VA HALL -A
MIXING DRINKS FOR THE LOCALS IS DELIGHTFULLY INTOXICATING. US$ . | PC | waifubartending.com
This is a game about listening. Not in the tedious
Assassin’s Creed sense, where you creep around behind some sickly target, eavesdropping for mission information, but rather listening in a very human way. The patrons who visit your bar all have something to say worth hearing, whether they’re good, bad or a talking goddamn dog.
Where does the ‘game’ element come in? As bartender Jill, your job is to serve the drinks people ask for and, sometimes, the drinks they don’t. You listen to instructions and mix cocktails, selecting from a menu of exotic beverages. This is a bleak, dystopian future, though, so even a simple beer has to be synthesised using chemicals (the horror!). You can mix drinks slowly, taking multiple attempts to get it right. Serving the incorrect tipple will a ect your pay, but you don’t fail. Instead, the main focus is on the excellent story, which stumbles forward inexorably like a sloshed uncle. The wrong drink will divert the course of the narrative, but never end it.
Everyone you meet feels like they have a history. You nd yourself looking forward to seeing the most unpleasant and eccentric characters just to learn more about them. VA- HALL-A also has a blackly comic sense of humour. It’s bold enough to visit dark places. We won’t spoil it, but Dorothy’s story is especially cheerful and horrifying. At rst she seems totally amoral, but as you progress the story, hidden layers are uncovered, like a PVC-coated onion.
There’s a threatening sense of social unease, revealed through whispered conversations, news reports and blogs, which makes the world feel real. Your bar becomes a safe haven. Jill’s simple struggle to exist is fascinating precisely because it’s so ordinary, so relatable. Quiet distractions, like buying retro consoles or drinking beer on your balcony, have an understated sense of cosmic signicance.
It would be easy to write VA- HALL-A o as simple, but there’s really nothing straightforward about great writing. It doesn’t ask much of you as a player, except for patience. And it’s a di erent kind of patience. Nothing here frustrates. To enjoy it properly, you need to relax and give it the time it deserves. In that sense, it’s not for everyone, but if you like cyberpunk, anime, cocktails, people, kotatsu and corgis, you’ll nd a refreshing frame of reference in VA- HALL-A.