Although work-from-home culture has blossomed over the past several years, there is still plenty of room for a game that makes fun of the endless monotony of everyday office work. That game isDev_Hell,aroguelike deck-builder gamefrom Unhinged Studios. InDev_Hell,players take on the role of a faceless office drone who will be confronted with all that is both good and bad about working an office job from free coffee to the constant barrage of unnecessary emails.
Dev_Helldirector Don Westendorp and creative director Del Sharratt recently spoke with Game Rant about the many aspects of corporate culture they chose to both honor and satirize in their game. They drew inspiration both from their real-life experiences working in offices and from media including long-running sitcomThe Officeandgames likePapers, Please.The result is a game that accurately depicts the life of a corporate drone through a wickedly humorous lens.
Weaponizing Corporate Lingo With “Per My Last Email”
The core gameplay ofDev_Hellcenters around building a deck of cards that can deal with a variety of problems ranging from performance reviews to tangled code to the not-so-hidden morally ambiguous nature of the company’s business. Many elements of corporate life were directly replicated in the form ofcards players can add to their deck. One, “It’s a Feature,” deals with Bug cards by simply allowing the player to state that no, in fact, it’s not a bug at all. Others reference the constant flow of emails one receives while working in an office. As Westendorp explained,
We have a card that’s literally named “Per My Last Email,” and it’s a guy throwing a Molotov cocktail. There are cards that you play against other cards, and they can just do damage. This one does influence damage, but also if it’s played against a specific email card or a defensive card and it doesn’t kill it, it draws another card. Like: “My last email wasn’t good enough, so we’re going to give you more.”
Both Sharratt and Westendorp have experience working corporate office jobs, and it shows.Dev_Hellplayers will be confronted with both over-eager coworkers and those who are just there to earn a paycheck. The company’s bosses aren’t always the most competent. The coffee is terrible, but at least it’s free - and provides players with a “concentration” boost,Dev_Hell’sversion of a mana system.
Gray Hallways And Bumbling Bosses Make Dev_Hell’s Office Feel Real
The art style ofDev_Hell’soffice setting is brutal and realistic; the office is bland and gray, with little color to be seen anywhere, contrasting elegantly with the brilliantly colorful cards. Sharratt explained that while the card art was illustrated, the backgrounds come from manipulated stock photos. As Westendrop added,
“We’re really trying to be unapologetically realistic about it. Even though some of it might be boring and some of the characters might hit someuncanny valleystuff, we kind of like that.”
When asked what sources of inspiration they drew from besides their personal experience, both Sharratt and Westendorp mentioned popular sitcomThe Office.One of the higher-ups inDev_Hell’scompany, the CTO, was compared toThe Office’sMichael Scott. However, Westendorp clarified that they didn’t want to replicate Michael Scott exactly. “There’s some levels of Michael Scott we don’t feel like we can do justice to in the format of the game - in terms of making the player really cringe.”
Dev_Hellwill put players through the day-to-day office drudgery, subject them to performance reviews in the form of card battles, and spam them with endless messages via Slack analogue “Smack” - but at least they won’t have to deal with their boss accidentally promising to pay the college tuition for an entire class of kids.
Dev_Hellis currently in development and is planned for a 2024 release on PC.
