Take a stroll with Milo and Lola
Afterparty proves there’s fun to be had in dark places
Afterparty
Night School Studio
Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, Playstation 4, Xbox One
None of the characters in Afterparty wants to take up too much of anyone’s time, even in hell where the game is set. Demons, if you didn’t know, take schedules seriously, and it’s only because a demon at a processing centre considers his off-hours sacrosanct that Milo and Lola are free to stroll about for a night rather than being assigned an ironic form of torture for their sins.
Milo and Lola aren’t sure how they died — one minute they were chatting with their fellow college grads at a party then, zap! — or why they’ve ended up in hell, but they adapt quickly. They learn that if they can best Satan in a drinking contest they’ll win their liberty. And so begins a pub crawl in which the kids, sorry, I mean the recently certified adults, get involved in a whole lot of tomfoolery.
Before the night is over Milo and Lola will, among other things, commit themselves to a bad impersonation, instigate a fight and cut past lots of people waiting to get into a party. They’ll also suffer the occasional interruption from their personal demon Sister Mary Wormhorn whose job, naturally, is to remind them of difficult memories. Wormhorn is batty and overeager, but like the rest of Hell’s denizens she keeps her routines short.
To everyone’s good fortune, Milo, a people pleaser, and Lola, the one who will tell you that your tastes are too commercial, have Sam to ferry them across lava on her boat from place to place and deliver clipped exposition. Without the burden of responsibility, Milo and Lola can, and really should, drink all manner of concoctions since they impart extra dialogue options.
Hell is a repository of drinks with names such as Famous Last Words and the Headless Groom. There are drinks that will boost the characters’ courage, as well as to make them more flirty, more obnoxious or more inclined to speak like someone out of a 1940s Hollywood noir film.
Afterparty is the second game from Night School Studio. Like its previous game Oxenfree, Afterparty feels like a marriage of graphic novels, animated films and video games. Playing it mostly involves walking around and talking to people. Though occasionally Milo and Lola might be called upon to dance, play beer pong or to try to stack shot glasses on top of each other, these are low-pressure activities that don’t carry the threat of a game over screen.
In contrast with Milo and Lola’s vigour, the demons come across as weary, working stiffs. For example, after hopping in and out of cages operated by elevator demons, Milo asks the third elevator demon, “Why didn’t Satan make more stairs?” to which the demon replies, “Because Satan likes to keep demons employed.”
Afterparty ably emulates the manic tempo of being young, smart (and stupid) and having a wild night out.