As the name suggests there are few things to be happy about with “We Happy Few” but it’s not as broken as most critics will have you think.
The game is a blend of genres being part roleplaying, stealth, survival and it’s first person view lends it to be action as well.
The story takes place on a british isle called Wellington Wells in a retro-futuristic 1960’s where World War 2 took some horrible tolls on the residents. I won’t go into to much detail on the story as if you are considering playing it I don’t want to spoil it.
The drug element of the game is called “joy” and is what the Wellington Wells people take in order to live with what happened during the war. There are factions (Downers) that choose not to take the drug or can’t for other reasons but they are banished to live outside the city. These story elements made me think of the Christian Bale movie “Equilibrium”, if you haven’t seen it I highly recommend it.
The game does a great job of showing you the two different aspects of Joy and Downer, to the point that even the music changes speed to match when you are or aren’t taking the drug, colours become more vibrant as well, but too much can cause an overdose.
The game has been compared pretty heavily to the Bioshock franchise and while visually it’s similar and the 60’s future elements can be compared they are very different games.
Not without it’s performance issues there are a few bugs but in a game this complex it’s kind of at an acceptable level. Especially if you compare it to games like Skyrim that rated very well with all it’s bugs.
We Happy Few is not perfect, but it’s a really well told story with an amazing soundtrack. The super dark themes mixed with the vibrant colours and cartoonish graphics are a welcome change to the norm.
We Happy Few is a 3 out of 5
