You have various tools available on your desk to aid you in this endeavour. Now, you’ll have to cross reference people’s passports with their work permit and work visas, as well as do some minor interrogation on people to check that the details match their account. You’ll be given a newspaper report of it too, just to rub it in further. Security gets tighter as a result of this suicide bombing at the border. You go home with less pay and the worrying feeling that perhaps you accidentally let in that suicide bomber and caused the death of dozens of your fellow Arstotzkans. The security guards on your screen are running and they see a man whose coat is open, waving explosives about. You’re trying to assess a person when the game seems to freeze. Life is good for you and your family who depends on your earnings. So you check for discrepancies and highlight any that exist, but still, for the most part, most people get through. The next day, you’re told that people need to have their passports checked as well. You let people through easily and you’ll earn lots of money doing so. Stamp DENY though, and they’ll trudge out of the line. You stamp ALLOW on their requisite documents and they go through. It starts off fairly easy, and initially, the only requirement to get into Arstotzka, the nation you work for, is to have a dated entry permit for today or to be a citizen. You play the role of a border controls officer who has to verify things like entry permits, passports, work permits and work visas and decide who to let in. What I discovered was a rather deceivingly simple looking game. Still, I was intrigued, and I downloaded the Beta version to give it a go. Unfortunately my Chinese surname was probably not going to be very suitable. For the game is set in a kind of dystopian eastern-European setting, and the names already in the game reflect that influence. After further exploration of the site, I realised that it was unlikely my name would ever make the final cut. I thought, why not, and inputted my name. It's a chilling lesson and one that videogames are in a unique position to make.Papers Please caught my attention when they started advertising on sites for people to input their names which would then appear in the game as NPC names. When 'playing' you're too busy to think about the arbitrary decisions you make: you may enter, you may not, next! Once you've stop playing though it really hits home just how quickly you have been become a cog in a repressive regime, even if it's a virtual one. It's a brilliant little piece of social commentary. Papers, Please could be described as a rather odd puzzle game but its far more than that. It's well worth a couple of plays through, plus there's an endless puzzle mode for those who really enjoy the toil, not our idea of fun though. Finishing the game, and getting one of numerous endings, takes around 4 hours. You can replay any level, and you'll want to if you have a really bad day at the office. The applicants vary, but certain characters and situations are fixed for each level. Keep an eye on the state newspaper, as it provides hints and cluesĮach level of the game consists of a few minutes of hectic clicking you can put it on easy mode if you want a more relaxed, but equally evocative, experience.
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