In a world where one man eats the last breakfast doughnut in the office, all hell breaks loose. What were once your fellow co-workers have now turned against you as you strive to survive the war-zone that was once an office and must use whatever you can get your hands on to gain a bit of an edge which can be the deciding factor between life and death. An unforgettable tale of isolation, survival and getting your ass handed to you by your 70 year old boss. All joking aside, Office Battle is a Beat ‘Em Up/RPG where you play as a customizable character and survive level after level of fighting your co-workers. You have a button to punch with each hand and one to kick while weapons can be picked up once an enemy randomly drops one or you purchase it.
Weapons range from newspapers to belts and other out of place things though they all handle the same and have the same reach and animations so you’ll be sticking to whichever causes most damage. Other than weapons you can also pick up shields and protection for your head such as trashcans and caskets. Sadly it all amounts to nothing but boredom regardless of how wacky this all sounds since the combat itself is extremely sub-par. This plays akin to something like Diablo where positioning and timing are nonexistent as you keep clicking the attack button like a madman. Aside from the few levels that require you to capture certain points of the map there is no reason to move your character other than finding a choke point to easier deal with the enemies and avoid getting surrounded.
You cannot dodge or get out of reach of attacks, once an enemy is an attacking animation it will hit you regardless of how far away you are. There is nothing in the levels like health pickups or anything of that sort, all items randomly fall from defeated foes and the AI always run directly to where you are as soon as they spawn. They always spawn near you and even right behind you occasionally. So no enemy placement, no items around the level and still taking damage from attacks that struck several feet away makes this game feel like an unholy combination of both the Beat ‘Em Up and RPG genres worst aspects. Whether you win or lose ultimately comes down to luck of item drops and how high your level is instead of any skill on your part. What it comes down to is you standing in a single place the entire time, mashing both punch buttons and wondering why you aren’t playing Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots instead.
You may be wondering what about the kick attack? Well it does the same damage as punching, is slow to use and range is the same, not that it matters in this title. It could have been used for staggering an enemy or something of that nature but it is just an inferior attack that you’ll likely never use in Office Battle. Defeating foes and completing missions grant you both money and experience which can be used to buy items and to level up your skill tree. In the main menu there is a store where you can purchase said weapons and gear to take into a mission. You can also sell whatever gear you picked up from missions for cash. Weapons do break down so the benefit of buying them is that they are in 100% condition as such will take longer for it to break in the middle of fighting. Protection for the head and shields wear down from taking damage so constantly replacing your gear is necessary if that is the way you built your character.
Leveling up grants 1 skill point that allows you to upgrade one of the abilities in the skill tree such as regenerating health, better hand to hand and weapon usage increases to name a few. There is a skill for blocking which oddly enough cannot be activated, instead works like an RPG where it’s pure chance if it activates. There are 4 types of missions. Survival where you must stay alive for a certain amount of time and Last Man Standing where you must defeat a certain amount of enemies. They feel pretty much the same to be quite honest. Office Capture is the one mode where you must move since you have to take control of three circles scatted on the map but once you are there it’s back to being stationary and mashing the attack buttons so not a huge departure. Finally we have Big B missions that has you facing your old boss in a fight.
Big B missions are without a doubt the worst part of the game. The old man has a ton of health and packs quite a punch making it so you can only beat these missions once you grind enough since skill isn’t a factor in this game. It’s not a one on one affair either, you will still be under attack by the endlessly spawning coworkers and with no way to refill your health other than the random pickup they drop beating the Big B missions require luck as well as being high leveled. There is an editor where you can create levels which is sadly ultimately pointless considering you will just head to a choke-point and not see anything else like in the developer’s levels due to the nature of the gameplay. This game has partial controller support so you will need your mouse to navigate menus and you will have to bind the keys before being able to use it.
Another thing I would like to mention is that the games highest resolution is 1920×1200 which is less than ideal for someone with a higher resolution but a minor annoyance overall. It sounds like I absolutely despise the game given how much negatives I’ve stated so far but it does have a certain charm to it. It’s not a serious game by any means so if you want to have a green skinned, freak of nature type of character you can. Also the physics are pretty hilarious and landing a critical hit will send them flying as if this were Dragon Ball Z or something. The music is pretty solid though the loop is a bit on the short side. Most importantly I feel it’s important to remember that this game is just 99 cents (or national equivalent) and it is stuffed with content. It’s a shame that the gameplay seriously drags it down as it would have been great with even a simple traditional Beat ’Em Up style of gameplay instead of this pseudo RPG monstrosity but at the end of the day there is some enjoyment to be found in Office Battle.
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