Difference between revisions of "Papers, Please"

Latest revision as of 13:22, 15 November 2014

Papers, Please

Systems:

Windows PC
Mac OSX
Linux
PlayStation Vita
Releases:
- Original Release: 2013
- Linux Release: 2014

Publisher:

Lucas Pope

Developer:

Lucas Pope

ESRB Rating:

Not available

In the puzzle game Papers, Please you play a person who has been randomly selected for boarder patrol for the fake, dystopian nation of Arstotzka. Every day you walk to work and look over people's passports, ensuring that their paperwork is in order before they come into the country; you are paid a meager amount for every person you let through. As the days go by the paperwork becomes more and more complicated, and you are offered bribes and threatened by terrorists. The game forces you to balance your job, your morality, and your family's welfare every time you ask the question, "Papers, please."

Incomplete Tags for this Game

General Comments

The game is rendered with retro-style pixel graphics meant to look like a late-80s/early-90s EGA DOS game.

Blood

At one point the resistance group EZIC gives the player a container of anthrax powder to poison an assassin attempting to cross the border. If the player does poison the target, they begin to vomit blood and infect either the guard who comes to check on them (if they were approved for entry) or the large number of innocent bystanders in line (if they were denied entry). The player can also die by touching the powder, but in this case it just causes the game to fade to white and sends you back to the main menu.

Claustrophobia

The entire game takes place in a small guard booth that the player cannot leave. It is the main mechanic of the game.

Death of Family/Friends

As the game progresses, your family will get sick and you have to pick who gets medicine. Those who do not get medicine die. The player never sees their family in person, they are just markers on the main game menu.

Dehumanization

The game forces the player to treat certain people as sub-standard via racial profiling; there are certain "countries" in the game that are at odds with Arstotzka, and as such are treated poorly. The player can choose whether or not to participate in this, but will be penalized if they do not.

The player can force people at the border to do anything. In particular, the player is required to use invasive scanning techniques to scan for contraband and check that the person's genitalia match the gender on their passport.

Depiction of Disaster

Several terrorist attacks happen throughout the game. The attacks are uniformly suicide bombers.

At one point the resistance group EZIC gives the player a container of anthrax powder to poison an assassin attempting to cross the border.

Disease

As the game progresses, your family will get sick and you have to pick who gets medicine. Those who do not get medicine die. The player never sees their family in person, they are just markers on the main game menu.

At one point the resistance group EZIC gives the player a container of anthrax powder to poison an assassin attempting to cross the border. If the player does poison the target, they begin to vomit blood and infect either the guard who comes to check on them (if they were approved for entry) or the large number of innocent bystanders in line (if they were denied entry). The player can also die by touching the powder, but in this case it just causes the game to fade to white and sends you back to the main menu.

Explosions

At several points in the game there will be terrorist attacks at the border. The person committing the attack will blow them selves up with an explosion noise and fire.

Existential Despair

The game presents to the player an extremely grim outlook on life. Either the player can be moral and allow good people through but get penalized, the player can be strict and amoral and turn away people who need to get into the country (for example for a much-needed surgery) but never get penalized, or the player can take bribes and turn people away for nothing to make more money. The overall attitude of the game is that whatever the player does they will be penalized in some way, thus the struggle to survive becomes futile.

Gender Dysphoria

The game assumes that every person has a binary gender.

A game mechanic is looking at the people trying to cross the border and assigning them a binary gender based on how they look. If the gender on the person's passport does not match what they present as, the player can question them and turn them away for having a "wrong" passport. If the gender is "wrong" but the player does not question it, the player will be penalized.

Once the player receives the "scanning" ability in the game, the player can scan the bodies of people whose gender is "wrong" on their passport as per the game mechanic above. The scanner shows the player a naked picture of the person and the player must scrutinize their genitalia. If the genitalia does not match what is on the person's passport the person must be turned away or the player is penalized.

Guns

The guards around the border checkpoint all have guns. If the player chooses to detain a person, the guards will threaten that person with their guns.

The player is given a tranquilizer gun in order to incapacitate terrorists during border attacks. Later he receives a sniper rifle. The player doesn't have to use either gun, but they're encouraged to do so with a bonus if they shoot the terrorists and a smaller bonus if they shoot but miss.

Jump Scares

The warning for terrorist is easy to miss for first-time players and thus attacks appear to happen without warning. They involve a suicide bomber shown on the other side of the gate with an explosion. The warning for attacks is this: if the player doesn't say "Cause no trouble" to a Kolechian traveler when they're let in, then that person is going to bomb the border.

Murder

The player is tasked with murdering several targets (once by poison, others by sniper rifle) over the course of the game. None of these are required to complete the game. Two of the criminals the player has to look out for are an athlete accused of murdering his girlfriend and a man who is a serial child murderer. The father of one of the child victims tasks you with letting him into the country but confiscating his passport so that he can kill him in revenge. The player does not need to accept the request.

Nudity

The player eventually receives the "scanning" ability that allows them to scan people at the border. This produces a naked picture of the person with visible genitalia. The nudity can be turned off in the Settings page of the game.

Offensive Language

If the player turns someone away, the person sometimes will swear at the player.

Racism

The game forces the player to treat certain people as sub-standard via racial profiling; there are certain "countries" in the game that are at odds with Arstotzka, and as such are treated poorly--generally in the form of assuming everyone from a certain country is a "terrorist" and selecting them for "random searches" where their privacy will be violated via a full-body, nude scan. The player can choose whether or not to participate in this, but will be penalized if they do not.

Sex Slavery

Early in the game the player encounters a woman who hands over a note naming a man whom she believes is going to force her to work at a brothel. The man shows up later in the day; the player can allow him entry, deny him, or detain him. If they player shows him the note they received from the woman, he gets angry and threatens to "break her in two".

No matter what the player does, after the man comes through there will be an article in the paper the next day about a girl dying at a brothel.

Substance Abuse

One of the reasons the player can detain people is because they are attempting to smuggle drugs into Arstotzka.

Suicide

Suicide bombers are common throughout the game.

Transphobia

A game mechanic is looking at the people trying to cross the border and assigning them a binary gender based on how they look. If the gender on the person's passport does not match what they present as, the player can question them and turn them away for having a "wrong" passport. If the gender is "wrong" but the player does not question it, the player will be penalized.

As part of the above game mechanic, the player also has a "scanning" ability that allows them to take a fully nude picture of the person they are questioning. If the person's genitalia does not match what it says on their passport, the player must turn them away or be penalized.

Verbal Abuse

Throughout the game if the player chooses to reject people they will verbally abuse the player. This may or may not be common in the game depending on how the player treats people trying to enter the country.

Violence Against Children

The player can choose to allow their son to die of illness. The player is forced to make decisions between family members when buying medicine.

One of the criminals the player needs to look out for is a serial child murderer from Republia attempting to flee the country.

Vomiting

At one point the resistance group EZIC gives the player a container of anthrax powder to poison an assassin attempting to cross the border. If the player does poison the target, they begin to vomit blood and infect either the guard who comes to check on them (if they were approved for entry) or the large number of innocent bystanders in line (if they were denied entry).

Weapons