▼ Not recommended
0 hrs
A Night Before the Deadline
Enjoyable for the short time on offer, with just enough variety to keep it interesting. The controls are terrible and the searching is a little tedious. I’d maybe recommend it in a sale.
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A Night Before the Deadline is an adventure game set in the IT department of an office block. The deadline for an important piece of software is due for completion tomorrow, and Joe must stay late to complete the work.
In order to complete the build, Joe must search the office for code fragments scattered around the building and deploy them; A simple task, but it soon becomes apparent that not everything is as it seems.
🤔Overall Impressions🤔
A Night Before the Deadline is a basic game of searching for USB sticks around an office and playing a few mini games. It only lasts around an hour and has keyboard control only. The story is quite weak but the atmosphere is heavy and it just about keeps your interest until its conclusion.
🎮 Controls 🎮
The controls are terrible. Initially, the room was spinning around uncontrollably until I removed my game pad. The game mechanics are very simple yet there is no controller support. I started to get a little motion sickness when I was playing due to the way the mouse controls the camera. I turned mouse sensitivity down to its lowest setting which helped. It is still harder than it should be to control the character though. He often gets caught on objects in the office and I was fighting the mouse to control camera angles. It is just about serviceable.
🕹️ Gameplay 🕹️
The gameplay is quite basic. Joe will spend the majority of his time searching rooms around the office for USB sticks. Some of the sticks can be tricky to find as they can’t always be seen from a specific angle. You won’t be able to open drawers, search desks or bookshelves for example. All the sticks are out in the open where you can see them. None are particularly hidden, and the office is not that large, so a thorough examination will reveal them all. Parts of the office are locked initially and get unlocked as the story progresses through the use of key cards you need to find.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2611959927
Once all the sticks are found, the code can be deployed into your PC which takes the form of a mini game where you have to re-arrange three bands of colors in a specific order. I couldn’t establish a pattern or reason for the order but organizing them in the correct pattern scores points and you need a minimum score to deploy the programme. There are some tactics involved in this game as you have two options on each colored band. I guess one side contains the colored bands with a scoring option and the other side doesn't. I had to use a pen and paper for the harder levels and make a note of which side was the correct side.
As you progress, the number of USB sticks increases, as well as the number of colored bands you need to arrange. The difficulty escalates slightly, but it isn't difficult enough to stop you progressing.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2611960186
There are a couple of other mini games to play which are reasonably fun to play, if not a little brief.
📕Story📕
The story is quite weak, only fueled by the ambient soundtrack which makes the atmosphere eerie and uncertain. There isn’t much narrative. Your boss pops up with some dialogue now and again and there is an all too brief mysterious caller which doesn’t develop much. The game isn’t really long enough to establish any character development or genuine backstory. There is no lore to search for or discover. I was a little confused by the ending and it didn’t really have much effect on me.
📺 Graphics 📺
The visuals weren’t too bad. They faithfully represented an office environment. The characters were distinctive and had personality but there’s nothing too special here.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2611960485
🎵Sound 🎵
The ambient soundtrack sounds quite creepy; Without this it would feel flat. It plays constantly throughout the game however and isn’t used to create moments of shock or tension. Mainly because there aren’t any.
🍳 Conclusion🍳
A Night Before the Deadline is reasonably enjoyable if you like hunting for items and playing mini games. Unfortunately, there just isn't enough challenge in finding the items and there aren't enough mini games and they are very brief and simple.
The story takes a backseat to the collecting part of the game but the ambient music makes an attempt to keep it mysterious.
I wouldn’t pay full price for a game that lasts only an hour but if you can pick it up in a sale it might be worth a go.
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