Box Knight review

Office life is such a ideal candidate for satire. And that one of the reasons why Box Knight is disappointing. From superfluous meetings to performative pep talks about improving the corporate climate (while making everyone miserable), the modern workplace has an inexhaustible supply of things to make fun of it.

Undoubtedly, Adelaide-based We Made A Thing Studios certainly recognizes that potential. Unfortunately, its action roguelite does much with premise. Here, toxic workplace culture has physically transformed employees into monsters. The office is now populated by drone goblins, shielded creatures that must be perceived, and volatile enemies that explode when subjected to a ground pound. Presiding over it all is the CEO, tucked away in the safety of an office on the top floor.

A Script as Witty as the Average LinkedIn Profile

Expectedly, you’re the game’s eponymous hero, an ordinary employee who transforms into a cardboard-clad corporate crusader hen the clock strikes 5 p.m. on Friday. Yes, your makeshift armor and weapons are discarded packaging from the recycling bin, and that’s about as deep as the humor goes. Largely, Box Knight is such a reserved parody of office life that it feels like human resources revised the script.

It would have been great to fling business cards like shuriken, turn Post-it notes into sticky traps, or use a stapler as a damage-over-time weapon. Maybe a manifesto from a disgruntled employee could have doubled as a shield or coffee cups could have morphed into a boss with a formidable burn attack. But beneath the paper armor and simple workplace caricatures is a pedestrian beat ’em up that follows familiar roguelite conventions without adding much innovation.

Gameplay as Fun as Casual Fridays

That’s frustrating because the game’s art style is undeniably appealing. The bright, cartoonish look provides monsters with personality as well as backdrops like drab cubicles and menacing looking data centers. Credit to the developers for keeping the tone and visuals comical rather than making things bloody or disturbing. Sure, there’s some pastel-colored pools that leak from terminated employees. But it’s close in tone to a series you’d find on the Cartoon Network.

Despite the half-hearted context, the game would work if fighting was at least fun. But sadly, it drones on like upper management apology. Your moveset is build around a basic attack combo, a jump, a ground pound, and a charge attack that changes depending on your equipped weapon. There are a couple of wrinkles, from holding down a button to prepare a stronger blow to executing weakened enemies.

Workplace Burnout

And that probably sounds like a solid foundation for a beat ‘em up. But most encounters quickly deteriorate into repeated button presses. Yes, individual enemies can be stunned stun, allowing you to issue an uninterrupted string of basic attacks. However, this advantage is less useful once other office creeps fill the room. As such, crowd control can be tough while the lone enemy is a pushover, giving encounters an unsatisfying rhythm.

Even the executions lack the cathartic payoff promised by their title. Rather than slicing an obnoxious manager in half with an oversized dismissal notice or burying a creature beneath a mountain of weekly reports, all these finishers do is save you from some additional button presses. Sure, there’s some quick animations, but it feels like a missed opportunity.

Buying new weapons with in-game currency alter attack speed, reach and damage output. But each new unlock barely causes any change in tactics. Game like Hades can change your approach to combat with a new ability. Even the similarly corporate-themed Going Under turned almost anything into an improvised weapon. Here, changing equipment feels more like slight upgrades in efficiency rather than learning to fight in some new way.

A Lackluster Performance Review

The roguelike structure doesn’t help to hide any of these shortcomings. Each attempt sends the Box Knight through a randomized sequence of rooms and departments, with rewards earned between battles. Single-run improvements offer a ‘choose one from three’ upgrades to stats such as attack strength, defense, attack speed or elemental damage. But largely, earning “+5% evasion” doesn’t deliver much of a perceptible upgrade. Internal numbers rise, enemies fall slightly faster, but the fundamental remains the same. And maybe that is Box Knight’s best joke.

Box Knight was played on PC with review code provided by the publisher.