After loading up Papers, Please your first impression may be that it is a simple game with not much depth to it. While the mechanics evolve only slightly during the game, Papers, Please offers an experience that is hard to find anywhere else. It is funny, tragic, and will make you question your decisions more than most games that require moral choices by the player. Papers, Please is a special game that should be played by all.
Papers, Please puts players in the shoes of a border agent for the fictional communist country Arstotzka. Set in the year 1982, Arstotzka has been at war with its neighbor country Kolechia for six years. After the fighting died down and the border town of Grestin was split into two halves, the borders have opened for immigrants from all over the region to travel to Arstotzka. The area the game takes place in has a very post Cold War vibe to it which fits the game perfectly. All of this information is presented to you in the first few minutes of Papers, Please. From that point on you will be looking at the same screen for the next four hours, but it never gets old.
When an entrant to Arstotzka approaches your booth, they hand you their papers. Using a rule book supplied by the Ministry of Admission, you can check to make sure the entrant’s documents are correct. If you feel like they are correct, you stamp their passport and allow them entry into the country. If there is something wrong, you can deny them entry. Levels are broken up into days, and if you play the game carefully you can last all 31 days. There are ways for your days to be cut short as a border agent, so make sure you follow the rules.
Each new day brings new rules. Sometimes you’ll have to deny entry from any person with a Kolechia passport, or maybe entrants will now need a special entry permit to get into the country. Not only does this keep you on your toes while you play, it is a great social commentary on modern society. There gets to be a point where you have the ability to take nude photos of travelers to make sure they are not sneaking in contraband. It makes you feel dirty every time you ask someone to face the camera, but you have to do it or else you’ll be docked pay.
In addition to checking documents, there is a side mechanic where you must provide for your family that consists of your wife, your son, your mother-in-law, and your uncle. All five of you live in one apartment. After each day you’ll be given a breakdown of how much money you made based on how many entrants you processed during the day, and how much you owe for rent, food, and heat. It doesn’t take long for your funds to dry up, and luckily there are other ways to make money. You can cut deals with guards where you get a kickback for every entrant you detain, or travelers may give you an incentive to let them through with false papers. It may feel wrong to detain an old woman just because her passport is expired, but it could also be the difference between your family eating, and your family going hungry. The decisions in Papers, Please are tough to make, and there is no correct way to play the game. It is how you see fit, and it is one of the better mechanics in the game.
Through these decisions and the daily newspaper, you’ll learn much about the world around you. It could be that a couple is trying to get through the border, but she does not have the correct credentials to get through, or maybe a high profile criminal was seen on his way to the border checkpoint. I had one lady approach the booth telling me that she needed surgery that was only legal in Arstotzka, and if she went back to Kolechia she would die. But her passport was expired. She sat there, pleading with me to let her through, but I didn’t. I had already messed up a few times that day, so letting her through would have docked my pay. I felt awful stamping “denied” on her passport, but I had to. You get to experience dozens and dozens of stories throughout your time with Papers, Please. You never know who is going to walk up to your window.
Graphically, Papers, Please looks pretty basic when you first look at it. But like the mechanics of the game, the more you play, you realize the visuals do a great job of setting the tone. It has this feel of being dark and cold, which is an accurate feeling of going through a real border checkpoint. It is evident that the limited desk space you have to work on is not a technical limitation, but it is done by design. As more and more rules get introduced, your desk becomes cluttered with paperwork. This can lead to you missing wrong information on a passport because you have to work quickly to get through as many people as possible. It is pretty frustrating when you’re on day 25 and you miss an expired passport because you’ve been looking out for so many other details, the last thing on your mind is an expired passport. The sound is great in the game as well. The soundtrack has this Soviet Union feel to it, and the sound effects in your booth are excellent. The “ka-chunk” of your denied and approved stamps always sound satisfying.
There are over 20 endings in Papers, Please, and so many little things to find in the game that you can play through the story multiple times. The game does save after each day, so you do not always have to start at day one. Plus with so many different story branches, it is cool to see how your decisions at the border affect other areas of Arstotzka. It is amazing to think that while letting someone through the border may seem pretty inconsequential, yet the effects can be monumental.
On paper, Papers, Please seems like the most mundane video game that has ever been created. But developer Lucas Pope has crafted a masterpiece of a video game that should be experienced by everyone.
Score: 9.5/10
Papers, Please was developed and published by Lucas Pope for the PC and Mac on August 8. A copy of the game was provided to us by Lucas Pope for reviewing purposes.
