Continuing the theme of paper coming from Lucas Pope is Unsolicited, a game about filling in various junk mail forms and sending them out into the world. As a typical Lucas Pope title there is a darker undertone to all the paper pushing although don’t expect the depths achieved in likes of Papers, Please as this game was created in 48 hours for Ludum Dare Game Jam 33. Despite this short development cycle though it’s worthy of a few playthroughs of your time particularly if you are a fan of Pope’s work.
Playable for free within your browser (originally Flash and not HTML5) players step into the desk role of an unknown character in ACME, a company that specialises in various direct mail campaigns. From collection notices to time shares, credit offers, donations, insurance and various other products you’re in charge of taking the information on screen and transferring it to the appropriate form. After the form has been completely appropriately players can sign, seal and deliver it (provided the details are correct) before accepting another task.
Players are fed the necessary form information on the left hand side of their screen and if not followed correctly the form will fail to send, instead being scrunched up and wasting precious game time. On the surface this assigned task is easy but once players have a bottleneck of up to 11 mail items to process and different forms for each it can quickly become hectic as you advance through the timed sessions.
Filling out said form is easy enough with each template having gaps on the page for players to plug in details which are provided on the left hand side of the screen as noted above. Clicking on one of these blank areas will trigger a drop down with various options based on your current workload requiring players to cross reference the information. In order to successfully send off a form all the details must match the provided information with the required signature and seal, which are automatic but the buttons must be pressed in the correct order otherwise you’ll also have to start again.
In order to keep the current client list (and attract new ones) players will need to ensure they are delivering a certain number each day without errors and the time pressure can definitely be felt only a few levels into the adventure of Unsolicited. For those that stay employed by completing all their jobs you’ll advance to other time sessions that slowly introduce new forms. Session one limits players to unsolicited charity donation requests where you match name, family, donation request and phone number before introducing new forms. While session two introduces the timeshare form that includes a new date field before session three introduces interest rate percentages through a car credit offer and beyond.
It wouldn’t be a full Lucas Pope game though without a little twist for those that can complete their unsolicited mail tasks over multiple days, which you can discover for yourself without too much time investment.
Summary:
- Free browser based title by Lucas Pope based in HTML 5.
- Send out junk mail on behalf of several companies including donations, car credit offers, timeshares and sweepstakes.
- Battle time limits, various forms and a high volume of requests and combinations as you advance through the timed work sessions.
- Simple core point and click gameplay that is easy to grasp and use.
- Great humour, art style and Lucas Pope style twist endings.
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Review Platform: Browser
