room he starts to think and notice things about the world. When going into the office next to him, he finds that Clive Birtwhistle wants his office when you read the notes around Birtwhistle’s office, he even a poster of Arthur with devil horn drawn on it.

The main floor of the office is filled with piles of Newspapers lying all over the place and Arthur says out loud how he never noticed how behind on work they are. When entering the conference room a few of his coworkers are gathered around a piñata. When Arthur hits it he is splattered with blood, then sees it was a giant rat the whole time showing that the effect of the Joy is slowly wearing off. When declining a Joy pill he is labeled a Downer and runs from the coming authorities who finally catch up and knock him out and the player wakes up in the Wellington underground.

It is unclear how Arthur got here but it seems that somehow he made it through the door, either way that was the end of the prologue. Now he awakes in the room on the other side. A TV is on with Uncle Jack playing. Uncle Jack is the face of propaganda in the game proclaiming the values of taking Joy.

The player must craft a jimmy bar to crack open the above hatch door to enter into the world above. The crafting system in the game  is simple you must find the allotted amount of items to craft the wanted item. You can craft different suits that offer protection or allow you to fit in better, Jimmy bars are useful for getting through locked doors or other locked containers, and of course crafting bandages to heal the player.

The game graphics art and styles are unique, the game really sets itself apart from other games with its bright colors and 60’s London style architecture. You first end up in Wellington Gardens District,  a rundown place with dull colors and what seem to be broken people. This is where all the Downers end up.

The Garden District, offers some interesting little side quests, crazy legs a man running around saying he has an important date he is late for who the player must somehow incapacitate,  finding a purple pill for a poisoned individual, or even rescue a doll for a very interesting fellow in a tree-house.

To get out there are two bridges one that requires you to know who won the Simeon Says game in town last week and one guarded by someone who really loves honey. I found the bee hive nearby, the game suggests crafting a padded suit so you can withstand the bee stings, I managed to grab the honey without crafting the suit and healed myself with a few bandages. Once you get the honey you are attacked by Downers who want it so they can cross the bridge. I jabbed them a bit with my sharpened stick and ran all the way to bridge where I rewarded the guard with his much sought after honey and made it through the gate.

The game offers a rich world to explore full of lure which are documents found in the world written by the people who live there, they sometimes offer hints to the player for figuring out quests or finding items.

The game allows you to free roam and explore the rich world of Wellington Wells It offers the player a decent amount of game play for someone who is interested in supporting the game by purchasing it before its initial release, the developers created a unique game and it will be interesting to see what they will do with the main story.