We Happy Few

We Happy Few (2018) is an action-adventure set in an alternative 1960s England drug-fuelled city. You explore the city to hide from authorities, fight, resist or conform your way out of this delusional, joy-obsessed world. It stands out both for the strong characters and how the world starkly changes depending on the amount of drugs in your system.

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We Happy Few is set in an alternative post-war England that has been invaded by Germany and left in tatters. The populace is placated with a Joy drug that dulls their memory and makes them obsessed with happiness. As you soon discover, it's a world on the brink of collapse.

You play three citizens tired of the control but unsure how to rebel without meeting a sticky end. Each has different strengths and weaknesses that you must use to survive. In this way, you take on both the authorities and the drug-addled inhabitants, who don’t take kindly to anyone rocking the boat. As you progress and start to resist the confines of the drug, memories return of a dark past and the bloody price they paid to get their city back from the Germans.

The result is a game about the price of standing up to power and the unintended consequences of controlling a populace. There are pertinent themes of a community dependent on a drug that vaccinates them from dark memories, who then ostracise those who won't or can't take the drug. This is wrapped up in a compelling set of narratives that gain depth by switching from the idealised saccharine drug-addled view of the world and the stark realities when not chemically enhanced.

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Our examiner, Jo Robertson, first checked We Happy Few 5 weeks ago. It was re-examined by Andy Robertson and updated 5 weeks ago.