Engrossing but short, broken save system
The Occupation is a fun stealth-em-up in a polished retro noir setting. Crawl through vents, nick keycards, fax documents, hack chunky 90s computers and sneakernet the floppies, in contained but meticulously detailed non-linear environments. The game's unique twist is the real-time nature of each level, forcing you to complete the objectives within a fixed time window, as various timed events play out. When it works, it's fun, tense and fair, albeit short.
But I have beef.
The developers have made a classic mistake, namely, messing with the save system. I get it: they want actions to have consequences and players to stick with their choices. Fine. But like almost every other game that does this, the devs have written checks their game can't cash.
Tension is sneaking behind a guard's back and swiping the crucial evidence before ducking into the shadows. Tension is a crucial clue missed due to running out of time. It is not Tension to get caught on shoddy climbing mechanics, or to be told by an increasingly irate NPC to leave the area through the very door he's currently blocking, while I try to bunny hop around him in exasperation and insta-fail the entire game.
The devs have crafted a handful of sprawling puzzle boxes of levels, which want you to explore them to their fullest... but the only way you can access them is through a single permanent save slot in order, going through the same unskippable cutscenes, hearing the same self-important dialog over and over again. Look, it's simple: letting people skip cutscenes preserves, not diminishes, the impact of the story.
"This game relies on an auto-save system" is dev speak for "You don't get to engage with and enjoy this content in the most accessible, convenient and reliable way possible." You may look, but please don't try to get comfy. For a stealth game where you play the nosiest person in the world, this is a fundamental mistake.
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