Papers, Please

Papers Please (Steam)

Here I sit in this small confined well guarded room, people are standing in a massive line waiting to pass through so they can conduct their business.  It's almost 8 am and I just walked to work from my small apartment that I share with my wife, her mother, and our son. I only have $5 to my name and my son is sick because we can't afford to heat the house.  I calculated last night that I need to process 20 people today so I can afford medicine.  I quickly read over the new instructions that I receive each day from the head office, since we had a terrorist attack yesterday that resulted in one guard being killed, new arrivals will need to have an entry ticket as well as their passport.  Two minutes till 8 so I get out my guidebook and turn to my bookmark so I can quickly assess each person.  I click on the switch and the cold iron gate slides up slowly revealing behind it the dull gray brick wall that is my backdrop each long day.  I press another button that turns on the microphone and I speak the words everyone is waiting to hear.......Next.

It's 9 pm now and I've had a long day, I sit cuddled next to my wife under many covers, the house is freezing.  I was able to earn enough money to buy medicine but turning on the heat will have to wait for another day, I sure hope nothing else unexpected happens. 

A new day, new instructions, they've upgraded the entry tickets to an entry pass, just one more document I need to check, this is starting to get complicated.  The first group of people had all the proper documents, but then I one person had an entry ticket so I had to turn him away, I could hear him curse me under his breath and mentioned he paid a lot of money for that ticket.  The next one had Female listed as his sex but I knew it was a man, I questioned him about it and they had no response so I sent them away, man I hate my job.   After lunch I see Istiv, he's crazy, I wonder what he has for me this time.  He steps into the booth and just stands there I smile then ask for paperwork, he apologizes and then slides me a passport that he clearly made himself, it's drawn in crayon and at the top it says pre-approved, the face does look like him though.  I press the decline stamp and tell him to try again another day, I wonder how long he waited in line.  It's getting close to 4 so my eyes are getting weary so I quickly glance at the paperwork and stamp approve and let them go, almost immediately there is a knock on my door and I receive a paper stating that I just let someone in with an expired passport and that my pay will be deducted at the end of the day.  Man I hate my job..........



This game just showed up on Steam yesterday and I glanced and passed on it and purchased Spelunky and Guacamelee.  I then visited a couple of websites and saw the Giantbomb quicklook and immediately returned to Steam and bought the game.  The game is about a mundane job but it's suprisingly fun and stressful at the same time.  There is a story mode which is what I wrote about above and an endless mode that opens up after you've completed the single player game.  The story mode has something like 20 different endings so I'm curious as to what they are.  I highly recommend this game, it's only $10 so give it a shot.