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Item - The Office

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Series: Choose Your Own Misery — no. 1
Authors: Gagnon, Jilly
Macdonald, Mike
Date: January 26, 2016
ISBN: 1626819246 / 9781626819245
Length: 294 pages
Number of Endings: 44 (not counting multiple sections that send you back to the start).
User Summary: You must handle another day at the job you hate as best as you can. Can you even get out of bed?
Guillermo's Thoughts:

This adult-aimed book (which includes no game system, only choices) deals with the emptiness and absurdity of modern office life in a satirical way. At nearly 300 pages, there is a large variety of storylines and outcomes to experience. I found the book reasonably funny, but its humour is not at level of the The Onion website. I also think the game significantly overstays its welcome - the various storylines were hardly entertaining enough to sustain my interest, and I felt relieved once I managed to finish the whole thing. I believe my dissatisfaction with the adventure might stem from the fact that there is no overarching plot and therefore no optimal ending for the reader to achieve - reading over and over a book consisting entirely of random events and whatever wacky ideas the authors could come up with doesn't feel that involving. Overall, this might entertain you a while if you want something different than the standard adventure gamebook fare, but don't expect it to be a masterpiece. As a final note, the book includes a totally outlandish, extremely happy ending that cannot be reached from anywhere else in the text (a nod to Inside UFO 54-40), which made me appreciate it a bit more.

More reviews by Guillermo

Special Thanks:Thanks to Mateusz Motyka for the cover image.
Users Who Own This Item: jdreller, marnaudo

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