New game announcements came one after another at the Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase as part of E3 2021. And while it may not be as big as Starfield or Avalanche Studios' new game Contraband, the party game Party Animals is no less exciting. Party Animals is a physics-enabled fighting game featuring anthropomorphic cutesy/violent animals. Party Animals is also confirmed to be a timed Xbox console exclusive and Game Pass launch game when it arrives in 2022.
Party Animals' two-minute Xbox E3 announcement trailer is a great introduction to what the party game is all about. Unicorns, punk pigs, corgis, and kitty cats are shown pushing each other off cliffs, shooting each other with tasers, and otherwise being completely ridiculous. These adorable animals are dangerous even without weapons, however, as they can grasp onto other players and the environment, push, and pull as they see fit.
Even the levels in Party Animals are over-the-top, with stages including a flying bomber jet, a fish market with wiggling tentacles, a train with a firey coal engine, and more. Interactivity is a big focus, clearly. For example, a nuclear submarine level is shown launching a rocket that players can grab onto. Another level has a lever that will open a door in the floor leading to a fiery doom. Mostly, though, the levels provide an open 3D space for the animals to fight their hearts out.
Party Animals is clearly not intended to be inherently a highly competitive experience. It's fun, clumsy, and humorous by nature. Unexpected gameplay interactions are by design, so it won't have the tight action of a Street Fighter-type fighting game. That's okay, though, because learning the clumsy physics-based action creates a different type of competitive environment on its own.
One massive question left unanswered in Party Animals' announcement is who it's being developed by. That question's been answered by one of the game's developers. Party Animals may look a lot like another fighting game named Gang Beasts, but it's made by someone else. Gang Beasts was made by Boneloaf, while Party Animals is being made by Recreate Games.
It's somewhat of a shame, but Party Animals' announcement was accidentally confirmed a day prior to its reveal during Xbox's E3 showcase. That doesn't pull away from how exciting the reveal was, but it does take away from some of the surprise. Luckily, the Xbox exclusivity and Game Pass deal helped bring back some of the shock value.
Party Animals releases on PC and Xbox in 2022.
