A Week in the Life of Asocial Giraffe makes me pretty grateful that I’m not asocial. Granted, I’m not particularly social. I WILL go out of my way to avoid talking with folks. But this poor giraffe will quite literally explode if you don’t help him navigate his weekly routine. The poor guy’s neck is so high and his arms are so low, he struggles to grab things that might be a normal height for regular people. Even worse, though, people actually talk to him, and they talk to him a lot.
I’m glad we’re seeing more comedy games working their way towards completion. Ever since Thank Goodness, You’re Here released, I’ve seen a lot of indies pop up with more comedic vibes. A Week in the Life of Asocial Giraffe is a bit more muted in some areas, but just as wacky in others. Split into a series of vignettes where the giraffe has a task that must be accomplished but simply cannot draw any attention, has you setting up a Rube Goldberg style of events that allow our giraffe to maintain his peaceful, asocial existence while accomplishing his goals.
The demo starts with the giraffe entering an elevator and having the single other person in the elevator strike up a conversation. Well, it’s more like the person is asking a million questions of our poor giraffe as he tries not to explode. Our tasks are neatly listed in the giraffe’s notebook, and the very first task should be simple, right? Get off the train. It’s an introductory task that helps the player understand how the game works, and it succeeds by showing the player exactly how ridiculous getting Asocial Giraffe through these situations is going to be.
Getting off the train should be very simple. As Asocial Giraffe is standing in the train car, a woman is guarding the door, looking around. Clearly shown on the seat is her purse, next to her purse is a dog bone, and finally, a dog on the ground. Like the woman, the dog is wearing pearls so you know it’s hers. In real life, you’d just shuffle past her, maybe make a snide remark about her blocking the exit depending on where you’re from, and be on with your day.
Asocial Giraffe, on the other hand, can’t bear to risk being talked to, so let’s help him out. Petting the dog gets the dog onto the seat and by the bone. Clicking on the bone has Asocial toss the squeak bone into the lady’s purse. The dog, being a good boy, gets in the purse and barks to alert the woman, he’s ready to go. And so, Asocial is able to exit the train. As you can imagine, the setups only get more and more ridiculous from there.
Beautifully, every scenario ends with a beautifully crafted haiku related to something in the previous puzzle. When attempting to complete the task of taking a formal ID photo, our poor friend Asocial had to stack a display just to hide behind it. Once he managed to get into the room alone and get his suit on, he placed the camera on a chair and takes a picture. What we get is an adorable picture of our giraffe wearing his suit wrong but looking so cute, along with a little haiku in the written section of the ID about how he feels. Gorgeous.
There’s something about a puzzle game that sets up a wacky premise. As much as I love straight puzzle games that tickle my brain, I like it when they tickle my funny bone as well. The extra layer of understanding the game’s logic and using that to exploit a situation in your favor is usually where the absurdity comes from. While trying to secure a can of matcha tea, I had to swap the matcha tea with a strawberry tea on a display to get a crowd of people to move between sample stands so Asocial could pass unmolested. Absurd? Yes, but consistent within the game’s world.
The demo is rather short, which is disappointing. Typically, comedy games don’t like to overstay their welcome. So in that regard, I’m really happy that A Week in the Life of Asocial Giraffe is making its way out in 2025. While the waiting will be annoying, I can practice my asocial skills and attempt to knock things off my personal checklist without talking to anyone. Oh look, I checked off my first one. Write a preview for A Week in the Life of Asocial Giraffe, and I did it without even seeing another human.
A Week in the Life of Asocial Giraffe is part of LudoNarraCon 2025 and has a demo available on their Steam page. Keep an eye on MonsterVine for more coverage of LudoNarraCon 2025.
