Afterparty

Afterparty doesn’t vary much mechanically from its predecessor, but the unique worldbuilding, characters, setting and heart gave me some of my biggest chuckles of the year. What could have been a cringe-worthy meme-fest of drinking gags and vomit jokes (ok, so there is some vomit) ended up being one hell of a party.

The humor shines bright and the emotional moments are balanced. When you mix that in with a solid ensemble cast, you’ve got a game that’s bound to be pleasing for fans of the genre and creative, story-driven games in general. The amount of branching paths and dialog options will have players ready to hop back into Hell after their first playthrough just to see everything that Afterparty has to offer.

Afterparty should be commended for its diabolical sense of humour and elegantly crafted conversations.

A nice travel in hell, with a deep focus on the burlesque setting, embellished by dialogue with a lot of sarcasm.

An irresistible journey to hell.

Night School's Oxenfree is a charming, hilarious, and insightful comedy that makes Hell a pretty fun place to be.

A funny, likeable adventure with lashings of alcohol. There's also enough content in Afterparty to push you through a second time around.

Night School has mastered its own style at this point and Afterparty represents its confirmation. It's still seems lacking a real gameplay but that is part of the style, that is all focused on narrative.

Afterparty is a fun, easy-going game with a pungent humor that will get you more than a laugh. The interaction is limited but the plot, the setting and the characters are irresistible.

Night School Studios have made hell intriguing and complex, with punchy dialog and relatable characters, be it human or demonic. The humor and writing is where Afterparty shines the most, breathing life into every character it touches—be it short and sarcastic, or emotional and reverent. Like the Beastie Boys' "Fight for Your Right (To Party)," what seems like dumb entertainment can evolve into something a lot more meaningful if you're willing to look beneath the surface.

It's well worth giving in to temptation partying with the devil by throwing back a few drinks in Afterparty. The game isn't very long or difficult, but it makes up for it with plenty of wit and charm.

The top-notch writing and superb voice acting, coupled with the visually vibrant hellscape, keeps your interest from start to finish.

While Afterparty arguably doesn’t quite hit the same overall heights as its older sibling, it still manages to deliver one amazing adventure of its own, largely thanks to a terrific sense of humor, a unique story, and some truly astounding writing and dialogue.

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 is a fantastic story about booze, buds, and the nature of good and evil. It’s just not much else.

As I played Afterparty, I kept thinking that I should be liking it more than I was. A character- and story-driven game sounds like it should be right up my alley, and I can picture people enjoying the conversations and appreciating a vision of Hell where it’s being run by devils with just as many problems as everybody else. But I didn’t like the game, and I didn’t really like that there isn’t much game in the game (there aren’t any puzzles, and the drinking mini-games are so inconsequential it doesn’t even matter if you win them). So I’m giving Afterparty a lukewarm score. It’s definitely a game where your mileage may vary.

The game is loaded with small glitches and inconsistencies but next to Night in the Woods it’s the one game I could point to and say ‘that’s how you should write engaging, living dialogue’. [13/2019, p.54]

When it hits those strides, it's a novel look at what hell might look like for most of us, a vision that turns the concept of eternal damnation into something more palpable and threatening. It fumbles when it reaches outside its comfort zone, and the focus on small moments means it lacks the grandiose ones that make our lives feel more meaningful than they might otherwise be.

At the end of the day though, Afterparty will leave many with a bit of a hangover, wondering if there was more that could have been done with the drinking system and its branching narrative.

Afterparty begins as a very joyful festivity in which you encounter a lot of great and eloquent people in a very charming place. But it continues as a very passive, clumsy experience and ends as a forgettable game from which you retain mostly technical issues, lack of impactful and pleasant interactions, instead of its strong writing and amazing vocal performances. Too bad, this Hell was surely paved with good intentions.

Afterparty offers up a good laugh, and not just at the unfortunate glitches. Its art style is adorable, and the neon lights and bloody backgrounds truly make it feel like you've jumped down into hell. But while the story is intriguing, it feels too slow at times and its main protagonists fall flat against an otherwise fantastic cast of characters.

As for a return trip to hell to see how alternative choices might have played out? It would have to freeze over first. [Issue#139, p.116]