Say No! More Makes Workplace Assertiveness Feel Fun

Wish you could refuse that overtime at work? Tell that family member you don’t want them coming to visit? Shut down some idiot who’s bothering you for something? Say No! More is a light, silly Switch game about being more assertive, giving you some powerful refusals that will blast jerks from your path. So, even if you can’t quite call up those powers in your work day, at least you can use them in a game. Saying NO so hard that it hurls someone into the air, Dragon Ball Z-style, feels pretty dang good.

You’ve just started a new job at some company, and naturally, you’re inclined, and encouraged, to say “YES!” to everything asked of you. Go get some coffee for another worker. Do their paperwork. Don’t knock over a pillar that weighs a few tons. You get asked for all kinds of stuff that you really shouldn’t have to deal with right out of the gate. You also get your lunch taken from you, since the boss forgot his own. You just roll over and take it until a motivational tape falls in your lap, offering you access to the power of NO.

Say No! More isn’t terribly complicated in what you can do as people come up to you with foolish, selfish, and rude requests. You’ll face them down as they speak to you, and you can slam them with a NO by pushing the button. You have four different styles of NO, ranging from Heated, Cold, Lazy, and Wacky, depending on the tone you wish to convey. You can also hold the button down to charge up a more powerful NO that does more damage to stronger opponents, but this costs energy. You can charge that energy through using extra actions like laughing at your foe or nodding sarcastically.

These abilities exist largely for show and for you to explore your own feelings on the situation. You don’t need the charged NO often, so your taunting actions are usually just fun ways to get your rude coworkers riled up. Likewise, any old NO is sufficient to blast foes aside, although it feels better to choose one that’s appropriate to what you want your coworker to feel. You don’t want to just refuse someone. You want to crush them with it.

This is the main form of interaction throughout Say No! More ­on the Switch — feeling out how you want to react to what’s being said. It largely doesn’t matter what you do or how you deliver that NO, as most NOs will take out anyone in your path (save for a few that need to be hit with a charged shot), so it’s up to you to gauge the reaction in your mind and how you want to do it. This means the game isn’t particularly challenging, but it makes it feel more like a playground. A playground where you finally get to yell at the people you hate at work.

This is the big charm of the game. It’s not hard, but it presents you with an endless array of mean office workers that you can literally smash through doors and walls just by refusing them. It feels pretty good to see the force of your refusal tearing the office building to shreds as it hurls a lazy coworker clean out of your path. When a bunch of them rush you from different angles, it can feel like a moment out of a Kung Fu movie or John Wick, where you effortlessly crush your enemies with well-placed, cutting NOs.

The things the other staff say are utterly ridiculous, making the refusals feel that much funnier, too. The office workers ramble out all kinds of reactions to what you say, spouting constant new silly lines despite the sheer number of people who come after you for paperwork and overtime. Say No! More had tons of lighthearted dialogue throughout its duration, and given the absurd nature of the game, it all stays pretty funny as you work your way through it.

The colorful world keeps everything playful as well, adding to the dialogue to create this silly, Katamari Damacy-like mood (the visual styles felt similar to me). It’s a place of bright faces and cartoonish mayhem, adding to that playground mood of the game.

Say No! More excels at creating this light, funny mood without challenging the player too much, and in doing so, it lets you really enjoy standing up for yourself. Here, you get to say no to your bosses and the other idiots who bother you throughout your day. Not only do you tell them off, but you do so with such force that it tears your workplace down. It’s an incredible experience in just burning off some steam from your work day. Not only that, but maybe it’ll show you a little bit of the power of being able to say NO to the people who constantly ruin your day in the real world.

Say No! More is available on the Nintendo Switch, PC, and iOS.