We Happy Few Reviews
We Happy Few delivers an intoxicating experience, rife with dark mysteries to unravel and exciting missions to complete, but some annoying mechanics and scarce resources keep it from reaching greatness
We Happy Few is a game of high highs and low lows. It's certainly far from perfect, with questionable stealth mechanics, sometimes derivative gameplay, and a lack of polish that intrudes on the fun. However, it also offers a totally unique world full of interesting characters and places.
After completing all three story acts, I found that I enjoyed the journey the game took me on, but I was also overwhelmingly relieved that it was finally over. At the end of the day, We Happy Few leaves me feeling conflicted.
We Happy Few doesn't always come together to form a cohesive video game experience, but its story and art direction are nothing short of fantastic. Had the developers dumped the stealth and survival mechanics, I'd love this game to death.
Despite the performance issues, We Happy Few is a must-own title for any gamer who loves survival open world titles and quality world building. Unless your PC doesn't meet the minimum specifications (visible on the Steam page) there is no reason not to pick this fantastic game up as soon as possible.
There's a lot to like about We Happy Few, with its unique psychedelic dystopian setting and well-developed story, but it's the moment-to-moment action that crashes down on you like a bad dose of Joy. So-so survival elements, the lack of mission variety, frame rate issues, prolific bugs, and tedious stealth and combat will make you want to cook up some Joy for yourself, so that maybe you too can forget the bad stuff and remember only the bright side of things.
We Happy Few has a pristine narrative vision, but it feels layered on top of a wholly different game. Much like the famous visage of the Wellington Wells citizenry, the story is a mask that tries to hide a buggy open world and needless procedural generation.
We Happy Few have a lot of good ideas and the best virtue of the game is the story of this original dystopian world that we can explore, but unfortunately, other mechanics like combat or stealth can be better.
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There's a huge amount of potential in this dystopian 1960s drug trip, but ultimately it starts to feel frustrating quite quickly. Every time We Happy Few draws you in with an interesting tidbit about the world or the character you are playing as it's scuppered by the systems fighting against you. It just becomes frustrating and makes a potentially immersive experience an irritating exercise in dealing with the game mistaking your intentions. Much like the dystopian world in which it is set, We Happy Few never feels quite right.
If you can see past the casually designed mechanics and truly immerse yourself in the environment and narrative aspects of We Happy Few, there's plenty to see here. Unfortunately for those probing a more wholesome experience, We Happy Few falls short.
We Happy Few is a game that deserves some more time to improve. As it stands, it offers some truly interesting characters in a well realized and intricate story, that unfortunately have been hampered by an overall unpolished feel.
There's a brilliant game that mixes peril with colourful exploration inside We Happy Few, but it's buried under flawed systems and bugs
As the hours wore on, my love affair with We Happy Few began to chip away as more and more bugs and gameplay shortcomings popped up. The real saving graces for the game lie in its concept, story, and setting.
We Happy Few releases on consoles and PC on August 10.
As it stands, the game’s early comparisons to BioShock were far too kind, and I would not recommend We Happy Few to anyone.
We Happy Few's focus on story over survival is a good choice, and at its best when dropping bombshells of truth that the drugged people of Wellington Wells have tried so hard to ignore. In its Early Access, I felt like wandering between procedurally-generated islands to stay alive wasted the intriguing setting and premise of its opening act. Now, exploring segments designed to reveal We Happy Few's secrets are both fun and rewarding. Although survival and crafting are fairly manageable, running through randomly generated towns, streets, or abandoned fields unfortunately shows that We Happy Few can't hide from the ghost of its own past, no matter how much Joy you take.
A jog-fest with sluggish combat and inconsistent stealth, but a story that will pull you toward the end anyway.
We Happy Few's borderline broken systems and unremarkable quest design make it an unentertaining slog through an intriguing world.
Aside from the immersive introduction, We Happy Few eventually becomes a chore more than an intense survival experience. One had only hoped, that the game became a linear experience akin to BioShock than the tacked on survival game it really is.