When your neighbors are having a party and playing loud music at 3 am you call the police and have them break up the festivities right? Not in Party Hard, the new game just released by Pinokl Games to the PS4 and XB1. You grab the nearest stabby thing, head next door, and systematically slaughter every last party goer for interrupting your beauty sleep. Then you move on to the site ofWhen your neighbors are having a party and playing loud music at 3 am you call the police and have them break up the festivities right? Not in Party Hard, the new game just released by Pinokl Games to the PS4 and XB1. You grab the nearest stabby thing, head next door, and systematically slaughter every last party goer for interrupting your beauty sleep. Then you move on to the site of the next bash for another blood bath, because - why not.
The objective of the game is simple, kill every person at the party without getting caught or killed. While this is a very straight forward premise, the execution can be rather tricky. Your hero - as the game calls the sleep deprived maniac - is armed only with a small knife so most of your kills have to be up close and personal. Waiting for drunk party goers to stray from the crowd to a secluded area before you do them in, and quickly hide their bodies to avoid detection. If a body is spotted, or if you are seen killing someone, the police are called and then you must try to evade capture. There are a few escape routes, open windows, trap doors and the like, but if you use them too often the resident handy man will seal them off to limit your movements. Besides your trusty knife, many parties will have traps that you can use to pick off a few hopeless victims. Unstable bookcases, rampaging bulls, runaway vehicles, large trees just to name a few. These are helpful, but never guarantee a large body count, and can be random on some maps. You can also pick up random items to help you on some maps like stun bombs, explosives, a large sword, or even a spare set of clothes to help you fool the fuzz.
Controls are very simple for the game. I played the XB1 version while testing it, so I will reference those. Left stick moves your maniac. The left trigger is used to listen to what people are saying - honestly I didn't find this very helpful. The right trigger allows you to sprint for a limited time which is very helpful when trying to evade the police or catch someone that is about to call the cops on you. Right bumper allows you to use any items that you pick up. The Y button sets any trap you may encounter. When you get close to them you will see a bullseye to let you know they can be triggered. B button is used for picking up bodies and putting them down. You can pick up people that are just passed out, but they get grumpy if they wake up before you kill them - go figure. It wouldn't be a party if you couldn't dance, press the A button and you will shake it with all your soon to be murder victims. And last but not least is the X button - kill kill kill.
The graphics are pure pixelated perfection. Even though the main focus of the game is to slaughter dozens of innocent people in every level, the graphics keep it from being to over the top while also giving it a great old school feel. The music is also something else. When a game has Party in the title you expect a decent soundtrack, and this title delivers. There are great beats to be had at all the locations. The voice acting in the cut scenes is a little over played at times, but that can be over looked.
There are 26 achievements for you to earn in the XB1 and Steam versions, and 21 trophies in the PS4 version of the game. Most are based on killing people in general, hiding bodies, and killing people in unique ways. Some will require you the speed through a level or rack up a massive murder multiplier (say that 10 times fast - no really do it and tape it and tag me on Twitter) You will earn many of the achievements / trophies just by playing though the 19 parties and unlocking your 5 heroes.… Expand