Bored at Work? Play ‘The Office’ on MSN Games

Over on the MSN games site, they have a fun little time waster that is sure to make the boring workday go by much faster than usual. The Office is exactly as it sounds – and it is more like the T.V. show than you would imagine. The funniest part of the game is the characters themselves, which all look like bobble-heads.The premise of the game, is that Michael has received word that there will be downsizing within Dunder Mifflin. In order to keep your job, Michael has devised a friendly efficiency competition for one week each month. This “no-holds-barred eff-comp” consists of tasks that you must complete for each employee. Whomever fills the order the fastest and gets the most done will win a paid month’s vacation. Although Michael has yet to run this by corporate – when does he EVER run anything by corporate – Jim (your character) is on board with anything that diverts his attention from work.

As Jim, you must complete tasks for other coworkers before your competition does. During the first level of the game, you go up against Dwight. There are four different tasks to complete for your coworkers and you do this by gathering folders, filing, delivering printed documents, and retreiving folders from a filing cabinet. Whomever gets to the goal first and then delivers it, they are rewarded with money. While trying to accomplish these tasks, there are two different things that can give you an edge over Dwight. One is Pam – if you have earned enough points during the day she will pull a prank on Dwight to distract him while you work. The other is an extra boost of speed from the coffee machine, where once activated you have the ability to almost fly circles around Dwight. After you have completed certain levels, you unlock different employees within the company to help boost your points. Each coworker will give you double points for the task assigned to them be it the printer, filing cabinet, or completed order. Once you beat the first level, your next nemesis is Ryan. You can pull pranks on him too, but be warned that he is much faster than Dwight – the good news is that since you proved to Dwight in the first level that you are indeed faster than him, he will now help you beat Ryan at his own game. Angela shows up once in a while to provide a mini-game where you collect items for her to accumulate money – the more you collect the more you get.

The Office is a pretty fun and addictive game to chase the boredom away. I only played the free trial version of the game, which only lasts an hour; but if you want the full version of the game, it costs 19.95 and you can get both versions here. I suggest any one who is a fan of the show to at least try the game out – it is pretty fun for a casual game.