Karoshi Suicide Salaryman
http://armorgames.com/play/2407/karoshi-suicide-salaryman
by Karoshi
Wednesday, 19 January 2010
If there ever has to be a game that encapsulates the state of Japanese workers, this is it. This flash game plays over 50 levels with a weird objective: to kill yourself. You play a suicidal businessman who has to navigate through the levels by pushing boxes, activating traps, firing a pistol, which, at the end of every level, will unlock itself to allow you to run or jump into spikes or electrocute yourself.
The controls are deceptively easy: up, down, left, right, spacebar. However, puzzles do get a little bit tougher each level, with the first few teaching the player the mechanics and objectives of the game. However, as the level progresses, the game breaks even its own mechanics to bring surprises to the player. For instance, in some levels the player is supposed to use the mouse to click and build a staircase of blocks to reach up to the top, where the spikes are located.
The puzzles have a good range of difficulty. Some are simple, but the majority of them require some thinking and forward planning. However, the puzzles are not that difficult as to stall players for too long. The game designer makes good use of simple physics to improve gameplay: at some levels, you get to jump on a trampoline while firing a pistol, in others, you have to push a button to let fall a safe deposit box to crush yourself. As there are not many elements in the game (there are probably only 6-7 assets in the game), the players will not feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of assets and instead focus on the gameplay since they already have an inkling as to how each assets 'should' work.
Art style is simple: the entire game is in 2D side scrolling format. But a game like that doesn't need to have superb graphics. Instead, I reckon the game wouldn't be as fun if the graphics were actually better than what it is already. The music has a funky jazzy groove to it, which is really unexpected because you wouldn't really expect a beat to accompany such a theme.
All in all, I would say that it is a fun game, as I went to play the sequel after completing this once. However, I have to comment that the owner of this game really knows how to milk it. He has already created 4 games using the same character with the same type of game objective (kill yourself), save for a few minor additions to the game.
Screenshots after the break.
RATING: 8/10
Karoshi preparing to meet his maker.
"Geronimo!"
Splat!
Alternate way of dying 1: getting electrocuted.
Alternate way of dying 2: death from above by a safe deposit box.
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