Ever have a desire to become a seasoned bartender? Well, with Aurora Games' Bar Oasis you can do exactly that! In the virtual world, that is.
The plot is shaped in a story, literally. You play a bartender named Vic who is telling his story of how he started off in the job to a fellow bar patron. Soon you are brought into this story world as it begins to unfold around you. You start off as Vic when he sees a "Help Wanted" sign in the window of a bar, and decides that he would take a crack at it. Why the hell not, he's been out of a job for over a year. He finds himself lucky, because the boss takes him in right away, despite his complete lack of experience. Reason being? The bar never takes a day off, not even on holidays. They have been open for 10 years without a night off, and the boss needs a well deserved break. Even early on, it is easy to see that the story is well-involved, as humour and mystery begin to creep in. You'd figure in a game about bartending the story would be the strongest aspect, and it definitely is.
That's not to take away from the gameplay though. The beginning of the game acts as a sort of tutorial, letting you learn the controls among other things. I personally found the drink making to be extremely fun and addicting. After all, who said that a game had to be action packed with violence to be fun? I'm just having a blast making my customers some drinks. There are seven seats at the bar, each with a circle at the bottom of the screen indicating each seat. When the circle starts flashing green, it means a customer is approaching. You must greet the customer as quickly as possible before they get aggitated, at which point the circle will turn red, signifying annoyance. Not only do you have to be fast, but you have to make sure you make their drink the right way too. When they order, you must take a look at the ingredients list and be sure to grab all of them, and the correct glass to go with it. The drink making process consists of tilting the iPod to pour the correct amount of drink, squeezing lemon juice to add flavour, shaking or stirring drinks by moving the iPod correctly, and more. As mentioned before, I had a lot of fun with this. And while it is admittedly quite repetitive, every drink includes a different recipe and different steps to make it, which keeps things pretty fresh.
The combination of story and gameplay in Bar Oasis is very impressive. The only problem i found with the parts where you need to listen to people talk is that, well, they talk far too much. That's not to say that most of the dialogue isn't needed, but there are good stretches in time where you might think to yourself, "Gee, I wish i could actually PLAY the game." If they had trimmed the fat with the dialogue they might have made it a little more addicting. But hey, for $0.99, this game is a gem.
-James C.
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