Bartender Hustle

There are lots of games out there that emulate the feeling of being a top chef or a freight driver to perfection – but few of them have focused on the underappreciated art of cocktail making as Bartender Hustle has.

Mix your way to the top in a game that will have you bartending all over the world. Although the game lacks a bit of complexity to be called a proper simulator, it still delivers enough fun for fans of bartending to finally have a title that appeals to their interests.

Mix and Match

In Bartender Hustle, players take on the role of a rising bartender, as they move up the ranks in a simple story mode that spans five bars all over the world. The objective is to get customers to tip well and to increase sales, which is done by preparing the right drink at the right time. It’s a simple concept, but the game does an amazing job of capturing the atmosphere of the real thing.

Aspects of the game outside of your job as a bartender are quite limited when compared to other titles like Metro Sim Hustle. This also translates to the game’s story mode, which turns out to be disappointingly short. A normal playthrough will take you roughly three hours of your time to beat the whole campaign – and that’s funnily short for a sim game.

This isn’t helped at all by the overall dryness of the game’s story. Even though Bartender Hustle tries to do a bit of the VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action formula, it simply falls short in terms of characters and overall presentation to compete with that indie title.

Granted, the overall bartending aspect of the game is quite entertaining, even if some of the recipes aren’t proper renditions of their real-life counterparts.

Flat Drinks

If there’s something that every bartending game has done, that’s including a bit of daily-life drama into the mix to add some spice to the everyday job of mixing drinks. We’ve seen it before in games like The Red Strings Club and the aforementioned VA-11 Hall-A, and Bartender Hustle is no exception.

Unfortunately, the story in the game is presented in a rather bland way that doesn’t make players feel involved in the plot in any capacity. To make matters worse, some of the story segments can drag on for quite a while, making them feel more like a chore than a distraction from your tasks.

It’s undeniable that there’s a lot of potential behind the concept of a game like Bartender Hustle – is just that there are some minor details that hold the experience back from reaching its full potential. Perhaps with a bit more development time or even some DLC, we might be witnessing something truly unique in the making.

As it is, this is a game that can only be recommended to players that simply love cocktails or mixology in general. There are some flaws in some of the core gameplay mechanics, but nothing that would make the game unenjoyable for die-hard drinking fans.

Pros

• Good variety of drinks to prepare
• Includes a short story mode
• Does a great job of explaining its basic gameplay to new players

Cons

• Lacks some of the most popular drinks – like Pina Coladas or Mojitos
• The story mode can feel like an afterthought at times
• Flat presentation and lifeless dialogue