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The Occupation (1980's Britain's terrorism with realtime aspect)

Wirdschowerdn

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http://www.occupation-game.com





The Occupation is a politically driven, first-person, narrative game set in 1980’s North-West England in which you play as a whistleblowing journalist.

A terrorist attack has left 23 dead & has become a catalyst for the creation of The Union Act. A controversial act which threatens the civil liberties of the British population.

The day is October 24th 1987 and the next 4 hours will determine the outcome of the act and the future of the country. Events happen in real-time and you must make decisions based on the evidence surrounding you.

Is the cost of an extreme action outweighed by the cause of the greater good?

You are the reporter. You decide the narrative.

 
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Aeschylus

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There are few things I enjoy less than constant time pressure in adventure games. But I suppose this will appeal to some.
 

Tigranes

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This seems really cool, actually, some of the principles of the last express into a very different setup. I like what they've done to depict Manchester.
 

Wirdschowerdn

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Infinitron

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https://www.pcgamer.com/the-occupation-review/

THE OCCUPATION REVIEW
A sometimes brilliant but noticeably buggy immersive sim about investigative journalism.

The Occupation, a game about investigative journalism, feels like a rough first draft of something spectacular.

When it works like it’s supposed to, it's the best immersive sim since 2017’s Prey: you solve inventive, multi-stage puzzles in labyrinthine offices by swiping key cards, cracking safes, pulling crumpled memos from bins, and printing incriminating documents from whirring computers.

The bulk of the game plays out over four real-time hours, and three sections have a time limit. It creates a tension I haven’t seen in the genre before, and makes every second—every agonising moment spent waiting for an incoming fax to screech into an out-of-bounds office—feel vital.

Unfortunately, it’s simply not ready for release. For every clever clue, I encountered a frustrating bug, one of which cost me a full hour of progress. The restrictive save system means you can’t reload when the game inevitably breaks, and it also stops you from exploring these intricately-designed spaces over and over, which feels like a massive missed opportunity.

You play as journalist Harvey Miller, who’s writing a report on an explosion at the Bowman Carson Group’s headquarters in north-west England. The group is helping the government co-ordinate The Union Act 1987, a controversial bill designed to restrict civil liberties and crack down on immigration, all in the name of national security. The blast has been pinned on Alex Dubois, an employee whose family face deportation because of the Act. It’s your job to find out what really happened.

It’s centered on those three timed sections, set in their own self-contained, sprawling spaces. In the first two, you have exactly an hour to gather clues before you interview a Bowman Carson employee—for the third, you only have half an hour, but your goal is more focused.

In each, you follow several leads that resolve in clever ways. For one, I uncovered the password to an employee’s computer, saved one of her emails onto a floppy disk, and took it to a printer hidden in a restricted area, ready to brandish at the interview later. For another, I followed a trail of love letters containing cryptic clues about where the next one was placed, eventually leading me to a tape recording hidden in a wall flap.

You can approach every lead from multiple angles. To break into the head of PR’s office, for example, I had four options. I could crawl through the vents, slip in through the window from some scaffolding, cut the fuse box to the keypad at the door, or swipe her card and punch in the code myself. I could find the code in an email on a PC one floor below—or, I could just peer over her shoulder as she tapped away.

I enjoyed that freedom, and I love how the leads overlap. While searching a detective’s office for phone records I came across a vent system leading to a part of the map I didn’t know existed. The levels are so densely packed with potential clues—notes pinned to monitors, locked doors requiring coloured access cards, desk draws begging to be pulled open—that it’s almost impossible to feel stuck.

The ticking clock, combined with security guards wandering the corridors, ensures you keep moving forward. The final five minutes of each level were a proper panic, as I scrabbled to get leads ticked off, and The Occupation ramps up the tension by simulating clunky, physical interactions. To print a document you must hit the computer’s power button, wait for it to boot up, insert a floppy disk, pick a file to print, pick a printer and then wait again while the paper chugs out. It feels wonderfully tactile—until you glance and your watch and realise you’ve only got two minutes left.

I like that the time limit forces you to choose which leads to follow, and that it’s virtually impossible to complete all of them on your first playthrough. I wish, however, that it let me revisit those levels after I’d finished them. My very first run at a timed section felt a bit like a scouting exercise, and I was only able to complete one lead. I wanted to go straight back and see more—but once I’d finished my interview, I couldn’t reload it. I had to live with my failure for the rest of the story, which reacts to your performance.

The developers tell me they’re keen to add a ‘replay chapter’ feature, but it was “thought of too late in development” to work in before release. You could simply quit just before the end of your hour and try again, which I did during my second playthrough of The Occupation. But it’s not ideal, because you might want to see how the story plays out before reloading.

A proper save system would also provide a way around it. Currently, the game only saves at the end of each chapter, so you can’t save and reload if you muck up. I’m all for any system that makes you react to your mistakes, and it helps that the game is forgiving. When a guard catches you in a staff-only area, they’ll first tell you to leave, and only after multiple requests will they take you to a security office for a slap on the wrist.

The big problem is that The Occupation is a buggy mess, and some of those bugs can break your game. The worst instance I encountered was when one of my interviews failed to trigger. I arrived bang on time at the right office and the name of my two interviewees flashed on screen as I took my seat. But neither of them entered the room. I was locked in place, unable to progress, and I watched fifteen minutes tick by before giving up and restarting the chapter, which cost me a full hour of progress.

In another section, the two security guards both lodged themselves inside the same wall, and all I could see were their noses and eyes poking out. It was comical, as if the bricks were wearing those Groucho glasses disguises, but it completely ruined the pacing of the level. I could stroll around the restricted areas without any danger of getting caught.

More minor, but equally annoying bugs included the game telling me the wrong pass code for a safe which housed a key lead, letters vanishing from my inventory, my character floating in mid-air and only coming down after I wrestled with the controls for ten minutes, and keyboard prompts displaying the wrong key to press.

On four occasions, I got stuck between a security guard and a wall, unable to move. The guard kept demanding I leave the area, and when I didn’t—because I couldn’t—he lost his cool and confiscated my briefcase, with all my notes stashed inside.

White Paper Games says a day one patch will fix "minor bugs", but the variety of the issues I encountered suggest it’ll be a while before The Occupation is totally fixed.

In isolation, the bugs would be frustrating, but because they exist alongside the restrictive save system, you’re in constant danger of losing your progress. If you come across a bug that ruins a chapter, your only choices are to battle through or restart the whole section again.

I’ve learned to live with them for now, and I’m already well into my second playthrough. It’s not just the puzzles that have pulled me back—I wanted to find out more about the characters and the world around them. The plot is a little confusing because it sets up a mystery to be solved (what caused the explosion?) and then later veers into something entirely different, throwing lots of information at you at once. I’d rather have just unravelled the initial question, which feels like it’s tossed aside too hastily.

But The Occupation’s surprisingly nuanced take on certain aspects of UK politics has drawn me back in, and the characters echo real-life politicians. They’re conflicted and confused in believable ways, and the voice acting is utterly fantastic, each line delivered with conviction. These NPCs can be charming, too: Marlon, the office cleaner, is my favourite. He’s from a northern mining town, and will tell anyone that will listen about the “hypocrites” who want to cut immigration. “If you don’t want the French ‘ere, then put down your bloody baguettes”, he says. “Quiche, that’s another one, and all them nice cheeses”.

On my second playthrough, I understood the story better, but I still haven’t fully grasped it, and I plan to jump in a third time so I can 100% all the levels. Usually, I’d heartily recommend any game I like enough to replay, but The Occupation is basically broken in its current form. Despite its brilliant levels, you shouldn’t consider buying it unless you can put up with losing an hour of progress without warning.

Perhaps it’s best to wait for the second draft.

THE VERDICT
67

THE OCCUPATION

An occasionally brilliant immersive sim blighted by bugs and a restrictive save system.
 

ebPD8PePfC

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Well, I thought months after release all bugs would be fixed. I started writing this after my first bug crash.

- The voice acting is nice, though the script is kinda iffy, especially during cut scenes.
- The motion blur is insane. You get it from twisting your view by 10 degrees. Disabled.
- The game would be easier to program and play by switching all interaction with an Interact button. The added complexity of understanding how to control each specific item is pointless. This isn’t immersion, this is messing around with the controls.
- At least in the prologue the start the game lacks any plot, characters, or objective to drive it forward. You are an aimless drone collecting items and solving puzzles for the sake of it. You are given no reason to care about anything, and no challenge to overcome.
- Steve the guard caught me sneaking around in the first level. My mouse, or more precisely my camera controls, was disabled when he talked to me and wasn’t re-enabled afterwards. I have to restart.
- The game only saves at the end of every chapter and the player can’t save on his own. so this bug means I have to restart the chapter and lose a lot of time.
- UNSKIPABLE CUTSCENE
- I retried and successfully finished the first level. Maybe, I’m not sure what I was supposed to do. The game has a ton of documents / disks / tapes lying about and you have one real time hour to finish the level. So if a tape plays for two minutes, that’s two minutes of time you lose to accomplish your mission. The problem is that it makes more sense to mark documents as read and then look at the objective list to see if anything changed, than actually read them. So I really have no idea what the hell is happening, I’m just following instructions from the objectives list. The game is absolutely bizarre as you zoom from one vent to the next, opening vaults and collecting notes. It’s like Deus Ex on acid. There's vents everywhere and they all have arrows with writing saying to which room they lead. It's easier to navigate in the vents than out in the open.
At least in Dues Ex I read stuff, here you’re encouraged to run as fast as possible while playing a collectathon as the NPCs yell at you for being in their office, so you run to the window and up the scaffolds, where another NPC barks at you so you collect everything in his office before he calls security. You then dash to the window again to look for more stuff. But ohhh shit my pager is bipping got make a phone call so Steve is chasing me as I run to the phone I hope he won’t bug crash my game again.
Amazing.
- The controls are so trashy. It would take less time to use some default unreal demo than program this customized mess. You click to pick a document, but if you click too long the document vanishes into your briefcase without giving you a chance to read it. To read it you now have to find a flat surface, press R for some time to put the down the briefcase, open it, click on the documents compartment, and now read the documents. This is in the name of immersion that’s never there because you’re busy dealing with convoluted menus.
- Apparently you can’t replay levels after you finish them, and all the old documents vanish when you finish the level. Fuck me.
- Steve got pissed and started chasing me, but I haven’t done anything yet. I started running in a public space and he’s on a power trip or something, so he decided to take me in. Thug life.
- I got caught again, though this time it’s legit. The guard starts hammering on and on saying I’m a poo poo head. I can’t skip the cut scene so I go to the bath room, and when I return there’s another cut-scene that actually seems relevant to the plot, but I just missed half of it.
- I’m now in the third level, and I can’t go back to the second.

Maybe I’m impatient and should be broad minded about this game’s design, but I lost around 40 minutes to a bug because the game doesn't save mid levels. Afterward I was pissed, and the game made sure to keep me that way. You can save in The Last Express so you don't feel bad about talking to people, or simply enjoying the world. It's a game about people with spatial exploration being a minor issue (excluding the bomb sequence), which make engaging with the plot interesting. In this game engaging with the plot (reading notes, hearing tapes) is a waste of valuable time - by design! And you really don't want to replay the level because again, no saves and who knows if Steve is gonna bug crash you again.
I'm happy the game got good reviews on steam, but I can't recommend it. The devs tried something unique and hopefully they sold enough to keep doing it. It's definitely a better game than their previous one, Ether One, so maybe next time they'll get it right.
 
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Zombra

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Thanks Spukrian for mentioning this game. Been on my wishlist for a long time - sadly it looks like its bugs were never fixed. People are still complaining about random crashes as recently as a few months ago.

Another reason I never took the plunge is the time pressure design decision. Generally I play at a VERY measured pace in investigation/detective games so I can think everything through. Time pressure is great in some genres but at first glance it seems like a bad fit here.
 

Rean

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Mediocre game. The time limit's not that bad and the least of its problems.
 

Spukrian

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The problem with the game is the saving system. I think restricting saves is a good thing sometimes, but in this game you definitiely need to be able save more often.

There isn't even a "save and quit" option, which is sorely needed.
 

Spukrian

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I replayed this so I can spill the beans...

So this is an immersive sim/walking sim/investigate adventure mix. Very ambitious...

The story is that Great Britain in the 1980s is about to turn into a big brother state. There is going to be a referendum on something called the Union Act, which is going to limit civil liberties. To aid with this a company has been making a program that will store a massive amount of information about citizens, though it is implied that the program will focus mostly on immigrants. However there is an explosion in one the company's buildings and a disgruntled immigrant employee is suspected of terrorism.

You play as an investigative journalist that got an anonymous tip that the suspect is being framed, so you go the company offices to find information about what happened, which you then use in interviews to confront people. Note that in the tutorial and also in a short walking sim interlude level you play as a different character though.

In the first and second buildings you sneak into offices, avoiding getting caught. There are different ways of getting in, finding keycards, finding codes to shut off alarms (or shutting off electricity), or looking for a vent. Two very good levels.

The third building is just walking from point A to point B, do action C, then walk to the next point etc. Untill the end, then you have to sneak out. A bit disappoitning, but I guess they didn't have time.

The fourth level... is very hard. I was stuck here for a while, I actually looked in a walkthrough for this one. There are many ways to fail in this level, you need to know what to do and also do it in the correct order.

So the game is realtime. One second in reality is one second in the game. The first two buidlings have about one hour each, the last two have about 30 mins each. The game is only saved between levels, there's no "save and quit" option. I understand why the developers did this, so that you could have different experiences when replaying and trying different things. Except there isn't really enough incentive to play the game more than twice, once for each ending. Also, if you fail, you could just restart the level and replay it several times untill you get it right (I suggest you don't do this on first playthrough though).

From what I can tell, how a bad or good job you do investigating the explosion in the first two levels doesn't matter in what ending you get. Only if you succeed in the third and fourth levels do you get to choose ending, otherwise you're locked in the "bad" ending.

The "bad" ending exonerated the falsely accused suspect and the real culprit gets apprehended. At the same time, the problems with the computer program and the politics around doesn't get exposed, so society is worse for it.

The "good" ending exposes the dirty laundry and I guess Britain dodges a bullet, but the innocent dude gets sentenced.

So it's a interesting moral dilemma I guess.

Overall an ambitious game, perhaps the developer, White Paper, bit off more than they could chew. The game is a bit buggy, the patrolling guard would bug out quite often. Also quite frequently when someone found me somewhere I shouldn't be, they'd tell me to leave immediately except they would be blocking the nearest exit.

White Paper previously made the puzzle/adventure/walking sim Ether One, it was good but also bit buggy. After The Occupation they made Conway: Disappearance at Dahlia View, I haven't played that but I might do so in the future.

Overall a good game with some problems. Anything else? I think some of the voice acting is pretty good.
 
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