We Happy Few is the tale of a plucky bunch of moderately terrible people trying to escape from a lifetime of cheerful denial in the city of Wellington Wells. In this alternative 1960s England, conformity is key. You’ll have to fight or blend in with the drug-addled inhabitants, most of whom don’t ta...
We Happy Few is the tale of a plucky bunch of moderately terrible people trying to escape from a lifetime of cheerful denial in the city of Wellington Wells. In this alternative 1960s England, conformity is key. You’ll have to fight or blend in with the drug-addled inhabitants, most of whom don’t take kindly to people who won’t abide by their not-so-normal rules.
Discover the retrofuturistic city’s dark history as you play through the intertwined narratives of three quietly rebellious citizens of Wellington Wells, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, as they face their pasts, prepare for the future, and engage in activities that aren’t exactly status quo in the artificially-enthused society.
Retrofuturistic 1960s England
Set in retrofuturistic 1960s England, you will find a city ravaged by war and rebuilt by delusionally happy people. Everything appears to be happy in Wellington Wells, including the roads, the people, and its omnipresent television personality, Uncle Jack! However, it’s a big, idyllic world on the brink of collapse. You will discover the history of this world, and how it came to be just so beguilingly happy.
Three Interwoven Narratives
Play as three flawed characters who explore their own connections to the events surrounding the rebuilding of Wellington Wells. They each have a unique storyline in which they interpret and react to the events around them in different ways. As you hide, conform, or fight back as each of them, you will encounter dark humour, a spot of hope, and even some redemption along the way.
Procedurally Generated World
In We Happy Few no two playthroughs are alike. While the citizens of Wellington Wells will always want to ensure that you’ve taken your Joy, the procedurally generated world will ensure that your experience with We Happy Few is different and unique.
Customizable Gameplay
Aside from a procedurally generated world, there are many ways to customize your We Happy Few experience:
Choose from a range of difficulties for new and experienced players alike,
Play through the story, or customize the sandbox world to your liking,
Try permadeath, if you want to satisfy all your masochistic needs,
Collect recipes, scavenge items, and craft dozens of weapons, tools, and devices,
Creep, crush, or conform your way through puzzles and encounters, and
Fight with your bare hands or the crazy weapons you create.
It's an interesting theme and great visuals and dialog. Gameplay and map really lack though.
Map- While the map has a few interesting points, the randomly generated terrain was a terrible decision that makes the map repetitive, boring, and painfully large and empty.
Walking- Walking is not a fun grind. Way too much slow walking.
Gameplay- Getting caught sneaking or running in the village turns every NPC hostile until you hide in bushes for 30s which is a lame mechanic. Combat is okay. Again, very repetitive.
Game started fun, but lacked sufficient replay value for me to even finish all 3 acts.
Bought this game on sale, ~5$ for the base game + season pass with all three DLCs
Story is great, mechanics are OK, technical execution lacks polish. It's not a bad game, it's a disappointing one - there are great ideas in there, but as a whole it doesn't really work.
Still, for 5$, I had an enjoyable moment, but I wouldn't pay near the official price tags (50$ for base game, 80$ for base game + DLCs) for that.
It's a great indie title, not a great AA(A) game.
I enjoy open world stealth combat games, and We Happy Few is just such a game. The stealth portions of the game remind me of Splinter Cell - excellent, tense, clever. Very enjoyable. The story line is decent; no complaints there. The harvesting and crafting portions of the game are simpler than Elder Scrolls games, but that's not really a bad thing. It keeps the focus on game play rather than crafting (though the crafting portion of things is still a moderate portion of the game). Lots of puzzle stuff, trying to figure out how to get from point A to point B, so it's not just sneaking around or fighting. They focused heavily on story telling, which can be very entertaining if you have a good story. And while the main story line is quite good, and the voice acting is expert...the whiny main character is killing me. Every time I knock out some guard, self-pitying Arthur (the main character we play) asks them for forgiveness. Sometimes after a fight, he laments what the world is coming to. And I appreciate the idea, but the guy's so...whiny, is all. He's constantly woe-is-me about his situation, which is certainly understandable, but in the midst of high tension, anxious stealth game play, it sucks the vigor out of me. Honestly, it's a great game, and if you like a good open world, harvesting, crafting, intelligent levels, periodic puzzles, decent and unique graphics, good base story line and challenging combat game, then We Happy Few is a great choice. But you will have to put up with a whiner. (Maybe its just me, by the way. It may simply be a pet peeve that's interfering with my personal ability to give this game a 5 star rating - and his self-pity may simply inspire sympathy from you, and you'll love it. It's my one complaint.)
This really should have been a much shorter, tighter Bioshock style linear experience.
The story, the voice acting, the cutscenes all look great! It's an original notion with a lot of exploration for both drama and dark humor. The fully designed locations look fantastic, stylish, and fun to explore.
The innumerable patches that are still going on HAVE improved a lot of aspects of the game as well, from the U.I to the balance.
But the procedural generation is the stumbling block. Characters cannot handle the complexities of the environments for long before getting stuck or floating in place. Combat is clunky but constant because it's way too easy to be spotted, and once you are spotted every enemy will immediately know where you are.
The harsher aspects of survival have been shaved down thankfully but they're still there a bit annoying. You'll never have enough food which is thematic...but so is getting infections from bandages (which is also a thing) and neither is particularly fun. There's just not a lot you can do when you're in trouble, being chased, or sick. You ARE the underdog, I realize that, but if you feel completely powerless you aren't so much playing the game as trying to avoid its mechanics.
This is a wonderful and creative story constantly fighting against a clunky game that overstepped its boundaries. You cannot ever fully predict procedural generation which is part of the appeal of it, but its also the problem We Happy Few cannot quit surmount despite considerable improvements.
Nice, but i don't know why gets repetitive and easy after the first quests. Maybe because of the powerups, but if you don't get them gets too tedious as well. Good for a couple of hours at least.
