How often have you, out of the kindness of your soul, agreed to help someone and in the end just wasted your time? This is because it seems wrong to refuse a person (especially if your boss or another employee of a higher rank asks you). Developers from the studio Fizbin , created the Say No! More , obviously have faced similar situations more than once – their game is completely devoted to the ability to say “no” in time and even change the company for the better. The result is a wonderful story, when watching which you sit with a smile from ear to ear and constantly laugh.
Trainee’s answer
First of all, here you need to create a character: choose a hairstyle, clothes, accessories and other parameters. And then he is asked to choose the language in which he will pronounce the word “no” throughout the game. There are languages of Asian countries, many European languages (if you want to answer in German, please), and Russian. Judging by the names of the actors in the credits, everything was voiced by native speakers – both female and male versions.
After that, the story begins. We are an intern who came to Say Yes! More, and at first we have zero self-confidence. Therefore, the manager, who dispenses pearls one by one, treats us like a slave – he takes food, because he forgot his own at home, and puts us in a “office” without a fourth wall and window. And we cannot say “no” – only mumble. Such is the situation here: everyone unquestioningly agrees to everything. Fortunately, the protagonist gets his hands on a cassette player, where a motivational lesson is recorded that will completely change the main character’s approach to work.
With such a coach, any mumbler grows up!
After listening to the first recording, the character significantly increases his self-esteem and begins to react differently to requests. Someone is too lazy to go for coffee, someone offers to take out the trash, someone asks to lend money or scan a pile of documents. But the protagonist refuses everyone, and his interlocutors do not just meekly retreat – they either fly off to the walls, like in action films, then fall on tables and break them, then they are imprinted into columns. At the same time, the character moves independently, as in rail shooters like The Typing of the Dead .
All the lines are perfectly voiced, and there are a lot of jokes in them – together with the visual effects and funny graphic style, it turns out to be a very fun game with an unpredictable story. In the second half, complete absurdity begins in the good sense of the word, which you observe with great interest. And the ending, fortunately, does not fail and even gives food for thought. Timing Say No! More is ideal for this kind of entertainment – about two and a half hours.
Cruel and ruthless.
If everything was so simple
It is not necessary to give a negative answer to all remarks – sometimes you can remain silent. In some cases, this is even desirable, although it is difficult not to succumb to temptation. Moments when a refusal is not necessary to advance the plot are marked with a white stripe – it narrows, as in the Telltale games when choosing an answer. Sometimes the process is delayed for a few seconds, and it is better not to miss the monologues of the interlocutors at this moment – there are also many good jokes there. Some requests are repeated, but rarely enough that it is not striking.
As the protagonist progresses, he listens more and more to a course of audio lessons and learns new ways to refuse. Before you say no, you can grin, clap your hands, or think about giving a colleague false hope. It doesn’t affect anything at all – it’s just that if you want to go deeper into roleplaying, they let you do it. There are also several types of refusal: ordinary, cold, lazy and weird. The intonation with which the word “no” will be pronounced depends on them, but you will not have to actively switch between them. But you need to charge a replica, especially in conversations with guards or bosses – from a loud scream, furniture breaks and paper sheets fly in all directions.
Sure! Not.
Yes, the authors romanticize the workflow – in reality, the trainee will not be able to defy the boss and ignore everything that is asked of him. This is in the game of asking to work overtime, you can say “no”, but in reality it will not work. No matter how the heads of game studios insist that crunches are a voluntary matter, in fact, in case of refusal, colleagues will look askance at you, and you will be closer and closer to the first positions on the list of dismissals. And this is not only the case in the gaming industry.
Therefore consider Say No! More as a guide to action, of course, is not needed – it’s just a comedy about life situations, an opportunity to fantasize what work would look like in an ideal world. And the authors themselves clarify in the game that you don’t need to say “no” to everyone. You just need to give up unnecessary things at least from time to time, otherwise you will begin to sit on your neck. Especially if you are a trainee and they try to hang everything on you, as on cheap labor.
Bosses always need a lot.
The last game that was able to make me laugh throughout the passage was There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension . Now the same can be said about Say No! More – seemingly nondescript at first glance, a game with a peculiar style, but it will surely cause a smile in everyone. The game is unlikely to be remembered for a long time, but one evening will definitely brighten up. And sometime later, when you start to forget the plot and the best moments, you will want to replay it, having noticed the name in your Steam library.
Pros: Lots of great jokes; unpredictable plot that does not disappoint in the end; funny gameplay mechanics; great voice acting that makes everything even funnier.
Cons: jokes are sometimes repeated; the game is unlikely to be remembered for long.
