VA-11 Hall-A is a rather simplistic game, even in terms of being a visual novel. It’s not this complex, grandiose story that takes dozens of hours to complete. While there are some additional endings you can unlock, they’re small and really only serve to expand upon the game’s primary ending. There aren’t a whole bunch of branching paths with their own long and intricate routes. While it does have some elements of romance and mystery to it, they’re very passive, and the game isn’t particularly married to either genre. Despite the science fiction nature of its cyberpunk setting, VA-11 Hall-A is rather… mundane. And as I grow older, I gradually find myself relating to its mundanity more and more as time passes.
VA-11 Hall-A is the game for twenty-somethings. It’s the perfect game to boot up after a long day at work and just relax with. It’s not extremely long, nor is it a huge commitment. It’s just a comfy visual novel/bartender simulator with fantastic pixel art and a catchy synthwave soundtrack. It has a relatable story about the struggles of finding what makes someone happy, as well as the value of community in a world where everything sucks all the time and is gradually getting worse day by day, all lessons which are primarily learned by the main character, Jill. Jill is the perfect encapsulation of someone in their mid-twenties working a dead end job who isn’t quite sure of what they want from life. She’s intelligent, witty, charming, and sarcastic in a way that’s not obnoxious. Most importantly: she’s a very caring person, and all of these personality traits serve to really enhance the conversations she has with her patrons as a bartender.
The primary focus of the narrative is just lending an ear to the patrons that come into the bar, as they share with you the unique problems that they struggle with on a day to day basis. There’s a serious incident that takes place early on in the game, and the fallout from that incident affects a few of the regulars who frequent the bar. As a result, they’ll often talk about how this event affects them or the people close to them. Jill is of course, merely a bartender, and there isn’t much that she can do to help those people. However, she still lends her ear to those who need to talk about these things, and she does her best to offer valuable input. She doesn’t always know what to say, but it still means a lot to many of her patrons that she’s willing to hear them out, and it’s a trait of hers that I find deeply admirable and relatable. The rest of the game’s characters are mostly fantastic, even if some of them aren’t necessarily the best people. Just about every character has something about them that adds to the story, whether its exposition about how the world works, a compelling subplot, or even just fun or comedic character interactions.
There is a character in this game that I feel like I should mention ahead of time because they’re a character that has caused a lot of controversy for the game. Dorothy is a sex worker android with the mind of a 24-year-old and the body of a 13-year-old. Despite the nature of her job, she’s constantly acting bright and happy-go-lucky, and she makes numerous sex jokes over the course of her appearances. She also frequently talks about her job in vivid detail. Understandably, her character really sticks out and has made several players of this game rather uncomfortable. It’s a bit hard to see her as anything but this game’s version of the stereotypical anime loli character with the mind of an adult. Her character could have been used as the springboard for a discussion about the morality of utilizing a life-like sex worker android with such a body type, but that doesn’t really happen. Her character isn’t completely about sex, as she mentions that she’s often hired just to provide comfort to people or to pretend to be their daughter in a non-sexual way. She even gets into a philosophical discussion with Jill regarding the concept of death. Still, I don’t think that the game treats her situation or her background with enough tact to really justify it. If a character like this is a dealbreaker for you, well, I totally get it, and I don’t really blame you.
There is a bit more to the gameplay aside from simply reading through the narrative. You do actually prepare the drinks that patrons order at the bar yourself. Making drinks isn’t at all complicated. After the customer orders their drink, Jill will recall what they chose and you just look the drink up in a recipe book and follow the directions. Sometimes, a patron will order a large version of a drink, but in those cases, all you have to do is double the ingredients in the recipe. It’s that simple. It's so simple, I don't even know if there are any repercussions for getting a drink wrong because it never happened to me.
Aside from that, Jill has an apartment, and before each shift, you have the opportunity to browse the internet on your phone. When you browse the net, you can visit a news site, a blog, and a message board in order to get updates on all of the happenings that are going on in Glitch City. This is a great way to learn about the larger setting despite not experiencing a lot of the things that go on within it yourself. You can also go shopping to purchase various things, such as decorations for Jill’s apartment or additional songs that you can play in the bar’s jukebox. As the day begins, Jill will sometimes desire an item from the store, and if you don’t purchase that item, Jill will be distracted and won’t be able to immediately recall a customer’s order during that night’s shift. Jill being distracted isn’t really a problem, though. As long as you’re paying attention to what people are ordering, it’s not hard to recall a customer’s order at all. However, there are mandatory things Jill needs to pay for, such as electricity and rent for her apartment, and if she doesn’t have the money to pay for those things by a certain date, you’ll get the “bad” ending to the game, so you can’t just purchase every single thing that Jill has her eye on. You’ll have to be smart with your money. It’s worth occasionally purchasing something, but not all the time.
The game does potentially date itself by implementing a lot of mid-2010s internet culture and humor, particularly by referencing common posts from 4chan and Tumblr at that time. These references aren’t frequent, nor are they especially in your face. They’re mainly made on the message board you can browse on her phone, and you can also spot some commonly posted comments flying across the screen whenever Streaming-Chan visits the bar. After nearly a decade of these types of posts going out of style, I feel like it might be a bit hard to really recognize them unless you were someone who was on the internet at the time those posts could typically be found. The game also makes several references to YIIK: A Post-Modern RPG, which was still in development at the time VA-11 Hall-A was released. I gotta tell ya, those YIIK references really hit like a truck in the wake of its… controversial release.
For the most part, VA-11 Hall-A manages to be a consistently endearing and entertaining story, despite some distractions that may or may not take you out of the cozy atmosphere it creates. For me, the struggles that Jill goes through were ones that I could really relate to, and the overall message the game conveys really struck a chord with me. My second playthrough of the game, now that I’m older, felt so much more personal than when I first played it. Finishing the game left me with a little bit of optimism, something that I’m really struggling to muster as each day passes and the world gradually resembles the worst aspects of cyberpunk settings more and more. I feel like a lot of people could really learn from Jill. The world sucks, so we should all do what we can to make it suck a little less for those around us, even if the only thing you can do is serve a drink and lend an ear to someone who needs to talk.
VA-11 Hall-A is the game for twenty-somethings. It’s the perfect game to boot up after a long day at work and just relax with. It’s not extremely long, nor is it a huge commitment. It’s just a comfy visual novel/bartender simulator with fantastic pixel art and a catchy synthwave soundtrack. It has a relatable story about the struggles of finding what makes someone happy, as well as the value of community in a world where everything sucks all the time and is gradually getting worse day by day, all lessons which are primarily learned by the main character, Jill. Jill is the perfect encapsulation of someone in their mid-twenties working a dead end job who isn’t quite sure of what they want from life. She’s intelligent, witty, charming, and sarcastic in a way that’s not obnoxious. Most importantly: she’s a very caring person, and all of these personality traits serve to really enhance the conversations she has with her patrons as a bartender.
The primary focus of the narrative is just lending an ear to the patrons that come into the bar, as they share with you the unique problems that they struggle with on a day to day basis. There’s a serious incident that takes place early on in the game, and the fallout from that incident affects a few of the regulars who frequent the bar. As a result, they’ll often talk about how this event affects them or the people close to them. Jill is of course, merely a bartender, and there isn’t much that she can do to help those people. However, she still lends her ear to those who need to talk about these things, and she does her best to offer valuable input. She doesn’t always know what to say, but it still means a lot to many of her patrons that she’s willing to hear them out, and it’s a trait of hers that I find deeply admirable and relatable. The rest of the game’s characters are mostly fantastic, even if some of them aren’t necessarily the best people. Just about every character has something about them that adds to the story, whether its exposition about how the world works, a compelling subplot, or even just fun or comedic character interactions.
There is a character in this game that I feel like I should mention ahead of time because they’re a character that has caused a lot of controversy for the game. Dorothy is a sex worker android with the mind of a 24-year-old and the body of a 13-year-old. Despite the nature of her job, she’s constantly acting bright and happy-go-lucky, and she makes numerous sex jokes over the course of her appearances. She also frequently talks about her job in vivid detail. Understandably, her character really sticks out and has made several players of this game rather uncomfortable. It’s a bit hard to see her as anything but this game’s version of the stereotypical anime loli character with the mind of an adult. Her character could have been used as the springboard for a discussion about the morality of utilizing a life-like sex worker android with such a body type, but that doesn’t really happen. Her character isn’t completely about sex, as she mentions that she’s often hired just to provide comfort to people or to pretend to be their daughter in a non-sexual way. She even gets into a philosophical discussion with Jill regarding the concept of death. Still, I don’t think that the game treats her situation or her background with enough tact to really justify it. If a character like this is a dealbreaker for you, well, I totally get it, and I don’t really blame you.
There is a bit more to the gameplay aside from simply reading through the narrative. You do actually prepare the drinks that patrons order at the bar yourself. Making drinks isn’t at all complicated. After the customer orders their drink, Jill will recall what they chose and you just look the drink up in a recipe book and follow the directions. Sometimes, a patron will order a large version of a drink, but in those cases, all you have to do is double the ingredients in the recipe. It’s that simple. It's so simple, I don't even know if there are any repercussions for getting a drink wrong because it never happened to me.
Aside from that, Jill has an apartment, and before each shift, you have the opportunity to browse the internet on your phone. When you browse the net, you can visit a news site, a blog, and a message board in order to get updates on all of the happenings that are going on in Glitch City. This is a great way to learn about the larger setting despite not experiencing a lot of the things that go on within it yourself. You can also go shopping to purchase various things, such as decorations for Jill’s apartment or additional songs that you can play in the bar’s jukebox. As the day begins, Jill will sometimes desire an item from the store, and if you don’t purchase that item, Jill will be distracted and won’t be able to immediately recall a customer’s order during that night’s shift. Jill being distracted isn’t really a problem, though. As long as you’re paying attention to what people are ordering, it’s not hard to recall a customer’s order at all. However, there are mandatory things Jill needs to pay for, such as electricity and rent for her apartment, and if she doesn’t have the money to pay for those things by a certain date, you’ll get the “bad” ending to the game, so you can’t just purchase every single thing that Jill has her eye on. You’ll have to be smart with your money. It’s worth occasionally purchasing something, but not all the time.
The game does potentially date itself by implementing a lot of mid-2010s internet culture and humor, particularly by referencing common posts from 4chan and Tumblr at that time. These references aren’t frequent, nor are they especially in your face. They’re mainly made on the message board you can browse on her phone, and you can also spot some commonly posted comments flying across the screen whenever Streaming-Chan visits the bar. After nearly a decade of these types of posts going out of style, I feel like it might be a bit hard to really recognize them unless you were someone who was on the internet at the time those posts could typically be found. The game also makes several references to YIIK: A Post-Modern RPG, which was still in development at the time VA-11 Hall-A was released. I gotta tell ya, those YIIK references really hit like a truck in the wake of its… controversial release.
For the most part, VA-11 Hall-A manages to be a consistently endearing and entertaining story, despite some distractions that may or may not take you out of the cozy atmosphere it creates. For me, the struggles that Jill goes through were ones that I could really relate to, and the overall message the game conveys really struck a chord with me. My second playthrough of the game, now that I’m older, felt so much more personal than when I first played it. Finishing the game left me with a little bit of optimism, something that I’m really struggling to muster as each day passes and the world gradually resembles the worst aspects of cyberpunk settings more and more. I feel like a lot of people could really learn from Jill. The world sucks, so we should all do what we can to make it suck a little less for those around us, even if the only thing you can do is serve a drink and lend an ear to someone who needs to talk.