LATE SHIFT
Take an early bath instead
For one eventful night, your choices decide the fate of Matt, 1 a gangly student settling into a sleepy night shift as a car valet. What happens next is up to you. Apart from the whole ‘getting kidnapped and forced to take part in an elaborate heist’ thing, that is. That’s nailed on, I’m afraid.
It unfolds so naturally on the first playthrough. Following up a CCTV anomaly sees you stumble upon a bungled car theft; soon, you’re sucked into a world of danger that seems to hinge on your whims.
Late Shift is the purest example yet of the ‘interactive story’ genre; discarding the walk-around-y bits that bog down the likes of Walking Dead or Life Is Strange, interaction is limited to either/or choices and so developments escalate quickly. Although the plot forgoes graphics for professionally-shot film footage, the various plot permutations are spliced together so expertly it’s difficult to find the seams.
But within 90 minutes it’s over, and on a second playthrough, the suspense deflates with a pop and a hiss. Ignore the CCTV, run out onto the street, 2 throw your PS4 into a canyon; despite the illusion of agency, you find yourself hurtling towards storyline bottlenecks as if they were black holes.
Is that an unfair criticism? The games namechecked above wilt from repeat exposure too, but they go to lengths to discourage repeat playthroughs, weighting decisions and forcing you to stand by them. Late Shift invites it, structuring itself more like one of those ‘choose your own adventure’ books that were passé by the ‘90s. The result is an unsatisfying yarn, where returns diminish as rapidly as the stakes escalate.