If you’re out for a tl;dr, buy the game if you want to experience a new world and enjoy story. Great soundtrack, cute aesthetic, lovable characters every turn. Full price is worth it.

VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action. The game that truly deserves the word "masterpiece" for anyone who's a deep fan of visual novels, or even just story games in general. This review is probably going to stay my lengthiest, and most serious, for a game that spoke to me, as deeply cliché as it may be.

Graphics wise, pixel art may not be everyone's forte, but it gets the job done wonderfully in this case, coupled with ear candy compositions all throughout. You get that wonderful 80’s future-y soundtrack that fits surprisingly well with the setting, and the retro art (and filter!) puts that icing on the cake for that old perception of what the future would be like.

The different approach from traditional visual novel choices also makes this stand out from its genre, making it much more accessible even to the masses that overall may not enjoy visual novels. The drinks you serve to your customers serve as the “choices” that would be in your everyday visual novel, either them enjoying the drink they asked for, ticked for giving them the wrong order, etc. Depending on that, your relationship with that character changes, for better or worse. You experience an entire beautiful cyberpunk world develop with all the characters somehow finding themselves tied together in it, all from the comfort of a bar counter. It has a specific way of reeling you in with charming characters that, sure, may have /some/ exaggerated quirks to fit the “waifu” criteria, but charming nonetheless. These overexaggerated characters however, are brought back to our own reality through their own common issues and everyday mishaps. It’s because of this that, even after months of playing and completing the game fully, I find myself still thinking about those people, how their lives were led after the end. Seeing some traits of those characters in others, or even myself. Besides that, there’s the other inclusion of adorning Jill’s apartment with furniture she may or may not need at the price of.. well, way too much money for today’s standards. These may or may not impede on the monthly bills Jill needs to pay off, changing the story drastically at points.

The story itself and how it tackles the setting, while sounding a bit strange at first, definitely sold by the end. It's one of my favorite aspects of VA-11, being able to have such a beautiful world be built without seeing a peek out of the bar and your apartment. You’re not the super powered, over equipped, nuke wielding main character of a cyberpunk video game where some evil corporation is out to buy the world with gold pennies. You’re the bartender the main character and everyday citizens of that world are a regular to, hearing their stories and others from their perspectives and allowing you to shape the world imaginatively yourself. Sure, you’re not out blowing up corporate buildings, taking out invading aliens, and all the sort that every cyberpunk future-y wet fever dream makes it out to be, but you’re still there, experiencing the world. You’re not there to make a change in the world as a whole, just (hopefully) a change in the people that you serve. You’re there to “mix drinks and change lives”, as the main character says before every day, and that’s exactly what this game lets you do, one drink at a time.

If you’re out for a tl;dr, buy the game if you want to experience a new world and enjoy story. Great soundtrack, cute aesthetic, lovable characters every turn. Full price is worth it. VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action. The game that truly deserves the word "masterpiece" for anyone who's a deep fan of visual novels, or even just story games in general. This review is probably going to stay my lengthiest, and most serious, for a game that spoke to me, as deeply cliché as it may be. Graphics wise, pixel art may not be everyone's forte, but it gets the job done wonderfully in this case, coupled with ear candy compositions all throughout. You get that wonderful 80’s future-y soundtrack that fits surprisingly well with the setting, and the retro art (and filter!) puts that icing on the cake for that old perception of what the future would be like. The different approach from traditional visual novel choices also makes this stand out from its genre, making it much more accessible even to the masses that overall may not enjoy visual novels. The drinks you serve to your customers serve as the “choices” that would be in your everyday visual novel, either them enjoying the drink they asked for, ticked for giving them the wrong order, etc. Depending on that, your relationship with that character changes, for better or worse. You experience an entire beautiful cyberpunk world develop with all the characters somehow finding themselves tied together in it, all from the comfort of a bar counter. It has a specific way of reeling you in with charming characters that, sure, may have /some/ exaggerated quirks to fit the “waifu” criteria, but charming nonetheless. These overexaggerated characters however, are brought back to our own reality through their own common issues and everyday mishaps. It’s because of this that, even after months of playing and completing the game fully, I find myself still thinking about those people, how their lives were led after the end. Seeing some traits of those characters in others, or even myself. Besides that, there’s the other inclusion of adorning Jill’s apartment with furniture she may or may not need at the price of.. well, way too much money for today’s standards. These may or may not impede on the monthly bills Jill needs to pay off, changing the story drastically at points. The story itself and how it tackles the setting, while sounding a bit strange at first, definitely sold by the end. It's one of my favorite aspects of VA-11, being able to have such a beautiful world be built without seeing a peek out of the bar and your apartment. You’re not the super powered, over equipped, nuke wielding main character of a cyberpunk video game where some evil corporation is out to buy the world with gold pennies. You’re the bartender the main character and everyday citizens of that world are a regular to, hearing their stories and others from their perspectives and allowing you to shape the world imaginatively yourself. Sure, you’re not out blowing up corporate buildings, taking out invading aliens, and all the sort that every cyberpunk future-y wet fever dream makes it out to be, but you’re still there, experiencing the world. You’re not there to make a change in the world as a whole, just (hopefully) a change in the people that you serve. You’re there to “mix drinks and change lives”, as the main character says before every day, and that’s exactly what this game lets you do, one drink at a time.