It's a weekend evening, and your best friend Derek or Brittney (depending on if you're a man or woman, respectively) has just invited you over to a house party to meet some new people and have some thrills. And possibly to get a little action as well.
That's really the entire story. You're just playing as yourself and are otherwise given free rein of how you want to spend your time in the house. Besides yourself and Derek, there are ten other party-goers to get to know:
- Ashley and Madison, two sisters who are hosting the party and love to play pranks on one another. Ashley also takes Spanish lessons with a private tutor, Lety.
- Stephanie, an easy-going and fun-loving girl whose lack of shame rivals her airheadedness.
- Amy, a girl trying to get into a sorority.
- Rachael, a pleasant girl who happens to be friends with a professional porn star, Vickie Vixen.
- Katherine, a brainy know-it-all with a talent for hacking electronics.
- Brittney, a southern-accented blonde who is dismayed about how large she is.
- Leah, an MMA student of Frank who follows his commands.
- Patrick, a drunk brah who nobody really likes.
- Frank, a tough guy who nobody really invited, but is there to keep the liquor on lockdown.
Several real-life personalities have been added to the game in updates. The Game Grumps, whose playthrough helped bring the game popularity, now have their own storyline in the game after winning a contest held by Eek! Games, the other winner and additional character being streamer Lety Does Stuff.
After spending five years in development in early access on Steam, House Party was fully released on July 15, 2022, and implemented a female player character. On September 30, 2022, the first expansion pack featuring Doja Cat was added to the game. On May 26, 2023, the second expansion pack featuring Liz Katz was added as well, centering around a murder mystery.
A sequel titled Office Party is also in development.
This game provides examples of:
- Academic Alpha Bitch: Katherine is smarter than you, and she knows it. Even while pursuing her romance, she makes it clear that she's using you to get back at her boyfriend and has no interest in a long-term engagement.
- Adaptational Jerkass:
- In the "Date Night With Brittney" side story, Patrick attempts to recruit the PC to take naked photos of Brittney without her consent for his porn site despite railing against such behavior in the main story, noting that photos uploaded without the subject's permission just cause trouble.
- Also in "Date Night With Brittney", Brittney herself comes across as much less pleasant, being openly rude and pushy towards the player. This is a sharp contrast to her polite and friendly attitude in the main game.
- Adjustable Censorship: You can censor the nudity if you so choose. Sexual penetration is always censored, since showing it would increase the age rating of the game. A DLC removes even that latter element.
- The Alcoholic: Patrick is always drunk by default and only becomes sober if the player intervenes.
- Alcohol-Induced Idiocy: Many of the quests require giving characters alcohol so they lose their inhibitions, such as getting Stephanie drunk enough to dance topless or getting Ashley or Madison drunk (and high, in Ashley's case) enough to shamelessly prank the other sister.
- Appearance Angst: Derek is shy about having "french fry nipples", and so refuses to take off his shirt- in the route where this needs to happen, you have to have everyone at the party sign a petition in order to convince him.
- Anti-Frustration Features: The game is normally played via Trial-and-Error Gameplay and isn't shy about letting you lock yourself out of opportunities if you screw yourself or decide on certain routes. However, there are a few times where the game is more merciful:
- When trying to give the whipped cream to Stephanie, the player character's internal dialogue says that they should really think carefully before handing it over a second time. Similarly, trying to untie Ashley's top more than once will have them warn the player that doing so will cause permanent issues with her.
- If you decide to lie to Derek that Madison killed Purgalicious, the game will give you a pop up strongly suggesting that you save, especially since letting the fire reach the garage will result in a Non-Standard Game Over.
- At the start of Lety and Rachael's secret route, the game will again strongly suggest that you save and it will give you a few moments to do so before continuing the conversation.
- Artistic License – Biology:
- The PC is able to recover from sex and masturbation and be ready to go again remarkably quickly and is capable of reaching *ahem* completion a seemingly endless number of times in one night.
- On a less sexy note, Derek, Patrick, and Frank are able to be beaten into unconsciousness (possibly multiple times) and walk it off with no lasting effects.
- Ascended Meme:
- The interface says "Yes, dood" and "No, dood" whenever there's a yes or no question, referencing Frank's "How'z it goin' dood?" Catchphrase, which became memetic.
- When the player manages to drop the Game Grumps into the party, Arin can be occasionally seen getting hypnotized by the Spooky Painting in the living room, which was a Running Gag in their playthrough.
- In the Lety and Rachael route where they destroy everybody at the party, Lety decides to go hunt down Frank for "hogging the House Party meme spotlight," referencing his memetic status.
- Assuming the Audience's Age: During one conversation, Derek breaks the fourth wall by noting that he and the male protagonist have Vague Ages to appeal to the player, who he presumes falls within the 18-35 demographic.
- Bald Head of Toughness:
- Frank is an angry buff bald guy guarding the alcohol cabinet, who will beat you up if he catches you drinking.
- Derek is also bald, and while not as irrational as Frank, he also swiftly beats you up if he catches you stealing.
- Note that the only other guy who's not bald, Patrick, is the Butt-Monkey and the easiest guy to beat up.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Amy's a complete sweetie who's specifically only at the party to make some new friends. However, after one too many jibes from Katherine, Amy's the one that suggests poisoning her to create a medical emergency to encourage Stephanie to become a doctor.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: Downplayed, since there's only three of them present in the game, but the family hosting the party seems like this. Sisters Madison and Ashley's relationship consists of insults and scheming mean spirited pranks at each other's expense. Neither of them can stand their cousin Patrick and he's only invited out of a sense of obligation. Patrick for his part makes a few efforts at bonding with his cousins but doesn't put much into it.
- Bland-Name Product: Zigzagged. There's a box of Sweeties (also known as Twinkies) in the fridge, but Mac and Clear Eyes are still name-dropped in earlier versions. In later versions, the latter is replaced by an unnamed brand of laxatives.
- Blatant Lies: Some of the dialogue choices are this, like lying to Frank about Rachael's thermos, but what takes the cake is trying to get Madison's phone back after you just gave it to her. When she naturally asks why she should give it back, the correct choice is to tell her that you dropped it in the bathroom sink and you need to save it. She believes it.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall:
- Rachael is all about this. Befriending her involves telling her not to worry too much about how you know Madison because you're in a video game, and she accuses the text messages she thinks she gets from Vickie as being "from the mind of a perverted game developer." Later updates escalated her to being a Fourth-Wall Observer who wants to escape the game so badly, she and Lety beat up everybody else at the party to wreck the game from the inside. When they approach Frank in this route, he drops his memetic deep voice and begins talking about how he doesn't want to act like an asshole just because the game devs want him to be a Hate Sink.
- Derek describes his high school days with the player as taking place "an undefined amount of time ago," noting how they want to be relatable to all sorts of ages within the 18-to-35 demographic.
- Breast Expansion: When Lety become self-aware of being in a game, she makes Rachael's boobs bigger just for the fun of it.
- Brilliant, but Lazy: Stephanie is very interested in medicine and one of her routes shows that she has quite the knack for helping the sick and injured. The problem is that she doesn't concentrate well on her schoolwork, finding it easier to get stoned and drunk than pursue such a stressful endeavor.
- The Bro Code: In the Madison art storyline, Derek tries to invoke this to prevent the PC from sleeping with her, as he's into her himself. Whether it works is of course up the player.
- But Thou Must!:
- As seen in Unexpectedly Realistic Gameplay below, players typically need to be careful about where characters are to make sure that they don't overhear you during certain conversations. However, if the game needs to have someone overhear or interrupt you, then they will find a way to do so. For example, at the start of Madison's art storyline, you could have the master bedroom door locked and look at the door's direction while you're talking to her. At a certain point in the conversation, Derek will outright teleport into the room to fight with you for Madison's attention.
- When the lights go out during Liz Kat's questline and you go to the garage to turn them back on, an unknown assailant will lock the door and attack you. You're free to fight back as much as you want, but their health bar will not go down in any way and you go down in one hit. Obviously, being knocked out is the only way to progress.
- Butt-Monkey: Patrick can be punched out by Frank and Madison, gets slapped by Rachael near the start of the game, is The Friend Nobody Likes among the partygoers, can have his phone stolen and used to spoof texts (which it's implied could land him in serious trouble), can potentially get his website shut down including the backups, records, and assets, and generally gets knocked around while at this party. Fortunately, he's too drunk to care.
- Buxom Beauty Standard: Mostly averted despite the horny nature of the guys present. Derek is hooked on Madison and Frank likes Katherine who, while neither are poorly endowed, aren't packing even close to the biggest chests at the party. And the player can end up describing the smallest chest there (Amy's) as "perfect." Only Patrick references Brittney's boob size and even then only in passing. However, one route does reveal that Amy is curious to see Brittney naked because of her large breasts.
- Choice-and-Consequence System: By pursuing a given character's route, you might lock yourself out of others, and they'll remember what you show and tell them.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Lety. She often brings weird tutoring materials to her private lessons and is kind of out there, which combined with her social awkwardness can lead to disastrous results.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Any time you anger someone to the point of fighting you, they usually wait until you end the conversation before they start swinging. However, there's a random chance they'll immediately start beating you while they're still talking to you.
- Costume Evolution: Updates have resulted in mostly mild changes to the characters' outfit. For example, Patrick's shirt was changed from a buttoned Hawaiian shirt to an open Hawaiian shirt with a T-shirt underneath reading "Brahzzers" (a pun on a porn website and Patrick's Verbal Tic).
- Cruelty Is the Only Option: While some choices have this to a lesser extent, the only way to start Leah's storyline is to release Ashley's pet snake from its cage. This can be after Ashley trusted you with her secret after you built up a relationship with her. If you choose to pursue Leah's Light path, it ends with the snake dead and Ashley incredibly upset. The only way to save it is to lead Leah down the Dark path instead.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Frank will inflict one to the player or Patrick if he catches them with alcohol and only a couple hits are enough to knock you unconscious early on. While you can beat him with enough patience or high enough stats, you're not even able to damage Doja Cat if you piss her off.
- Cutting Off the Branches: While the side stories that take place after the main story try to stay vague on what happened during the party, they do assume a couple things about what the player did:
- A Vickie Vixen Valentine obviously assumes the player invited Vickie to the party and hooked up with her, but it also assumes he is on bad terms with Ashley, since he mentions untying her top at the party if you try to enter her room earlier than intended, and is on good terms with Madison since one of the Game Over screens mentions that he has her phone number.
- Date Night With Brittney assumes the player character is unfamiliar with Neighborhoodwatch and that he didn't resolve the conflict between Patrick and Rachel, meaning that it's still being used for uploading photos without the subject's permission (something that he's on board with in this side story).
- Dark and Troubled Past: Brittney was raised by a doomsday cult, whose leader hunted her and the other children. She still has some PTSD from the experience.
- D-Cup Distress: Brittany's first big obstacle is that she's ashamed to go out on the party floor because her top shows off her large breasts, which makes her insecure about unwanted attention.
- Depraved Bisexual:
- Frank is a violent straightedge asshole who is attracted to Katherine (exchanging alcohol for a topless picture of her) and can give a blowjob to the male player character. During the latter storyline, he implies a past experience of stalking somebody at a grocery store, breaking into their house, and masturbating into their socks.
- Lety sexually harasses Derek by groping his chest and later makes out with Brittney. After she and Rachael set Frank on fire during their purge, the two of them make out as well.
- Developer's Foresight:
- Usually, during Frank's route, you ask Derek if Frank is gay, then go "admit" your feelings to Frank himself after you get an answer. However, if you ask Derek while Frank is nearby, Frank will overhear and launch into his response after you finish talking to Derek without you having to ask Frank separately.
- If Madison gets pissed with you and gets Frank to try to beat you up, it's normally a Curb-Stomp Battle with him beating you with just a couple hits. However, should Frank be unconscious, she'll instead call for Derek's help. If Derek's knocked out cold as well, she will get Leah to help. If all three of them are unconscious, a feat only possible with either a lot of patience or by raising your stats, Madison will give up and say that she's going to ignore you since nobody can kick you out of the house.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Frank and Leah beat people unconscious for drinking alcohol or even just picking up a bottle.
- Downer Ending: While most of the other opportunities either progress a character's storyline, or lead to good endings or bittersweet ones at worst, completing Host Hijinks is just bleak for the people involved. After Derek thinks Madison killed Purgalicious after you give him her collar, you push Derek to humiliate her. If you decide to send only one random person up, she's hurt that Derek would be cruel and their relationship becomes even more strained. If you send up three people, Madison outright says she's through with him. Either way, Derek feels empty and regretful.
- Dude, She's A Lesbian: As a male player, various characters suggest that you won't get very far with Brittney, as she tends to eye the lasses. You can succeed with her.
- Dysfunction Junction: Downplayed, but most of the partygoers have some kind of backstory involving a childhood or home life that was less-than-ideal. Derek & Stephanie both had fathers who cheated on their mothers (with Derek's leaving his for another man), Madison & Ashley are sisters who despise each other, Patrick apparently had a string of deadbeat not-stepfathers, Brittney grew up in a doomsday cult, Katherine was apparently clearly unwanted by her parents and Frank had a distant father. Amy doesn't seem to have any Parental Issues but does have "that thing with the Mayor" in her backstory. Derek also has to deal with the recent issue of his younger brother's drug problems.
- Either "World Domination", or Something About Bananas: The Flavor Text of the Starbombs reads, "A lot of this is written in a different language. These Starbombs are either 1. totally okay to eat or 2. guaranteed death by diarrhea if eaten. Man, I've had a good education."
- Empty Room Psych: There is one room in the house which is bizarrely unfurnished, only having a rocking chair and a closet. Subverted when this becomes the room you need to use to spy on Rachael masturbating during her route. Later versions of the game turn it into Madison's art room, meaning it is no longer an empty room.
- "Everybody Dies" Ending: A secret route involves Lety and Rachael realizing they're in a game and destroying it by growing giant hands and slapping everybody in the game to death, with the exception of Frank who gets burnt alive and Patrick who gets shrunk out of existence. The player character gets to have sex with Rachael and Lety, but gets crushed to death via Marshmallow Hell when Lety grows to gigantic proportions.
- Everyone Has Standards:
- Even though Patrick is a gullible, perpetually-high pervert who runs a shady sex site and buys used panties off the internet, he still thinks Madison's belief in "sky animals" is ridiculous. Ashley specifically points this out.
- As much as Ashley hates her sister and wishes to get even with her using the nudes on Madison's phone, she isn't on board with some of the more ruthless options, like getting Katherine to help. If you decide to straight-up blackmail Madison using the nudes and threaten to leak themnote , Ashley will not be amused at all.
- Everyone Is Bi: While initially only Brittany, Amy, Stephanie, and Frank showed bisexual tendencies, the incorporation of various Gay Options and a female player character has allowed nearly every character to hook up with a man or woman.
- Fangirl:
- Katherine is a huge Game Grumps fan and gushes over them if you manage to bring them to the party.
- Amy really loves Panic! at the Disco, and one of the first ways you (or Brittany) can get in good with her is by talking to her about them.
- Featureless Protagonist: All that's known about the male protagonist in earlier versions of the game is that he's a male wearing a green shirt and jeans. Averted in later versions where you can see him through mirrors.
- Fetch Quest: Amy is on a scavenger hunt as part of pledging to her sorority, and you can help her find each of the items she needs. Examples include an expired credit card and the shirt off of her best male friend.
- Fictional Zodiac: Madison is really into "sky animals," a play on spirit animals involving protective animal spirits that watch you from the sky. Everybody else at the party thinks it's ridiculous, and she admits she's only into it because she wants to be unique.
- Flanderization: In the alpha version of the game, Rachael had a few Breaking the Fourth Wall moments such as calling the texts Vickie sends her something out of the mind of a "perverted game developer," but they were more nudges at the audience than an indication of anything serious. In the updated game, Rachael not only makes more jokes of this nature, but has a whole hidden route revolving around her status as a Fourth-Wall Observer. By the time of the game's official release, nearly every line of hers that isn't connected to her route is a fourth-wall joke.
- Formerly Fat: Derek admits he used to be fat in high school and had to work hard to get his chiseled physique. Upsetting him during a particular questline will make him revert to his bad eating habits for a moment.
- Fourth-Wall Observer: Rachael is aware she's an avatar in a game and has wanted to escape the party for ages. Only after meeting Lety and being pushed by the player does she do anything about it, knocking out everybody at the party in a Rage Against the Author. Talking to Frank during this route reveals that he's also aware of his Hate Sink status in the game and resents it as well, even dropping his deep voice.
- Fragile Speedster: The player at the start of the game. They can easily outrun their opponents, but can only take two to three hits (effectively one if you get stunlocked) before dropping unconscious. Their attacks only deal Scratch Damage and they need to wait seconds for their stamina to recharge before attacking again. Fortunately, they can utilize a few opportunities and items around the house to raise their stats to become stronger and withstand more punches.
- Freudian Slip: Experienced and then immediately lampshaded by Rachael if you talk to her after hooking up:Rachael: What's up, sex? WHOA! I just had one of those things where you say what you're thinking about.
- The Friend Nobody Likes:
- Everyone at the party regrets Patrick being there.
- Nobody besides Leah wants Frank at the party because of him confiscating everyone's alcohol. After you prove to Frank that Derek has the biggest...package, you can choose to mock him and cause him to permanently leave the party. Nobody is that broken up about it and Leah even allows everybody to drink as they please.
- Friends with Benefits:
- This is how all the game's sexual encounters are framed; all characters require a certain amount of emotional connection but nobody ever suggests the possibility of actual romance. Justified in that these are hook-ups at a party, not the best place to discuss long-term relationships.
- For a specific example in the plot, there's Madison and Derek. They hooked up not long before the party and now keep away from each other out of fear of making things awkward. If you coax Derek to reconcile with her, they can talk things out and settle upon staying friends while still sleeping together every now and then. They start sleeping together again immediately after that conversation.
- Gainax Ending:
- The Easter Egg with Lety and Rachael has the most bizarre way to get "Game Over" in the whole game. The girls become aware they're in a game, decide to rebel against their creator, change their bodily proportions, and kill everybody at the party. They have sex with the player character, but Lety randomly decides to become a giant, crushing the protagonist to death. Cue the "Game Over" screen.
- The Game Grumps storyline ends with the Grumps getting high off bath bombs and riding pink flamingos into the sky.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation:
- Plot-wise, Derek and Madison avoid each other fearing that they'll make things awkward because they hooked up not too long ago and because of what happened with Purgalicious. In their ambient dialogues, they have no issues having conversations should they happen to be in the same room together.
- Choosing to go through with the Host Hijinks opportunity and calling up three characters to witness the prank will have Madison being incredibly hurt by what Derek did and outright saying that they're through. Despite this, if you're on Ashley's route, you can push Derek to reconcile with Madison with no mention of what happened prior.
- Genius Ditz: Stephanie is a ditzy burnout who spends most of the party indulging in her impulses, but she's very skilled in the medical field. You can encourage her to pursue her studies instead of getting high all of the time.
- Genre Savvy: When Lety enters the party, she seeks out the typical party guest stereotypes that she's seen in movies, all of which happen to accurately describe other guests in the game.
- Girl on Girl Is Hot: There are a few options where you can watch two female characters make out and remark about how pleasurable it is, specifically Lety and Brittney, Lety and Rachael in the "Derezzed" route, and Amy and Brittany.
- Goofy Print Underwear: Derek's boxers have a picture of a cat on the crotch area.
- Granola Girl: Ashley has shades of this, with an interest in ecological preservation (given the "Save the Whales" poster in her room), being interested in yoga (though she apparently doesn't know much about it, as she can't pronounce "Namaste" right), and being really into smoking weed. One reason she resents her sister's art hobby is because the art room used to be Ashley's yoga studio/meditation chamber where she could smoke weed.
- Gratuitous Spanish: Being a Spanish tutor, Lety often throws Spanish phrases into casual conversation, including calling the player character a pendejo.
- Guide Dang It!: Who knew going to a party could be so tricky? Some of the routes to gaining favor with the characters can be ridiculously obtuse and you're guaranteed to miss or fail some of the opportunities. For example, to start the Host Hijinks opportunity, you have to be the female player character and intentionally fail the The Muse opportunity by failing to impress Madison with your sculpture and have Derek win instead.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Stephanie just wants some whip-its and is perfectly happy to dance the night away until she gets some. Once she gets some alcohol, her clothes come off.
- Hidden Depths:
- Stephanie is pretty knowledgeable about drugs and medication, despite otherwise being The Ditz. The player can suggest she study to become a doctor, which she seems to give some serious consideration.
- Patrick. Perpetually drunk brah or not, he still managed to code a successful website from the ground up and is likely the most successful person at the party. Additionally, despite he and Rachael being opposed to each other, he still seems to hold her in high regard and holds no grudge over her slapping him.
- Katherine, of all people, turns out to be a big fan of the Game Grumps, to the point of drinking out of depression when she thinks she'll miss their live show, and comes out with a plan with the player to redirect their route so they crash the house party, letting out a high pitched Squee when Dan and Arin drop in.
- Hollywood Hacking: Katherine just needs a phone (not her own) and a computer to start sending spoofed text messages for you.
- Hooker with a Heart of Gold:
- Vickie Vixen. This being the kind of game it is, the "hooker" aspect is played up immensely, but in the main story, she's close friends with one of the partygoers, is nice enough to give the player some genuinely helpful tips despite having met him only a few seconds ago (including pointing out how badly certain douchey behaviors are going to go), and generally doesn't seem to have a malicious bone in her body. Notably, the one truly despicable act she can be involved in (getting Madison's sex tape leaked to the internet) requires lying to her to accomplish.
- Averted in the Vickie Vixen Valentine story. Vickie lies to the PC to get them to help her break into Madison's house in order to steal Ashley's edible weed. She also smashes Ashley's guitar trying to get a key out of it before closing the door and pretending it didn't happen.
- Hypocrite: Frank at least twice. He admits that he'll look the other way on you taking booze if you do favors for him, and claims to be straight-edge, but is a drug dealer.
- Hypocritical Heartwarming: The wrong dialogue option to get Madison to sign a petition regarding Derek is to prank Ashley. She refuses and responds that only she gets to prank her sister.
- If It's You, It's Okay: Brittney is apparently interested in girls, but seems to make an exception for the male PC.
- Ignored Epiphany: Rachael nearly gives up on her mission to destroy the game and knock everybody out when Frank breaks character and pleads not to beat him up because he's just as much a puppet as she is. But she gets caught up in the fact that the game is apparently fifteen dollars, thinking her dignity is worth at least thirty dollars, and continues her purge.
- The Immodest Orgasm: The female player's orgasm is louder and higher-pitched than the male's, likely because there's no visible ejaculation, so this is the primary cue to signal that she's finished.
- Informed Deformity: Derek refuses to remove his shirt, on account of his "French fry nipples". If you succeed in getting him to, his chest looks perfectly normal.
- Interchangeable Asian Cultures: The PC can fall into this thinking by bringing a katana Leah found to the Asian-American Amy to authenticate. She plays along for a bit to get them to help with her scavenger hunt before she cracks and laughs at them, explaining that A: her family background is Chinese, not Japanese and B: she's from Rhode Island. Her underwear pattern may also be a jab at this, as it's covered in pictures of sushi, a Japanese dish.
- Intoxication Mechanic: Drinking too much alcohol will make your view a little wobbly and make you have to pee more. However, the real danger comes from Frank noticing if you stole all the alcohol and didn't gain his trust, as he'll fight you and likely knock you into a Game Over.
- Irony: If you talk to Stephanie and then go speak to Katherine, she'll insult Stephanie's intelligence before disparagingly/snarkily telling the PC that they would have a better chance of getting into Stephanie's pants than hers due to them being "more on her level intellectually." However, Katherine's main questline is by far one of the easiest in the game, as it essentially only involves a quick back and forth between Katherine herself and Frank while needing relatively easy to find items. Meanwhile, getting any one of Stephanie's scenes is far more involved than Katherine's, as three of her side quests still require doing several other character's quests first (including the entirety of Vickie Vixen's story to get her threesome scene). In fact, Stephanie's main questline requires you to do almost all of Katherine's main quest first, even.
- Jerkass:
- Frank, nonstop. He barges into the party uninvited to confiscate everyone's alcohol and will relentlessly beat up anyone he catches drinking, even if they're women. Not to mention that he's a giant hypocrite who'll look the other way if the player does him favors and is a drug dealer who landed Derek's brother into prison. Nobody will be heartbroken if you decide to humiliate him and make him leave the party.
- There's also Katherine, who constantly brags about her intelligence, insults the player at every turn, and makes no effort to hide that she's just using the player character for her own personal gain. She cheats on her boyfriend with you as punishment for "being a dick" (as in, he's really into biking everywhere and wearing a full-body spandex suit), shows no concern over the possibility that he'll beat up the player character for it, and calls him in the middle of said cheating so he could listen.
- Madison. According to her sister Ashley, she apparently makes it a point to humiliate Ashley at every party they throw. Most of which involved forcing Ashley to run around the house naked with guests. And there isn't really a reason why she does this other than for fun.
- You, technically. Attempts to get laid usually involve doing scummy things like spoofing text messages make a girl sleep with you, pretending to befriend a girl to humiliate her later, and sexually harassing other girls by whipping out your penis in front of them. There's also some of your internal dialogue that can be assholish as well.
- Kick the Dog: While the player can be a dick (and is often required for certain storylines), most of them have a purpose of getting closer with various people at the party. Some options don't even have that in mind, letting you be an asshole for the sake of it and lower your standing with them as a result. For example, if you forget too many of the stories Derek tells you in the Memory Lane opportunity, he'll become frustrated with you. One dialogue option has you promise him to do better, but another has you bluntly tell him that you don't care about his stories because you moved on from high school unlike Derek. Cue the player character getting punched and your relationship with him hitting rock bottom.
- Laxative Prank: The presence of a bottle of laxatives in the house allows you to pull this on various people to varying result.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: During a certain point in Katherine's route, she bluntly tells you that you have a 75% chance of getting in her pants tonight. It fits her Academic Alpha Bitch personality to be so calculating, but her lust meter really is around 75% full by that point.
- Level Editor: Eek! Games offers tools on their website to let you add in your own dialogues and choices.
- Level-Up at Intimacy 5: Making Madison like you and comforting her in one opportunity gives you the one-time ability to ask her to repair your reputation with any character you might have angered (except for Ashley). Being nice to Derek and deciding not to sleep with Madison in the art storyline means he will back you up in a fight with either of the other two guys. Finally, any sexual activity increases your stamina.
- Lightning Bruiser: Play your cards right with certain items and opportunities, Leah's in particular, and you effectively become this. Thanks to your health and stamina regenerating quickly, you'll be able to eat your opponent's hits like they're nothing and attack more frequently. The only way to get knocked out at that point is if the whole house gangs up on you.
- LOL, 69:
- Katherine sarcastically calls you "Agent 69" while instructing you to get the Game Grumps to arrive.
- After the Grumps fall from their balloon, Dan remarks that he and Arin have got a "Level 69 goof" on their hands.
- Lost Pet Grievance: This turns out to be one reason for Derek and Madison's strained relationship. Derek let Madison take care of his cat Purgalicious for the weekend, and Purgalicious was gone when he came back, with the implication being she died. He's still distraught over the whole thing and writes a poem mourning Purgalicious, complete with an imitation of her meow.
- Love Triangle: Madison's art route has the player, who's attracted to Madison (and every other woman at the party), and Derek (who has a complicated romantic history with Madison), fight for Madison's attention when she offers to paint one of them nude.
- Making Love in All the Wrong Places: While most of the girls insist on going to one of the bedrooms to have sex Leah gets it on in the garage. That at least is a room somewhat out of the way that other partygoers rarely go into; Vickie jumps the PC in the hot tub right in the middle of the garden. And she'll do this even if others are in the tub with them.
- Man on Fire: Instead of just slapping him like other party guests, Lety and Rachael decide the best way to kill Frank is to throw him into the bonfire and let his body burn.
- Military Brat: Vickie, at least according to the side story "A Vickie Vixen Valentine." Her father, grandfather and brothers were all in the military and she was headed that way too until she found her brother's porn collection. This does explain her Affectionate Nickname of "cadet" for the PC.
- Mistaken for Gay: The male PC can ask Frank for a condom as part of Amy's scavenger hunt and Frank thinks it's a come on. Whether it's actually mistaken or not is up for the player but if it is Frank can only be persuaded otherwise by walking in on the male PC having sex with a girl.
- Mistaken for Prostitute: The PC in one quest line. He approaches Stephanie (who's rich) for money to buy weed from Frank. She thinks he's a gigolo offering his services. The player can choose to go along with it and get the money.
- Mundane Solution:
- When trying to get Vickie's phone number, asking Madison about it will have her offer to give it to you in exchange for untying Ashley's top, which will obviously hurt your relationship with her. You can also simply look at her phone's contact list for the number, provided Ashley gave you Madison's passcode.
- After the Grumps arrive, you have a couple options to get rid of them. One is to use the Starbombs as seen in Gainax Ending or use Compubrah, where Katherine will take a picture with them before letting the Grumps go. Or you can simply give them Madison or Patrick's phone to let them call for a ride. Arin lampshades this.Arin: Wow what an incredibly simple solution to our problem! If this was a video game, I'd say that the Player just took the easiest fucking route to victory, and will reap no reward whatsoever! But we're fucking outta here! Danny boy, let's wait by the street while someone picks our asses up!
- Named After Somebody Famous: Frank is named after Frank Perdue of Perdue Farms chicken fame. It has something to do with his mom having choked on a chicken bone.
- Nice Girl: While some of the female guests are downright catty, Amy, Brittney, and Vickie are very pleasant company, and Rachael has to be provoked before she gets mean.
- Nice Guy:
- Derek is easily the nicest guy at the party. You and Patrick are perverts, while Frank is a Smug Straight Edge.
- Perversion aside, Patrick. He and Rachael are opposed to each other regarding his porn site. His proposed solution? Why, trying to make the party as much fun for her as possible, of course!
- No Bisexuals: Discussed in an ambient Patrick line, where he remarks that it's weird that Frank is attracted to guys and girls and that he should pick a side, though he follows it up with a "Just kidding!"
- Nobody Poops:
- Zigzagged with Ashley. Although you can use laxatives on her, she is seen only walking in front of the toilet and not actually using it if you follow her into a bathroom and completely forgets about needing to relieve herself altogether if she is forced downstairs in her birthday suit before Madison and the other guests, courtesy of you locking all the bathroom doors.
- Averted if you use the laxatives on Katherine, who locks herself in the downstairs bathroom and complains about the state of her bowels when under their effect. Like the above example, however, she is never shown actually using the toilet as it's impossible to enter the bathroom while she's inside (even if you have the key) and she'll force you out if you get inside before her.
- Also averted with yourself - you can unleash a fiery discharge out of your anus by consuming them, which causes you to pass out. Later updates also added a urination mechanic, which comes into play during Derek's route where you have a literal pissing contest.
- Non-Standard Game Over: Usually, the only way to get a game over in the main game is to lose all your health, Gainax Ending not withstanding. In the "Mission Impawsible" opportunity, however, if you decide to lie to Derek and say Madison was the one who killed Purgaliciousnote , he'll snap and try to burn the house down using motor oil and the fire pit outside. Fail to put it out in time and the entire garage will be set alight, forcing most of the partygoers to evacuate. Although the fire won't spread and you're free to stay for as long as you want, you won't be able to talk to the remaining characters, so your only options are to either go out the front door or walk straight into the burning inferno. Notably, the game asks you to save before all this happens.
- Only Sane Woman: Leah is Frank's second in command, but is a lot more lenient than he is, quietly accepting any alcohol the player will show to her rather than beat you down like Frank would and during the sidequest where you look for Ashley's escaped pet python, she'll point out how ridiculous it is to keep such a large animal in such a cramped cage. She loses this status if you decide to pursue Leah's Dark path.
- Operation: Jealousy: Katherine only wants to sleep with you so she can make her boyfriend mad, since his hobby has been getting on her nerves. She even reveals after your sexual encounter that she left her phone on so he could hear you guys doing it.
- Optional Sexual Encounter: The Game. There are plenty of other things to do but most storylines are ultimately about getting into someone's pants.
- Pants-Pulling Prank: A variant; if you decide to prank Ashley for Madison the simplest way is to undo the back of her somewhat over-stuffed top, exposing her boobs.
- A Party, Also Known as an Orgy: Most of the guests are at least considering hooking up and the PC can score with almost all of them. A few can also enjoy each other's company.
- Plucky Comic Relief: Unlike the other Secret Characters which have their own quests, the Game Grumps cannot be romanced after first meeting them, the only quest is to get them to leave, and have no bearing on anybody's plotlines after they've arrived. Most of their antics consist of wacky side-stories that reference the show's comedy.
- Porn with Plot: The goals of each route are to have sex scenes with the characters, but there's a hefty amount of story involved in getting to that end.
- Press X to Die:
- Telling Frank that you're drunk will get your lights knocked out. The later updates subverted this by allowing you to fight back and Derek will step in for you if he becomes your bouncer, although your standing with Frank will still lower a little.
- Go ahead, steal in front of Madison or Derek or even grope her while you're at it! See how far that gets you with Frank, Derek, or Leah. Even if you happen to succeed in knocking them out, any attempts to talk to Madison afterwards will result in her ignoring you or calling Derek over to try to knock you out again.
- In the side stories, pissing off the girls by being an asshole or pervert will cause them to let you know. Bluntly. Unlike the main game, you can't fight back and go down in one hit.
- Privacy by Distraction: You can usually tell a character that someone else is looking for them to get them out of a room if you need to steal something or have a...private moment with another guest.
- Public Exposure: One of Madison's storylines is a competition between the player and Derek to see who's more fit for her to paint in the nude. Her painting isn't even of your naked body - it's of your supposed sky animal, a penguin with a floppy penis. She insists she needed you to be nude to get more in touch with your animalistic side, but it's suggested she might have just wanted an excuse to see a naked guy (as she's willing to sleep with you shortly afterwards).
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Ashley getting heated over Madison's newfound art hobby: "She. Is not. An artist!"
- Rage Against the Author: If pushed by the player when Lety talks to Rachael, Rachael will reveal she's aware she's in a game and enlists Lety to help destroy the party. Lety vows to "start knocking heads till Bobby's got no choice but to shut this shit down!" Lety then begins to rebel, altering her own design to give herself huge hands to knock out everybody at the party, and giving Rachael big boobs just for fun.
- Rape as Backstory: One of Frank's throwaway lines implies this as one of the reasons he hates alcohol, saying that the last time he drank alcohol, he woke up next to his scoutmaster. But at least he got a "Deep Throat" badge out of it.
- Really Gets Around: Stephanie and Vickie both have a lot of sex, although the latter is a porn star. Also potentially the PC: if you complete a lot of side quests, they could have slept with most of the girls and boys at the party by night's end.
- Recursive Canon: After dropping into the party, Arin remarks that it looks like a "backyard gastropub" with a House Party theme, specifying that he means the game. A few other ambient lines imply that even in the world of the game, their Let's Play of House Party exists.
- Relationship Values: Your relationships with each of the party-goers are measured in terms of general friendship and how sexually attracted they are to you, as well as their level of intoxication.
- Same Race Means Related: Lampshaded. Derek and Leah, the only two black characters at the party, have ambient dialogue in which they complain about people asking if they're related.
- Satellite Character: In the original game, Rachael's only real character was that she was friends with famous porn star Vickie Vixen, and her route involved pretending to be Vickie to make Rachael do sexy things or using Rachael's phone to invite Vickie to the party. Even in-universe, Rachael acknowledges that she only gets invited places because people want to know more about Vickie. This gets downplayed in later updates as Rachael is fleshed out more, particularly when it comes to her dynamic with Patrick and her status as a Fourth-Wall Observer.
- Schmuck Bait: When Doja Cat tasks you with setting up a stage for her, one option is to drape the pool cover over the hot tub. Do that and she'll unsurprisingly fall in to the water, ending her performance before it even begins. You're supposed to use the plexiglass in the garage to cover the hot tub instead, which proves to be much sturdier.
- Secret Character:
- Using Katherine's text spoofing skills, you can encourage Vickie Vixen to attend the party.
- Lety can be invited by using Ashley's laptop.
- The Game Grumps can be brought to the party by using a cell phone jammer as they fly over in a hot air balloon.
- Secret Diary: You can find Madison's diary locked in a safe. Most of the time the player character won't read it because he'd rather interact with girls, but one of Ashley's routes requires you to read it so you can learn about Madison's tryst with Derek.
- Sex in a Shared Room: Played with. Some characters will stop having sex with you if somebody walks in, and most will request you lock the bedroom door before you hook up. However, it's possible to perform sexual acts on some characters, like Stephanie or Frank, while other characters are watching, and the spectators will usually remark on the strange sight.
- Shameless Fanservice Girl: Stephanie and Vickie again are both happy to disrobe (and weren't wearing a lot to begin with) and both are well aware of the effect this is having on the men at the party. One potential variant of Amy's story leads to both her and Brittney gaining an appreciation for nudism (encouraged by the player, of course) and start walking around the party sans clothing.
- Ship Tease: Between Brittney and Stephanie. Getting Brittney to come downstairs involves getting Stephanie to dance topless and Brittney spends the rest of the party watching her. Their ambient dialogue also references them knowing each other and spending at least one night "making out until sunrise."
- Shout-Out: Derek criticizes your bizarre art sculpture by saying that it looks like it belongs in "an insane asylum for animatronic animals that climbed off the stage and started killing everyone in the pizza place."
- Sibling Rivalry: Between the sisters Ashley and Madison, who are out to humiliate each other throughout the game.
- Simple Solution Won't Work: When Derek decides to lock Madison in the bathroom during her art storyline after he took one of Amy's Hyperalls, the player character can ask Frank to beat him up, which he responds positively to. When they mention he's on Hyperall, he promptly backs out, comparing fighting a high Derek to fighting a grizzly bear. The conversation does give the player character another idea on how to deal with Derek, however.
- Smug Straight Edge: Frank has absolutely zero tolerance for anyone partaking of alcohol in his presence, and he considers it his civic duty to attend parties and keep it away from the party-goers. It's also an act to deprive them of alcohol so that they partake in his drugs. He also has plans of opening up some sort of strip club/fight club.
- Sophisticated as Hell: In one of Brittney's ambient dialogue lines, she writes a verbose letter back to her mom and dad about how difficult it's been for her to make friends, then caps it off by remarking that her "tits are too fucking big."
- Spooky Painting: There's an oddly Giger-esque portrait in the living room. In the Game Grumps route, Arin gets hypnotized staring at it, a reference to a meme from their playthrough.
- Stealth Pun: Two sisters are named Ashley and Madison, a reference to an infamous dating site based on infidelity.
They're hosting a party that allows you to sleep with multiple girls in one night. - Story Branch Favoritism: When it comes to the siblings' rivalry, it's pretty clear that Madison's art storyline is her "real" route as siding with her against Ashley just gets you a repeatable blowjob. Siding with Ashley on the other hand requires you to invite Vickie to the party (which has its own benefits), pushing Derek to reconcile with Madison, and comes with repeatable sex as your reward.
- Story Branching: Various choices can open up new storylines but close off others. For example, sleeping with Rachael prevents you from getting Vickie to the party. Getting Rachael into bed involves getting Katherine to send fake texts to her phone pretending to be Vickie daring her and getting Vickie to come to the party requires Katherine to fake being Rachael texting her to come join the party. Katherine will only do one.
- Straw Feminist: Katherine can be tricked into signing a petition for Derek to take off his shirt if you tell her it's to chemically castrate all men.
- Streaking: You, if you so choose. You can remove your clothes (or at least whip your dick or breasts out) at any time and run around, to the various amusement and disgust of your friends. You can also force this on Ashley as a prank to attract Madison.
- Technobabble: When Katherine engages in Hollywood Hacking or prepares the cell phone jammer, she explains what she's doing using complicated language and then acknowledges how the player has no idea what she's saying."Give me a second to recalibrate the jammer's capacity. I'll change the conduction parameters to amplify the - who am I kidding, you're not going to understand a word of this."
- Teeny Weenie: In keeping with his Butt-Monkey status, Patrick's, um, equipment is nothing to write home about. When he sees your penis, he remarks that it's bigger than his and says he needs another drink. In one of the routes, you can see it's so small he uses a key ring as a cock ring.
- Terrible Pick-Up Lines: Each girl has a one-liner you can give them which instantly lowers their opinion of you.
- This Is Reality: In her questline, Leah says she's "not some NPC in a game".
- This Loser Is You: Most of the methods for gaining favor with the various girls require being a really scummy human being, but you're rewarded with sex of various kinds.
- Token Black Friend: Derek is the male protagonist's best friend, and before Leah was introduced, he was also the only black person at the party.
- Token Minority: Of the current cast of 15 characters, the only non-white characters are Derek and Leah, who are black, and Amy, who is Chinese. Leah was only added in a later update, making Derek the only black character for a while. There is more than a little Lampshade Hanging about this.
- Tradesnark™: Dan and Arin refer to their bath bombs as "official Starbomb Mini Bathbombs™," pronouncing the "TM" every time.
- Unexpectedly Realistic Gameplay: As mentioned above in But Thou Must!, events where certain characters overhear or interrupt your conversations with others are scripted, so an unwitting or careless player might think they're safe to, say, plot with Ashley to prank Madison with Madison nearby. Do so and Madison will bluntly remind you that she can hear you and calls you an idiot. Cue the game locking you out of one or more opportunities and the player character internally giving themselves a Facepalm for their stupidity.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: At the end of one of the Game Grumps routes, the Player character can toss some failed bathbombs in the fire pit, where the chemicals cause Arin and Danny to get high. Eventually, they hop on some pink lawn flamingos before slowly rising in the air, doing a lap around the party, and zooming off into the night, finally getting to go to their show. Aside from the Player character, no one else in the backyard comments on this.
- Vague Age: The characters appear to be in their twenties or early thirties, with many being college students, but nothing is made specific. Derek skirts around the exact amount of time since his high school graduation, lampshading how the game needs to appeal to a wide age demographic.
- Verbal Tic: Patrick always throws "brah" into sentences.
- Victoria's Secret Compartment: Ashley keeps her key for her pet snake's terrarium in her top.
- Video Game Caring Potential:
- Played with. You can do some genuinely nice things for some of the characters, such as helping Ashley recover from a prank Madison played on her, assisting Lety in making new friends or bringing Patrick some painkillers after Rachael slaps him. Of course, for most of the follow-ups, you have to be a complete dick to someone else to proceed, but the initial acts are still kind.
- Vickie's route requires you to be in good-enough standing with other people at the party, mostly to have sex and increase your sexual stamina. If you pissed someone off in someone else's route, this route actually allows you to apologize and start over from scratch, making their routes available again note .
- After you get Madison to draw your sky animal in her art storyline, Derek will try to invoke The Bro Code and beg the player character not to sleep with her. If you side with Derek, he'll be grateful and become your bouncer, defusing any fights that would happen with Frank and calm Madison down if you piss them off. Don't expect him to intervene if any of the girls get pissed with you though, including Leah.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential: You can act like a complete and utter jackass for no reason other than your own amusement. This includes very rude or sleazy dialogue choices, stealing random things, and in the updated game, punching characters in the face. Oftentimes you have to be cruel to one character to succeed in the storyline for another character, such as the Madison route that largely involves cruel pranks on Ashley.
- Video Game Cruelty Punishment:
- Step too far out of line and you'll have to worry about Frank, Derek, and/or Leah getting up and kicking your ass.
- Using skeevy lines on the girls or trying to talk to them while you're exposed often results in them giving you the cold shoulder.
- You can punch characters in the updated game, but if they deplete your health points first, it's a game over. Punch one of the girls unprovoked and Frank, Derek, and/or Leah will run up and likely knock you out. If they're all unconscious, you're free to do as you feel, although don't expect to be in good standing with Frank or Derek for the rest of the night. Repeatedly punching one of the women will provoke the other girls into fighting you.
- Unlike what happens with the guys, punching a woman unconscious will have them permanently knocked out for the rest of the night. This has an effect on the other characters and you won't be able to progress their storylines which involve the knocked out woman. For example, knocking out Madison means you won't be able to progress Ashley's storyline and you won't even be able to read Madison's diary or see her contact list thanks to a quirk in the game's code that requires Madison to be awake. Knocking out Katherine means you won't be able to get the best ending of Patrick's storyline.
- Version 0.14.4 adds a feature that allows the player to grope the chests of any NPC in the game (including the guys). However, trying this with many of the girls in public and when your relationship with them is too low will cause their opinions of you to plummet, and most of them will let out a What the Hell, Hero? comment even if they like you. What really cements this trope is what happens if you attempt it on most of the girls: a firm talking-to and then a game over as they punch your lights out. If you do it to Amy enough times, she'll instead start crying, state that she just wanted to make friends, and run out the door, leaving the party forever and permanently locking you out of her content (and get Derek to beat your ass if your relationship with him isn't high enough.) Damn.
- When trying to help Lety out with her first party, messing up too many times will result in her leaving. She mentions on the way out that she'll double Ashley's rate on her Spanish lessons as well (although that doesn't affect you gameplay-wise).
- While you can win a fight against every character at once at the beginning of the game if you're patient enough, fighting Doja Cat is inadvisable since she has infinite health.
- Unintentionally Unwinnable: You can punch Derek unconscious right before you start Madison's art storyline. Unusually, the game doesn't anticipate this since he's supposed to interrupt the conversation for the storyline to continue. It proceeds normally until you tell Madison that you're ready to present your sculpture, at which point the game refuses to progress. Since a few other characters show up for your presentation, most of their respective storylines are locked out in the crossfire. The only solution is to reload a save before the art storyline and make sure Derek is conscious when you start it again.
- Unusual Euphemism: Frank calls his giant balls his "glorious gravy nuggets" and his "massive milk and honeys," among other things.
- Waiting Puzzle: The last step to getting the Game Grumps to appear is to go outside with the cell phone jammer turned on and stand for about a minute as their hot air balloon falls to the ground. Katherine warns you that moving around too much will mess up the signal.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: Part of Amy's quest involves getting Derek's shirt. He'll walk around shirtless for the rest of the party after that.
- Wardrobe Malfunction: The player can invoke this by untying Ashley's top as a prank, exposing her breasts to the party and humiliating her.
- What the Hell, Hero?: An inevitability since certain routes will get locked following a couple quests, with a good example of this being Madison or Ashley after you pull a prank on one of them. This will pop up a lot more often should you decide to be a dick to people, ending with you getting beat up should you go too far.
- Where da White Women At?: In his poem to Purgalicious, Derek laments that he left her to stay with Madison over the weekend hoping it would improve his chances of getting some "white-girl freakin'." Interestingly, he also gets a bit of Ship Tease with Amy, one of the only other characters who isn't white (she's Chinese).
- Would Hit a Girl: Frank has no qualms about punching the lights out of the female player character should he see her drinking or holding alcohol.
- Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Derek. Even if he becomes your bouncer, he won't step in if the women decide to fight you. This also applies to the female player character, assuming you don't step too far out of line. If a male player character, his best friend, decides to sleep with Madison in her art route, Derek will attempt to beat him until the Hyperall he took wears off. After that, he tries to get the player on Amy's bad side by telling her he's racist. For the female player character, someone he doesn't know that well, he forgoes the beating and just tells Amy she's racist.
- Wide-Open Sandbox: Similar to Façade (2005), you're confined to the house, but beyond that, anything goes.
- Wreaking Havok: You can call up a disembodied hand to move objects around the house.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: You can convince Stephanie to pursue a medical career by giving her a nice pep talk that instills confidence in her.
