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    Plants Vs. Zombies: Battle For Neighborville – Mindless Mayhem

    in Game Reviews

    Posted

    Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville

    Publisher: Electronic Arts
    Developer: PopCap Games
    Release: October 18, 2019
    Rating: Everyone 10+
    Reviewed on: Xbox One
    Also on: PlayStation 4, PC

    After the Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare series gave players two games full of exciting heroes and intense battles across fun multiplayer modes, Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville rebrands the series. However, despite the new name, make no mistake: This new entry carries forward the enjoyable multiplayer suite from those enjoyable Garden Warfare games while experimenting with PvE modes to mixed results.

    Regardless of what mode you want to dive into, you can expect zany, over-the-top action from start to finish thanks to the roster of 20 playable heroes. Rockets whiz past you to annihilate your teammates, drone-style onions and zombie parrots provide air support, and sentient oak trees emerge from the ground. Thanks to a wide range of hero classes to choose from, from a basic foot soldier and a shotgunning healer to an agile mushroom ninja and a fire-breathing snapdragon, you can approach every situation how you want. Picking the right class and equipping perks (like health regeneration and the ability to move and dodge while reviving a teammate) to suit your playstyle is endlessly rewarding as you experiment to find the right loadout for your playstyle and characters.

    Click here to watch embedded media

    Learning the skills of the various plants and zombies is daunting at first, but simple controls and abilities make it a breeze to jump into any mode with little to no practice. While you have a plethora of options available from the start, the robust competitive multiplayer suite is the main attraction.  My favorite modes return from Garden Warfare 2, like Vanquish Confirmed, offense-versus-defense Turf Takeover, and control-point-based Suburbination. I also love the tense new Battle Arena, where two teams of four duke it out in an elimination mode. In addition to no respawns, when you choose a character at the start of each round, you are unable to choose that specific character again for the rest of the match. These restrictions lead to strategic team compositions and white-knuckled firefights you rarely encounter in other modes.

    You can also dive into PvE options with the wave-based Ops mode and three open regions full of missions to complete and collectibles to gather. While laying out your defenses and protecting your point from the increasingly difficult waves of enemies in Ops is a blast, the PvE in the three open regions is hit-and-miss. While I liked some of the more straightforward missions and boss battles, others fall flat, delivering an uneven experience. This inconsistent enjoyment propelled me back toward the multiplayer suite on several occasions, as I worried about whether the next mission would be fun or frustrating.

    The part I dislike most about the PvE regions is you can’t change characters mid-mission or without backing out to the hub, which is frustrating since certain heroes are not well-suited for all situations. This means that if you get to the end of a long, multi-part quest and find it unbalanced for the hero you chose, you have to go back to the hub and lose all progress on the quest, starting again with the hero better suited for the challenge. It’s an unnecessary headache that saps the fun from some missions.

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    No matter the mode you choose, you earn coins to spend on cosmetics and experience to level up your heroes. Experience points are used to level up and promote individual heroes to earn upgrades for their abilities. These upgrades are useful, like giving the Peashooter’s bullets a homing property, or increasing the rate of fire for the Foot Soldier zombie. I like the straightforward nature of the promotion mechanic and wish it carried into the cosmetic items, but unlocking those is more complicated and less engaging.

    In-game currency is primarily used to purchase random pieces of cosmetic equipment from a giant capsule toy machine. The randomized nature of this method of unlocking is annoying, with the brief moment of excitement from seeing what you got usually giving way to disappointment. Because many of the items are underwhelming components or customizations for characters you don’t often use, the act of progressing through the cosmetics you want feels throttled. However, Battle for Neighborville also runs themed events that let you chart paths to specific customization components by spending prize bulbs you earn with experience – just don’t expect to earn the top prizes of an event without investing some serious playtime or saving up over multiple events. I like the idea of having multiple paths to earn customizations, but this convoluted method is unrewarding and unmotivating since there’s rarely a clear path to getting the exact piece you want. The team does have a soon-to-be implemented solution to this problem, but here’s the bad news: It’s a premium shop using real-world currency.

    Those looking for zany multiplayer fun can find it here, but that also comes with an unnecessarily complicated economy and inconsistent PvE components. Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville lets dedicated soldiers dive back into this long-running conflict, even if everyone else has moved on to other battles.

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    Score: 7.75

    Summary: Battle for Neighborville delivers exciting competitive and cooperative multiplayer, but an overly complicated economy and inconsistent PvE elements take away from the experience.

    Concept: Take sides in the seemingly endless conflict between plants and zombies in a third hero-based shooter

    Graphics: A cute-but-unremarkable visual experience with bright colors, delightful animations, and unique character designs

    Sound: Series mainstay tracks react to the action on the battlefield and amp up the action

    Playability: While the prospect of learning the unique loadouts of 20 different heroes is daunting at first, the controls are easy to pick up for anyone who has played a shooter before

    Entertainment: Despite strong competitive and cooperative multiplayer action, the PvE elements fall short of those marquee modes. The progression leads to more frustration than satisfaction

    Replay: Moderately high

    Click to Purchase

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    3.1 Patch notes

    in Apex Legends

    Posted

    DUOS MODE NOW AVAILABLE FROM NOVEMBER 5TH TO NOVEMBER 19TH.

     

     

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    WELCOME TO THE FIRING RANGE

     

    From the lobby you can now select the firing range. Here you can practice playing around with all the weapons, items, and Legends.

     

    • Can enter the firing range solo or with your squad.
    • You can change to any Legend and use their abilities and ultimates.
    • All loot items are available to play with including weapons, attachments, and hopups.
    •  Target DUMMIES available to practice those headshots.
    • Future improvements to come! Please give us your feedback. 

    WEAPONS

     

    Wingman

      • Reduced the headshot multiplier: 2.15 -> 2.1

    Changes to Projectile Collision: We’ve increased the projectile width on the some weapons so they are easier to hit with. We made this change to the TripleTake in Season 2 and the following will be updated for this patch:

     

    • Shotguns: All shotguns will have projectiles with a small amount of width.
    • L-STAR
    • Snipers: The Longbow DMR, Kraber, and G7 Scout.

    QUALITY OF LIFE

    • In an effort to surface easier challenges to players more often and offer a balanced set of challenges each day, Daily Challenge distribution has been adjusted so players are guaranteed to receive 1 easy, 1 medium, and 1 hard challenge. 
    • You can now spend Legend Tokens to reroll Daily Challenges. 
      • First reroll: 200 Legend Tokens
      • Second reroll: 500 Legend Tokens
      • Third or more reroll: 1000 Legend Tokens for each reroll.
      • Cost increases with each purchase before capping out at 1000 Legend Tokens.
      • Cost resets every day
    • You can now adjust the game cursor velocity in Settings -> Controller. This will apply to cursor velocity in all menus including the Lobby, Pause/Inventory menus, and Death Box inventories. 
    • We now show you what Music Pack you have selected while dropping into the map. If you only have the “default” Pack selected you won’t see anything.
    • Improved flow from Lobby to Match that fixes some minor bugs and will hopefully get players into matches a bit faster.
      • Disabling pregame spawning of players before character selection. This will address cases where players might hear someone voice comms or other sounds before the Legend selection starts.
      • The “Waiting for Players...” transition now shows the game world instead of a black screen.
      • Removed the 5 second countdown that would start at the beginning of Legend selection.
    • Player will now be able to view the ammo types of their squadmates equipped weapons when in the inventory menu.
    • RANKED MODE: Players will no longer receive a penalty for abandoning a match if they leave after 2 and a half minutes have passed since their Banner was picked up after dying. As a reminder: players will be warned via the menus if their leaving may trigger abandon penalties; if the warning does not show up players are free to leave.  

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    • [Controller] you can now open the quip wheel by holding down on the dpad (you can still do it the old way - open ping menu and press Y)
    • [PC] Quick Chat binding should now auto bind to F1 if it isn’t bound to anything (assuming nothing is already bound to F1)

    BUG FIXES

    • Fixed a bug where players would stay in place while the train keeps moving when reviving another player.
    • Updated the layout of the minimap that was previously showing a route that doesn’t exist.
    • Fixed cases where players could drop into Out of Bounds areas without getting the timer.
    • Fixed cases of some areas where players could take lava damage near the Volcano when there isn’t any lava.
    • Fixed display issue with post game where it would show you earning 2 battle pass levels for levelling up via Stars.

    LEGENDS

     

    Crypto

     

    • EMP now will damage armor that players have dropped.
    • Fixed a bug where Lifeline’s drone couldn’t heal Crypto while he was in the drone.
    • Fix for friendly Caustic gas kicking Crypto out of his drone.

    Bangalore

     

      • Fixed bug where sometimes the missiles from Bangalore’s Ultimate would disappear after landing on the train.

    View the full article

    Death Stranding Review – The Wanderer

    in Game Reviews

    Posted

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    Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
    Developer: Kojima Productions
    Release: November 8, 2019
    Rating: Rating Pending
    Reviewed on: PlayStation 4
    Also on: PC

    The mystery around Death Stranding has piqued everyone’s curiosity as to the game’s true nature. Part of this is down to the creator himself, Hideo Kojima, who has consistently obfuscated his titles with complex stories, themes, and the personal fancies of an auteur. It’s also due to the incredulous feeling that there must be more to the game than what we’ve seen so far. Surely players must do more than transport cargo – a video game trope in and of itself. But Death Stranding (whose main character is named Sam Porter Bridges, no less) is unable to muster significance.

    In order to rebuild America after a mysterious event that has blown a crater in the middle of the country and destroyed society as we know it, Sam treks across the land delivering supplies and connecting pockets of survivors. Doing so requires loading Sam up with packages of various sizes, weights, and possibly mission-ending stipulations – such as breaking fragile equipment and even delivering a pizza correctly.

    I was initially frustrated by the teeter-totter nature of keeping my balance while traversing rocky, moss-covered landscapes. As I leveled up and became proficient in my movements (the terrain is thankfully consistent in terms of what does and doesn’t trip you up), I realized the fight to stay upright isn’t the fundamental problem with the core gameplay concept. The real issue is that Death Stranding’s gameplay really is as simple as it appears to be, and the elements around it – the story, combat, and lackluster mission objectives – aren’t satisfying enough to anchor the title and get players invested.

    Death Stranding has optional side missions and ways to build up the infrastructure of the world, such as making roads and other helpful structures, but the core delivery loop doesn’t branch out in more interesting directions. Your objectives are straightforward and unsurprising; they don’t expand Sam’s interaction with the world, nor do they require novel resourcefulness. It’s all about the journey, as they say, but when the journey feels dull, that’s not a good thing. 

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    Combat is also part of Sam’s travels, but it’s not demanding or engaging. Multi-dimensional spirits called BTs rise from the ground and apparate from the air, but they feel more like nuisances than challenges – similar to random encounters in an RPG that cause you to swear more than lick your chops. Marauders called MULEs get physically tougher and have guns and trucks to hunt you down, but defeating them is easy, whether using guns, melee blows, or stealth. Don’t expect the ingenuity or problem-solving required in the Metal Gear series; enemies’ A.I. routines and reactions don’t enliven your interactions with them or encourage experimentation.

    Sure, it’s fun to knock marauders down with a piece of luggage in your hand, but you can’t drive them from an area, their encampments are basic, and their loot (unless tied to a specific mission) isn’t particularly enticing since the items can be found elsewhere in the world. Combat is non-essential to the point that plain hoofing it is as effective as any weapon when dealing with both BTs and MULEs. Even the boss battles, if they can even be called that, are simple encounters of shooting and evading over multiple rounds. They lack the inventiveness and thrill of Kojima’s previous efforts, to say nothing of other games. This is a shame, because you can fabricate some pretty useful equipment, like grenade launchers and camouflage rocks you can hide under, despite an absence of compelling situations in which to apply them.

    Overall, Death Stranding’s intertwining systems are well thought out. Rain and snow (called Timefall) damage everything they touch, so I like the sense of urgent survival when the weather report shows precipitation on the way. Building zip-lines and safe houses in useful areas is satisfying, especially since they augment the overall network of nodes that keep you supplied and aid your travels.

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    Death Stranding’s online connectivity is one of the game’s strengths, not only because other real-life players add useful items like ladders and warning signs to your world, but because it achieves what it tries to do: It creates bonds. I liked knowing I was helping others when I erected a bridge or anchored a rope at a key location, and enjoyed giving others praise for their efforts via the like system. Regardless, this sentiment wanes amidst the larger morass of routine.

    That the game ultimately comes up short is unfortunate, because there were times when I was spurred on to complete my delivery mission. Coming over a ridge, reflecting on how far I’d come and knowing that I just had to make it across one final expanse before delivering my cargo felt like sweet relief at times. The game is also visually stunning, which helps when spending all that time traveling from one place to another.

    Try as it might, Death Stranding’s story doesn’t shore up its faults. It’s the normal Kojima mix of twists-and-turns, tropes, and overbearing themes, but at least I like that it explores real-world topics like the theory of multiple dimensions and key events in the history of the planet’s biodiversity. Like Sam himself, I often wasn’t sure why I kept going in Death Stranding. Maybe there was a little bit of pride in another task checked off the list, another job done. Unfortunately, this added up to little reward in the end.

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    Score: 7

    Summary: The game bears the unmistakable mark of its creator, but doesn't leave enough for players to enjoy.

    Concept: Transport cargo to and fro in a beautiful-but-convoluted world from Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima

    Graphics: The details on everything from the logos to the environment are amazing, bringing to life this strand of the multiverse

    Sound: Most of the triple-A voice talent does a great job. I also enjoyed the relatively incidental sounds such as a blaring alarm or the rustle of Sam’s gear

    Playability: Apart from an occasional delay in bringing up a newly equipped weapon’s reticle, combat works fine. This includes melee combat, which does not have an enemy lock-on

    Entertainment: The pillars of gameplay, combat, and story all bear the mark of creator Hideo Kojima, but none of them stand out or carry the experience

    Replay: Moderately High

    Click to Purchase

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    Lonely Mountains: Downhill Review – Serene Velocity

    in Game Reviews

    Posted

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    Publisher: Thunderful
    Developer: Megagon Industries
    Release: October 23, 2019
    Rating: Rating Pending
    Reviewed on: PC
    Also on: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, Mac

    A gentle wind rustles the autumn leaves, and an owl’s solitary call echoes across the mountainside in the pre-dusk light. My bike rattles across an old wooden bridge, and the path ahead curves around the rising roar of the waterfall. Instead of following it, I accelerate off the cliff at ill-advised speed, and crash headlong into a tree trunk, just missing the jump. Time to restart the checkpoint.

    Such is the flow of Lonely Mountains: Downhill, an idyllic mountain biking game of nature sounds and beautiful vistas juxtaposed against excessive speed and foolhardy jumps. 16 trails across four mountain landscapes all start the same: Your bike and rider are poised at the peak, ready to descend. From here, it’s all about the path to your cozy base camp, bumping and sliding down gravel switchbacks, dirt slides, hidden tree paths, and waterlogged streambeds. Can you beat your best time to the bottom? Can you manage fewer crashes this time? That simple formula carries the game forward, while the precise controls and many shortcuts and add depth to ensure you come back for more.

    Gameplay owes a debt to classics like Marble Madness and its isometric view of the slope, as well as the time-trial optimization of the long-running Trials series. However, the injection of a Zen-like natural landscape and soundscape sets these lonely mountains apart. The ambient nature soundtrack is an inspired choice, and the low-poly but vibrantly colorful visuals perfectly capture the hazy sense of speeding down a hill as the background details blur together.

    In any given run, you’re challenging yourself to beat time thresholds by any means necessary, hitting the finish line with a cleaner run, or both. The objectives are limited in scope; without more variety in targeted goals, the potential for tedium can set in over time. As it is, the main avenue to difficulty is shaving seconds off each checkpoint, transforming seemingly impossible time goals into increasingly realistic possibilities. The frustration of dozens of crashes is softened because it’s so amusing to see your poor rider go tumbling into empty space, or bang with a grunt into a stone wall. Restarts are instantaneous, so you don’t have time to dwell on your failures.

    Click here to watch embedded media

    The bikes control like a dream, with quick-turning, believable acceleration arcs and lots of variance between the six unlockable cycles, each of which feels like a “class” of its own. One bike excels at big jumps, while another can’t be beat in the off-road. Each one adds a compelling playstyle, and a new way to tackle all the courses. In fact, it’s that compelling variability between playstyles that leads to my biggest frustration. Each new bike unlocks in parts, and you can’t use the vehicle until you get all its parts. In most cases, getting the full set of pieces for a new ride only occurs late in the game, and at especially high challenge thresholds. That’s a bummer, because it means players are bound to limited options for most of the game, and may never get to experience the impressive variety in playstyle encouraged by the different bikes.

    For the most dedicated players, that distinction won’t matter much. Discovering new shortcuts never loses that eureka moment feel, and each trail has a surprising array of alternate paths to explore. Mastering the physics of the cycle and learning the visual language of each landscape is a lengthy and rewarding endeavor. Detailed leaderboards help you not only compete against friends and the wider global playerbase, but also help pinpoint individual checkpoints in any given run where you can still improve. Beyond new mountains and trails, cosmetic unlock rewards let you tweak the appearance of your rider and ride. Go especially off the beaten path, and you can even find all the cleverly hidden resting places on a given mountain. To what end? To see the game pause, and watch your rider relax by a beautiful vista for a well-deserved break.

    Lonely Mountains: Downhill is a skill-focused arcade experience of surprising depth and replayability. The relaxing aesthetic is a figurative breath of fresh air when compared to other games that compete to be loudest and most in-your-face. Even so, there’s a searing intensity and competitive flair to this outdoor adventure that can easily accommodate serious engagement. Like the real sport, this mountain biking undertaking is ultimately about challenging yourself, and pushing just a little harder to improve, and that’s enough to keep me coming back.

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    Score: 8.75

    Summary: This mountain biking game blends an idyllic nature aesthetic with tight arcade action to create a surprisingly thrilling adventure.

    Concept: Race your mountain bike down peaceful mountain trails at breakneck speed

    Graphics: Low-poly, high-color graphics are attractive and provide readable pathing

    Sound: Quiet, ambient nature sounds accompany your frantic descent – a simple design choice that does wonders for the aesthetic and enjoyability

    Playability: Precise controls allow for skill and improvisation, but some aspects of the long-term unlock approach are frustrating

    Entertainment: Somehow simultaneously soothing and thrilling, this excellent arcade-style experience captures the joys of biking, nature, and competing against yourself

    Replay: High

    Click to Purchase

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    Luigi's Mansion 3 Review – Frights And Delights

    in Game Reviews

    Posted

    Luigi's Mansion 3

    Publisher: Nintendo
    Developer: Next Level Games
    Release: October 31, 2019
    Rating: Everyone
    Reviewed on: Switch

    After ridding several haunted mansions of their ghost infestations in the series’ first two games, the taller, goofier brother of Nintendo’s first family is ready for his biggest task yet: cleansing a whole haunted hotel. In Luigi’s Mansion 3, our hero grabs ghosts and solves simple puzzles on a mission to defeat King Boo and rescue Mario, Peach, and the Toads. With themed floors full of fun environmental puzzle and a ton of exciting encounters, this hotel is well worth checking into.

    As Luigi progresses through the hotel’s 15 floors (and 2 basements), he encounters all manner of spirits, traps, and puzzles, which require him to use all the moves in his arsenal centered around his ghost vacuum. I appreciate how the puzzles and fights have you use Luigi’s abilities in unexpected ways, often in conjunction with one another. Encounters have fun ways of pushing your expertise with Luigi’s moveset, like one that had me dodging lasers with the vacuum’s burst jump while searching for hidden ghosts with the dark-light flashlight before stunning them with a strobe and vacuuming them up.

    The entire adventure is well-crafted, with environmental cues giving you just the right amount of breadcrumbs you need to feel like you discovered the hidden paths yourself. However, the clues sometimes fall too far on one end of the difficulty spectrum; I sometimes was hot on the trail of solving a puzzle when Professor E. Gadd would pipe in with too much information and spoil the discovery, while other times I aimlessly explored an area before finally finding what I needed to do. The secrets, which typically involve rotating seemingly ordinary objects or looking in mirrors to reveal hidden items, are enjoyable to discover and encourage exploration in an otherwise linear experience.

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    Luigi’s Mansion 3 also makes use of Gooigi, a slimy clone you can deploy to reach areas Luigi cannot. Gooigi can squeeze through grates, spikes, and drains, opening the door for fun puzzles revolving around opening passageways for Gooigi. The floors all do fantastic jobs of hinting at new areas you can send him, with hidden grates and drains galore. You can only control one character at time, but switching between them is as simple as clicking the right stick. While the swap between the two is mostly smooth, it can be annoying when a heavy object or ghost requires you to use the suction power of both characters. Thankfully, a co-op partner can take control of Gooigi, which makes everything easier. Co-op play in story is a fun way to streamline the experience and tag team challenges, but single-player is still just as viable and entertaining.

    Unfortunately, clunky controls prevent the game from being completely without frustration. A fixed camera, an omnidirectional right stick, and motion controls combine for an imprecise experience. While the plunger mechanic for pulling items often locks on, I had to experiment with different control schemes before I felt like I had a handle on Luigi’s aim.

    Once you do get a grip on the controls, the boss battles serve as a highlight of the story. From a shark ghost that possesses a pirate ship to a DJ that wields spinning vinyl records, I loved seeing the final challenge for each themed floor. While I don’t want to spoil my favorite boss encounter, it pays homage to kaiju films of the past in hilarious and exciting ways.

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    If you’re too scared to go alone, ScareScraper, an eight-player cooperative mode where you try and clear randomly generated floors of ghosts before the time expires, serves as the highlight to the multiplayer offerings. Banding together with the rest of your team to clear out the final few rooms as the timer screams toward zero is a blast. With a strict time limit, you need to be judicious with your exploration, but I love how rewarding a little poking around can be; a trap-detecting alarm or a map showing the locations of ghosts help immensely. Whether you have one other person to play with or a full lobby, ScareScraper is an exciting co-op multiplayer mode.

    For a little friendly competition, you can visit the ScreamPark, where you clash in three minigames that feel ripped straight from the Mario Party series. I enjoyed the competitive ghost hunting and target practice games, but the one based on an annoying water section in the campaign wasn’t fun in the story, and it’s not much better here. These minigames can be fun diversions with a group of friends, but the story is definitely the main attraction here.

    With unique puzzles, diverse floor themes, and exciting boss battles, Luigi’s Mansion 3 is a spooky delight for players of all experience levels. Seasoned ghostbusters and rookie paranormal enthusiasts alike would do well to look into Luigi’s latest eerie adventure.

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    Score: 8.5

    Summary: Luigi's Mansion 3 is a fun ghost-hunting adventure regardless of your experience with the franchise.

    Concept: Climb through a haunted hotel as Luigi on a spooky quest to save Mario, Peach, and the Toads from King Boo

    Graphics: Crisp visuals, great animations, and interesting floor themes create a colorful but spooky atmosphere

    Sound: Tunes fitting the action haunt the hotel as much as ghosts do, and the satisfying sounds made by the vacuum never grow old. However, the low-life warning sound is more annoying than stressful

    Playability: Sucking up ghosts and other items feels great, but clunky controls lessen the enjoyment

    Entertainment: Creative environmental puzzles and unique boss battles make this a rewarding experience from start to finish

    Replay: Moderate

    Click to Purchase

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    Afterparty Review – Worth The Hangover

    in Game Reviews

    Posted

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    Publisher: Night School Studio
    Developer: Night School Studio
    Release: October 29, 2019
    Rating: Rating Pending
    Reviewed on: PC
    Also on: PlayStation 4, Xbox One

    Alcohol has a sinister temptation that can lead to excess. Bad and embarrassing things often come with a night of overindulgence, from losing inhibitions to waking up hungover. Night School Studio, best known for its breakout hit Oxenfree, leverages that by making alcohol the centerpiece of Hell. But before you think this is just a game about partying, think again. Afterparty is at its strongest when it subverts your expectations, explores relatable topics about life and death, and is okay with not having all the answers. 

    We all have our own ideas about Hell, but Night School Studio created an intriguing version in which everyone works basic 9-to-5 jobs followed by a night of debauchery at the bar. While this premise could easily become silly fast (it has plenty of well-done humor), Night School Studio isn’t afraid to touch deeper themes, like what it means to have a good life and the impact of being locked away with alcohol for eternity. Afterparty is at its best when it takes a break from nightlife antics to discuss the afterlife and what it means for longtime friends Milo and Lola, our main characters. They mysteriously end up in the inferno, and part of the journey is piecing together their lives and what caused their untimely demise. The other part is doing a bunch of tasks to ensure you can face off against Satan in a drinking contest, the only loophole to get back to Earth. 

    Afterparty is a story-driven experience (much like Oxenfree was), and that is certainly its strong point. Colorful characters and witty dialogue drive the narrative, and the natural flow keeps things moving despite having a lot of spoken lines. You can alternate between Milo and Lola, getting their different perspectives on how to approach problems or how they feel about the current situation and their friendship. For instance, as you learn more about Hell, small puzzles pop up, like how to get past a bouncer, and Milo and Lola both push for different solutions. I especially enjoyed switching characters, as you get to view the friendship from their different lens and understand where they’re coming from when they get into arguments or bigger discussions about life. This also evolves later, as the game recognizes who you’ve been siding with more, which is a nice touch.

    While the heroes’ changing friendship is a core focus, cast standouts Sister Mary Wormhorn and taxi driver Sam offer a welcome reprieve from the Milo and Lola dynamic. The former is Milo and Lola’s personal inner demon and she’s constantly trying to rattle them, and by extension, you. She frequently comments on the choices you picked, putting doubts in your mind. Sam has a mysterious aura about her, but her down-to-earth nature and subtle quips make her fun to have around. 

    Click image thumbnails to view larger version

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    While most of your time is spent exploring and engaging in conversations, you also make decisions and engage in some drinking-related activities. The minigames are really simplistic, such as a “Simon Says” dancing contest, aiming precisely in beer pong, and a cup-stacking game. You don’t really get a chance to practice any of these before you play them, but you aren’t punished for failing. However, they also don’t add anything entertaining to the gameplay. That’s Afterparty’s biggest problem: It tells an engaging story, but it’s not always fun to play. The backtracking doesn’t do it any favors, as you’re often required to go from the end of an area back to its beginning to take a taxi to your next locale. Considering you revisit a lot of places, this makes the whole structure feel repetitive and drawn out. To spice up situations, you can choose different drinks that provide extra conversation options as a way to roleplay. For instance, I spent a whole conversation talking like a pirate and another where I was a rich jerk, but these exchanges feel empty when they don’t affect anything larger.

    Branching paths are important to any choice-driven game, and Afterparty certainly has them, but after playing through the game twice, they don’t alter the experience much. A lot of moments that seem important don’t matter, and the only big variations I saw were in the two different endings I experienced. I like that relationships you invest in have some payoff, but my second playthrough ultimately felt like a waste of time, especially since you need to replay the entire game to see any of the differences. I won’t spoil anything, but the ending is not what I expected, which made me appreciate it all the more. I didn’t feel judged, or like I had made a definitive “right” or “wrong” choice, and the various endings reflect this ambiguity wonderfully. 

    Afterparty poses questions you don’t expect it to ask, and that’s what ultimately made me satisfied with it – just don’t expect a non-stop rager. As with most parties, there are high points combined with lulls. At the very least, the conversations, locale, and attendees make it a good party to attend, even if sometimes you get a little bored.

    afterparty.jpg

    Score: 7.75

    Summary: Afterparty has plenty of lighthearted moments, but you'll stay at the party for the meaningful conversations.

    Concept: Explore the complex friendship between Lola and Milo as they take on Satan in a drinking contest to earn their freedom from Hell

    Graphics: The neon color scheme captures the nightlife and the character designs look great, but the bars lack variety and personality

    Sound: Night School Studio enlisted the help of top-tier voice talent that brings the characters and the world to life

    Playability: Outside of a few simple minigames, you don’t do much except walk and chat. Everything controls fine, but the constant backtracking between locations breaks the immersion

    Entertainment: The premise may seem silly and lighthearted, but Afterparty goes well beyond drinking games into something more meaningful

    Replay: Moderate

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