We Happy Few Review - A Premise With A Lot of Promise That Falls Short

Written by Chris Woodside on August 14, 2018

Reviews: By playing We Happy Few you can experience the same artificial satisfaction that the residents of Wellington Wells do every time they “Pop a Joy.”

We Happy Few is unapologetically inspired by many different works of entertainment across various mediums. The world and characters of Wellington Wells appear to be pulled directly out of an Ayn Rand novel or a George Orwell dystopia. The characters have deep interactions with each other, and at times the stories of the three protagonists the players control become so personal and intersecting you will often have to remind yourself you are not in Rapture from the Bioshock series. Unfortunately, despite We Happy Few being a masterclass in storytelling, the emotional depths of the journey you will embark on fail to mask what is a mediocre stealth game with repetitive gameplay, frustrating sequences, and inexcusable bugs.

It should be noted early on that We Happy Few began its existence in early access as a sandbox survival game. After receiving feedback from some of the early players, production took an entire 180-degree turn with a focus shifted back onto the narrative of the story. It’s rare for a game to change focus so drastically so late into the production cycle, but it seems to have been the right move for Compulsion Games to do so. The world they have created with its psychedelic scenery, odd and bizarre cast of characters and a sense of doom within the dystopia all lend nicely to creating an engaging story for the player.

The world that the developers have created in We Happy Few is beautifully crafted. With the exception of some of the main areas in the game, much of the world is procedurally generated. While that term may send shivers down your spine of some of the many broken promises associated with this method of game design, We Happy Few is one of the few games that have incorporated it correctly. Indeed, the very concept fits within the narrative of the story, as when players overdose on Joy they forget their past memories and what they know of the world around them changes so often. If you choose to replay the game, you will get the sense that you too may have taken a few too many Joy as the design of the world will never be exactly the same.

As beautifully crafted as the world seems, the game never seems to be able to run it well enough. Even on my review copy which I played on the Xbox One X, I still encountered drastic drops in FPS when I was being chased by a larger number of NPC’s or if there happened to be a lot of foliage. Even when the framerate was stable, there always seemed to be some graphical issue that was constantly taking me out of the story. Entering homes, you would often see characters floating in mid-air, or jumping in place without a care in the world that a downer had just picked the lock to their door in the middle of the night. The worst technical issues with this game were the constant crashes I encountered during the course of my playthrough of the 3 act story. Over the course of the 45 hours I spent playing through this game, I encountered no less than 10 crashes where I was sent back to the Xbox UI. An occasional crash in an early access game on steam is understandable and nowadays expected. It is entirely unacceptable to encounter crashes with such consistency in a game that is marked at a full $60 price tag.

”We

Despite these bugs, when We Happy Few does run smoothly, it is well worth it to experience the truly unique story that has been crafted here. Across the 3 acts, the player will control 3 different characters, all of whom have vastly different play styles, which forces you to experiment with different ways to complete missions. Arthur serves as the main protagonist, who you spend the most time with among the three and also has the most compelling story. His play style is the most balanced between stealth and combat, allowing players the most freedom to play through his story with whatever preference you prefer. The other two characters, Sally and Ollie, are almost entirely focused around stealth and combat respectively. Sally is unable to even wield some of the most powerful weapons in the game, and Ollie is too slow to be able to escape most fights. The stories of these three characters intersect quite a bit across the playthrough of each one, but each is still engaging as a self-contained story as they seek redemption for their past mistakes, in a world where even remembering your past can see you hunted down by the police and other residents.

Perhaps the biggest issue with We Happy Few is how repetitive and monotonous the gameplay is. Virtually every character's story is structured the same way. You need someone’s help, whether it be in gaining a new item, getting something repaired or created for you, or special quest items to access new areas. Conveniently, none of the NPC’s are willing to give you what you need until you complete a special assignment for them. Usually, this involves infiltrating a building or facility that is crawling with police officers or other enemies you must avoid. As repetitive as this is, it would not have been nearly as much of a problem if there was any nuance to the stealth system in this game.

Unlike other stealth games where getting caught means almost certain death and restarting from the last checkpoint, it is actually quite hard to be killed in We Happy Few. Even in the rare times you are sighted, the AI is so shockingly poor that it is almost impossible to not get away. While some guards did seem to have better AI than others and were more keen to your movements (doctors, for example, are able to smell you even if you are hiding, making the only way to escape them by running out of the line of sight), the majority of the enemies in this game are incredibly stupid. If you are able to enter a bathroom, for example, you are almost assured to be safe and unspotted even if the enemy saw you enter the bathroom. If you hide in the bathtub, rather than examining the room, they simply give up if they could not find you. While I did not expect to see hyper-realistic AI in this game, the fact that they could not even search areas where you are able to hide (something that happens quite a bit in the decade-old Assassin’s Creed series) struck me as truly uninspired game design. Doing missions over and over again with a fresh coat of paint on them for 40 hours will always be repetitive, but it is almost unbearable when there is hardly a challenge to completing them.

Considering the many changes that We Happy Few underwent when it was first shown a few years ago, it is a minor miracle that we have finally gotten the chance to play the game and it wasn’t consigned to development hell like so many kickstarter games before it. It is a shame that there is so much to dislike about the gameplay and the technical aspects of the game that it ruins what is a truly fascinating setting and premise. As good as the story is, it is impossible to recommend a game that has so many bugs and uninspired game play as We Happy Few.