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The Occupation (PS4) Status: Stopped playing - Got Bored I started playing this game on Friday 5 May, 2023 // I stopped playing this game on: Friday 25 August, 2023
Current opinion of this game
No comment, yet.
August 25, 2023 04:28:00 PM
Fired this up the other day and...I was just not feeling it...I'm not sure why, because it was a bit fun to poke around in other people's computers, copy files to a floppy disc, scan them, and... I think you're also supposed to print some of them? However, the more I played the more annoyed I got at a (arguably minor) audio issue - I'm playin on a TV that's a reasonable distance away and the positional audio in the game really lowers the volume on audio sources when you're looking away or not directly at something - so the overall experience for me was irksome and annoying because I couldn't always hear stuff well it was either too soft or too loud and this was happening really frequently and I just wasn't enjoying it. BUT... The first time I played I was sneaking around at night inside a building and had to find some info, etc. The second time I played - there's been an explosion, someone is being framed, and I need to sneak around the same building (I think? lol...it's been a while since play sessions) but it's daytime now! And there's a time limit because I had to gather info (I think) before my meeting. I did encounter what I thought would be a fail state - I was spotted by a guard - I snuck away, but later on - when I was walking around in the open, the guard came up to me and chastised me for being somewhere I wasn't supposed to and then absconding. So, I was impressed by that. It seems like an elegant solution and I'm guessing you can't abuse it. The annoying part is that I don't know how/when I was spotted, and I think there was an alarm blaring but I couldn't hear it/didn't notice it? And so on... But the game's setting is neat - alternate past UK in the 80s... from a quick look at a guide it seems like I did complete a little over 20% of the game, but - annoyingly? - there are things you think you can do, but you cannot on your first playthrough. So, all the leads I was pursuing and the info I was tracking down might not have panned out...
June 11, 2023 12:43:22 PM
I don't understand this game's name. I'm guessing it will become clearer later in the experience, but for now I'm just confused. And, it makes it hard for me to remember this game. Naming a game isn't easy - you want something short, but memorable, and evocative of the game. There should ideally be some strong connection in the player's mind between the game and the name. This game hasn't done that yet for me. I've only played once, though I did finish the first chapter/section. Or at least I got to a point that felt like a natural "end". I escaped from the building (center? lab? office?) having (I think) accomplished what I was supposed to do...which, as I write this, about a month after having played, I'm not entirely sure what it was - I think I took a copy of some files or something from a computer? I'm guessing a quick read of a guide will get me back up to speed... The game's setting is pretty neat - as far as I can tell it's sort of a 1980's alternate dystopian past set in England. Now that I think about it, it sort of seems like the sort of thing you could have read about in the 1980s, but that would have been (when it was created in the 1980s) been futuristic, but for this game it's in the past. For example, in the 1980s I read Alan Moore's "V for Vendetta" which was dark and dystopian but set in a future from when it was written, but THAT future (in V for Vendetta) is now our present (in terms of the calendar) - but this game is sort of set in the 1980s but as if they were more like the future that was imagined then - but the game was made now. Oh! It's a similar relationship that steampunk has to cyberpunk - like an imagined alternate future for the past... Anyways... The game sits to fit in the Gone Home/Firewatch style of games - but with more puzzles...and possibly more danger/game ending situations? I didn't see any in my playthrough, but I got the sense that there are ways to "lose" that require a new start....

The Occupation (PS4)