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WTF (PSP)

Status: Stopped playing - Got Bored
I started playing this game on Thursday 2 April, 2009  //  I stopped playing this game on: Friday 10 April, 2009
Current opinion of this game
More bizarre than anything. It isn't exactly compelling, but it's definitely made me think a lot about games. In a good way. There's some interesting commentary, but not so much gameplay.

April 10, 2009 04:06:48 PM
When you fail to catch the ball in the baseball game, you get called an idiot. That actually made me laugh. :-)

Another thing that cracked me up is that, as I mentioned before, you get email from another chump like you. However, you ALSO get email from a woman who is the exact opposite. According to her email, she travels all over the world with a jet-settish crowd while you, well... get called an idiot!


April 8, 2009 09:54:18 PM
WTF is an odd game. The experience of playing it is odd. I guess I feel that, at heart, it's a mindless game that makes you think when you think it shouldn't. It's bizarre.

When I first booted it up, I was expecting a Warioware knock off that might have been a little bit edgier, or crazy. It wasn't any of those things. In terms of gameplay, it's an eclectic mix of mini-games some of which aren't even games. They're clearly NOT designed for you to have fun. You can tell. That's the point! Others are perhaps more "traditional". The weirdest thing of all is the structure that contains it all.

WTF stands for "Work time fun". Sure, the pun is a bit crass, bit then again it's curiously appropriate. You should be thinking "WTF?" as you play the game. The "premise" is that you're some sort of down-and-out loser who basically does the oddest jobs you can think of for a pittance in pay.

You communicate with the "outside world" via email. Sort of. You get messages from the placement agency rewarding you stupid titles for meeting silly goals in the games. You also get email from another chump like yourself. The email actually comes with a (real) picture of someone making a weird face. Loser?!

So, essentially you're playing a mindless game about the mindlessness of certain jobs while getting paid to collect more job opportunities and trinkets that have no real value. The whole thing is a crazy commentary on... the ills of the modern dehumanized industrial nation? Something like that...

Take for example the following game (job):

Pendemonium:
You work at a factory putting caps on an endless stream of pens. Button press to cap, button press to advance the next pen down the line. Occasionally, a pen will show up upside down. Button press to flip it. The background looks like a blurred out factory floor. The soundscape is essentially people muttering and mumbling. You'll hear them complain as well. The score? On the bottom of the screen is a pen counter. It stretches ALL the way across the PSP's wide screen. You start at zero. I don't even know what the name is for a number with that many zeros... Just looking at the score is disheartening. There's no point. There's no end. When your tired, quit and get your paycheck.

Work, made fun, but it's actually work.

Brilliant.


 
kudos for original design to Rodrigo Barria