Papers, Please Short Movie Now Available on YouTube

Papers, Please has got a short film adaptation, which you can check out for free. It’s a pretty faithful and well-done adaptation, as opposed to every single high-budget video game movie ever. Even people that have never played Papers, Please can watch the movie and get it.

In a departure from the usual quality of video game movies, the short adaptation of Papers, Please is actually pretty good. It covers most of the important basics of the game. The oppressive, totalitarian atmosphere, the difficult moral choices, and even the consequences of making a mistake. Plus, they know exactly which details to keep a bit more in the background, such as the constant worry for your family. The film is only ten minutes long, and it’s absolutely worth watching. Even those of you that haven’t played the game can watch it and enjoy, I’d say. I do recommend turning on subtitles, though.

For those of you that have no idea what we’re talking about here, let’s get you up to speed quickly. Papers, Please is a… well… bureaucracy simulator? Honesty, it defies any kind of genre classification. Basically, you play as a clerk on the border of a horrifyingly totalitarian state. You have to process people that want to enter the country, and weed out anybody that shows even the slightest hint of discrepancy. However, time is of the essence, since you get paid for every person you process. However, if you make a mistake, you’ll get fined. And you’ll need every penny to keep your family fed and warm.

That’s not even the end of it. The game does an amazing job of telling some very heart-wrenching stories, both with the people that you have to process, and the protagonist himself. It’s quite often soul-crushing. Papers, Please is well-worth your attention. And, conveniently enough, it’s currently half off on Steam. Oh, and you can also watch the movie on Steam, if you wish.