Interaction/emotional strategy game where you live the life of a shutaway person with a broken computer who has forgotten how to connect to others from being alone. You have recently been pushed to apply for a job, and will be working with and around people for the first time in recent memory. You hate attention, and as a result have found that the easiest solution is to do what everyone does and pretend to be fine. The game is played over a span of days which start when you wake up in the morning, and how you prepare for work will influence how relaxed or stressed you are from how piercing your alarm is to how stale the cereal is to whether you accidentally bump into walls or break cups or plates while still sleepy. It starts at a rough value depending on how well you slept - usually terribly at day one - and decreases when faced with negative stimuli like harsh noises or social phobias.

At work, the tasks are usually away from people and are simple tasks such as stacking shelves or wiping tables, but coworkers and customers may come and talk to you from time to time and you will have to navigate dialogue and maintain your body language/composure using comfort objects or escape tactics to keep stress down so they don't guess anything is wrong. The higher your stress the harder this will be, and people wondering is a likely occurrence in the first week or two if things don't improve. Other random events include day to day trials such as laundry days, extra responsibilities, the chance of picking up a stray pet and having to feed it, being mugged after a late shift, and even tripping over the sidewalk and not being able to afford the health insurance until you heal.

With the money you earn, you can afford things like a better mattress, medication for asthma and sleeping, cleaning clothes more often, new music, confectionary treats, and other things for general hygiene and mental health that will reduce the effect stress has and make it easier to fool people into thinking you're okay. If someone suspects something and tries to move closer, though, your stress will ramp up for as long as they're focused on you and the effects of relaxation will have less of an impact the longer it goes on, all the way to zero. If stress hits maximum at any time, you will have a breakdown - if anyone sees you during this you will be found out and referred to a therapist, which will use up any money you would have put towards repairing your computer and result in a failure state.

The aim of the game is to work shift for as long as it takes to afford a repaired or new computer - depending on how many days played, more parts will be needed as your computer breaks down - without being found out in the meantime so that you can fix it in as few days as possible and go back to how you were living before you had to get the job.

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Picture: Dream Life by ImaginarySmile on DeviantArt http://imaginarysmile.deviantart.com/art/Dream-Lif...