NECROBARISTA
DEVELOPER Route 59 PRICE $24.95 AVAILABILITY Released WEBSITE https://www.necrobarista.com/
Right now, I’m 42 years old, and (likely) more than halfway through my life. I have a vivid memory of being (probably) 12, in the company of my grandmother and realising that, one day, death would be happening to me “now”; in the present moment, rather than in some abstract future. I was terrified. But I’m not terrified any more, I understand it. Grandma Winifred died at age 98, still healthy in every way, except that her heart stopped, as they eventually do. Necrobarista is about time, acceptance and the persistent echo of a once beating heart.
The Terminal is a coffee shop between here and wherever the unknowable “next place” may be. You’ll spend 24 hours ordering drinks, chatting to people and trying not to scratch the nebulous itch that begins to appear as your precious last moments diminish. There’s a luminescent tree, books lining wooden shelves and a strange girl with a robotic arm. Kishan arrives and is drawn into a last day that is both mundane and quite exceptional. He has choices to make but unlike in most visual novels, the story doesn’t branch at all. He decides for himself.
This is not to say the player has no agency, although it is slight. You can select yellow, highlighted words from dialogue to gain additional perspectives and information. I found this prevented me from rushing and skim reading. At the end of each chapter, you can collect seven of the yellow keywords which then correspond to tokens, used to unlock memories (more text) in various arrangements. Figuring out which tokens you need should be motivating, but opportunities to spend them are sporadic.
The game is (otherwise) literally just words and pictures, but it’s hard to miss how beautifully each moment is framed. In the beginning, the wide angles were standoffish, as if everyone were in on some elaborate, private joke, except for me. As plot points were revealed, faces came closer and I came to understand how caring, if conflicted and complex, these people are. It’s also worth noting how proudly the game wears Australia on its sleeve. Unapologetically Melbourne, too; it’s definitely more proud of Ned Kelly than the rest of us are.
As with every aspect of presentation, the music is detailed and engaging. Created as a collaboration between Florence’s Kevin Penkin and producer Jeremy Lim, it elegantly straddles a kind of implementation that lies between diegetic (as if it were on a radio in The Terminal) and soundtrack (where it is used to highlight dramatic moments). Again, it’s sometimes alienating in the way jazz may be, sometimes warm, like elevator music, but the kind that makes you want to push the button of every floor you don’t need to go to, just to hear more.
One of Necrobarista’s more ancient characters remarks that customers used to ask which place they were in; heaven or hell, but that (now) no-one asks. On her last day, Grandma Winifred asked if she were in a church. She was from that era. I also recall placing my newborn son on her lap. Amazingly, the last time I recall mentioning my age in PC Powerplay, I’d just turned 30. But 42 is “happening now” and so will my last day. I only hope I can spend it in the company of baby grandchildren or, failing that, wordy baristas and bushrangers.
Grandma Winifred died at age 98, still healthy in every way, except that her heart stopped, as they eventually do.