Party Hard (video game)

Party Hard is an action stealth video game developed by Pinokl Games and published by tinyBuild for Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, Fire OS, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One and also coming to iOS and Android. In this game, players assume the role of a serial killer who infiltrate several parties with the objective of killing all attendants without getting caught.

A sequel, Party Hard 2, is set for Summer 2017.

Gameplay

The gameplay is quite similar to Hitman. If you kill a person within their sight, they are alerted and will call the cops, and if the NPC finds a dead body, they will call the cops, who puts them in a body-bag. In addition to that, the player can hide dead bodies in dumpsters and other concealed locations. The player can trigger traps, such as poisoning drinks, making speakers explode, destroying dance floors, cutting down trees, starting fires and short circuiting electricity boards. The player also has limited use weapons like swords (with an area damage), bombs and stun grenades, which are collected from suitcases. They can also pick up disguises and other collectibles. Bouncers are present regularly and if the player gets spotted, the bouncers will kick the player to death. If the player keeps using an escape route from the police and is able to escape, a Mario like person will block the path so that the player cannot use it again. Partying people are distracted most of the time, and the player can take out more than 2-3 people out in this manner before being detected. The police in the game are ruthless, being very hard to escape from unless the player has known the map very well. Special Agents are called in if the police is killed.

Twitch.tv integration

The game integrates with the streaming site Twitch.tv. The viewers of the livestream can trigger events within the game, such as SWAT raids or rampaging bears.^[1] The twitch-exclusive events were later enabled for non-streaming players.^[2]

Plot

Initially, you play as a man named Darius who finds it difficult to sleep when there are active party-goers nearby. He decides to kill them all using a standard knife. There are four other unlockable characters, including a Ninja (obtained by clearing a level with no bodies found), Policeman (obtained by completing all the levels), Katie (obtained by escaping the police 5 times in one game; also the only person available on a specific level), and the Butcher (obtained by killing 20 people). Each level takes place at a party with a different theme, interactive objects, and "special guests," who are people that you call to distract/kill party guests. The completion of these levels also unlocks the storyline, which focuses on Detective John West's detailing of the Party Hard Killings of autumn, 2000.

The story starts somewhere in San Francisco County with the killer, fed up of the noise and of a small neighbourhood party. He then takes a knife and a hockey mask and kills them. He then goes on to massacre a BBQ house party somewhere in North Beach, CA (Salina, CA according to menu map). After he was "done" with the party goers, he gets picked up by bikers who take him to ranch party in Bakersfield and after that leaves to Las Vegas via a shuttle bus to a casino party and rooftop party near Arizona.

Multiple months later, he reaches Baycity, TX and boards a cruise liner heading from Trinity Bay to Florida, only for it burn down and sink near Miami as Darius watches, he also meets up with Katie (Detective John West's daughter) there. She follows his footsteps by attacking a beach party as a way to rebel against her father as it turns out he was abusive (according to Darius). Darius takes a party bus on Route 10 only to commit yet another atrocity on board and drops off to meet up with Katie, which he turns into "one of his pieces of art" before being arrested by the detective.

They end up crashing near Salina, Kansas at saw mill, Darius fakes being a victim and escapes the scene by an ambulance. He reaches a rooftop pool party at Denver, Colorado and a Halloween party at Raymond, Wyoming. After a campus party in Salt Lake City, Utah was hit, there was a party in the San Francisco subway by some of his fans where the detective seeked to stop the serial killer. It turns out in the end, the man who was interviewing John was Darius, John questions Darius the morality of his actions, but Darius eventually convinced him that the shameful acts committed by those people made them deserve it, he is even convinced that John was always agree with what he did and has been helping him to commit his murders by letting him escape.

Reception

Party Hard received "mixed or average" reviews, according to video game review aggregator Metacritic.^[3][4][5]

References

External links

• Official website