

The Pauser
YaYa · September 20, 2024 · Adventure, Story Rich, Satire, Puzzle, 2D
The Pauser is free to play — no purchase needed. We track it so you know if that ever changes.
Screenshots
The Pauser price
The Pauser is free to play — there is no purchase price, on Steam or anywhere else we track. We keep watching it, so if it ever stops being free the price history on this page will show when that happened and what it changed to.
About The Pauser
The Pauser is a narrative adventure where you guide a father through a mysteriously frozen world, using paused blocks to navigate while resisting intrusive ads that tempt you with easier difficulty. This indie game brilliantly satirizes mobile gaming's ad-reward culture by intentionally frustrating the player with constant interruptions, forcing you to experience the developer's real-world frustration with ads plaguing modern digital platforms.
In this game, players take on the role of a father on a journey to find his child. You'll need to use paused blocks to progress, but beware—numerous ads will pop up along the way. If you choose to watch them, the game's difficulty will drop significantly. Sounds great, right? ......right?
This game satirizes the growing trend of "watch ads to get rewards" in games and the increasing ads on social media and video platforms. The developer, frustrated by constant ad interruptions while watching videos, created this game to purposely disrupt the player's experience, giving you a taste of that frustration and expressing dissatisfaction with the current digital landscape. Welcome to try this game and enjoy it.This game is entirely free!The author made this game with "love". If you'd like to support my continued game development, you're welcome to make a small donation via my Instagrant "ya_makegame_ya" where has a link to "buy me a coffee". The minimum amount on that platform is about $5. If you'd prefer to donate a smaller amount, please wait for the release of the DLC and purchase it.Please note: The DLC will not contain any additional game content. It is simply a way to support the author. Please carefully consider and evaluate your ability before purchasing. Thank you!How To Control:A/D :left/rightSpace:jumpEnter: DialogueIf any wrong happends,please use "load game" button.
The Pauser — game info
- Platforms
- Windows
- Player modes
- Single-player
- PC Game Pass
- Not included
What Steam players say
Recent verbatim reviews from Steam — separate from playze.io community reviews below.
⠀6 found this helpful
Review in progress here. I know game dev is tough as ♥♥♥♥, but the game's far from finished. As such, I will reserve judgement until the game is in a semi-finished state. First off, some suggested features: - Skip dialogue - Speed up dialogue - Dialogue box blocks your view of the characters when present. Maybe make it smaller or put it at the top of the screen? Other than that, the game plays fine. Maybe add the ability to rebind actions? By far, however, the biggest problem with this game is bugs. As I said, it's still inconclusive, so imma need this fixed before I give the game a final score. Some particulars: - Dialogue triggers with multiple NPCs will repeat if you walk back to the trigger area. This can be annoying if you accidentally backtrack and get stuck in an unskippable conversation. - In your first encounter with the demons, they disappear awkwardly when you get the prompt to pause the game. Just a little visual bug but still makes the game look unpolished. Maybe have them fade out? - Grammatical errors. In a story-based adventure platformer, grammatical errors are the last thing you want. I spotted quite a few within the first ten minutes of playing. I'd go back over …4 found this helpful
The Pauser is an unusual indie adventure that takes the irritating interruptions commonly associated with modern digital entertainment and transforms them into an intentional part of its gameplay and commentary. Developed and published by YaYa, the game combines straightforward 2D platforming, environmental puzzles, narrative elements, and satire into a relatively small but distinctive experience. Rather than relying on complicated combat, extensive progression systems, or a huge world, it focuses on a simple mechanical concept and uses that foundation to explore the increasingly intrusive role of advertisements in games and online entertainment. The story follows a father known as Mr. Egg, who awakens after experiencing a disturbing nightmare and discovers that the world around him appears to have been paused. His primary objective is to search for his missing child, giving the otherwise strange premise a more personal motivation. This contrast between an emotional journey and an absurd environment is one of the game's more interesting qualities. The narrative provides a reason to continue through the various obstacles instead of presenting the experience as nothing more than a c…1 found this helpful
"The Pauser" is a very lame 2D retro/minimalist/hand drawn platformer with a few other minigames thrown in, all of the same deplorably low quality. This was made by someone who apparently dropped out of school so they could make this. Wow. That was the biggest mistake since Hagar the Awful accidentally ordered 10,000 viking helmets with the horns on the inside. There's the old overdone gimmick where you can drop your own little platforms... other games have done this far better. This game features very lacklustre lazy, minimalist hand-drawn "art" for graphics instead of anything remotely contemporary. I'm sure the "developer" thought this would come across as "artistic", but it doesn't, it comes across as "really lazy" and looks bad as a result of their lack of interest in doing their job properly. Developers must try to understand that gaming is a visual medium, and gamers spend a lot of money on high end gaming rigs for a reason. And that reason is not so they can look at lazy, phoned-in half efforts like this. Not every "free" game really is. There's often MTX, or content locked behind DLC, or donations being requested, or any other number of things that could mislead …1 found this helpful
Amazing game, it took about an hour to complete without ads.1 found this helpful
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