'The Occupation (2019)' is a frustrating experience, primarily because it has plenty of good ideas that are executed incredibly poorly. The piece is a stealth-based investigative political thriller in which you take control of a journalist tasked with discovering the truth surrounding a recent bombing at a company, who design technology to track citizens, that is pushing for an act to be passed that will result in mass deportations. It's an interesting premise, one that isn't often seen in games, and the thing unfolds in a relatively restrained, surprisingly realistic way. It's generally well-written and, when everything is working as it's supposed to, it can be fairly engaging. The main hook of the piece is that it operates on a real-time system. You only have a few hours to finish the game and you have to manage your time so that you can get to all the interviews you have set up while also finding evidence to use in those interviews along the way. If you miss something, you miss it for good. That's rather interesting in concept. However, it's flawed in execution. That's because the game doesn't save for absolutely ages. There are no checkpoints within chapters and the chapters often take over ninety minutes to finish. That's ridiculous, meaning that you lose tons of progress if the game hits you with one of its many glitches (more on those in a moment) or if you suddenly have to leave to attend to real-world matters. This single decision absolutely ruins the experience and it cleaves its potential audience in two; not everyone wants to - or is even able to - sit down for hours at a time to play a game. The sad part is that it's entirely unnecessary. The real-time timer could save when the game does, meaning that you'd still only have a certain amount of time to finish a section even if you turned it off halfway through. At the very least, the game ought to save when it pops you in a new location (sometimes, chapters consist of several distinct gameplay segments). What makes it worse is that the game isn't all that stable. There are a plethora of glitches that will sometimes force you to quit to the main menu (one soft freeze cost me thirty minutes of gameplay, leading me to almost turn the thing off and never boot it up again). Plus, there are glitches that prevent progress, especially when it comes to the game's printing mechanic (it often plain doesn't work as it should and threatens to ruin your chances of getting the evidence you need). The thing also stutters and lags at times. It's really, really annoying. It makes the thing way more intense than it needs to be; you're practically crossing all your fingers and toes that everything goes smoothly enough that you don't have to replay an entire segment. Playing the game is just so nerve-racking that it's difficult to properly enjoy the typically effective and underplayed narrative. Thankfully, the game is relatively liberal when it comes to giving you warnings for being caught in staff-only areas; it takes being spotted a few times before the piece punishes you by skipping out a chunk of time. The security guards can see you from a mile away, though, and the generally clunky controls (it takes way too many prompts to do something even as simple as open a letter) often causes you to get stuck in an inconvenient position. The ending is really rather weak, too, as it's essentially told with just three newspaper headings and an unneeded epilogue. It makes your hard work getting to the end feel... well, let's just say less than satisfying. Ultimately, this isn't a bad game (though it may sound like one). It has an interesting premise and several promising concepts. It's also rather entertaining when it all works smoothly. Its execution certainly doesn't live up to its potential, though, and it's typically a frustrating affair. 5/10.
