Demo: Tavern Keeper is about to win game of the year, I don’t make the rules.

Sup, Friendos. We got a chance to try out Tavern Keeper’s demo and I can’t even begin to express to you how much fun this game is going to be. Well, unless you hate fun –  or, more likely, dislike management games. It’s fine if that’s the case, I won’t take it personally. I’ll just hold a grudge forever, no big.

Obviously, I’m kidding. I think there’s a management game void in your heart, but that’s not why we’re here. I’m here to sell you on Tavern Keeper. I’m not getting paid to do this, I just enjoyed the demo so much that I’m making it my mission for as long as this post takes to write it up.

When you open up Tavern Keeper, you should be ready with popcorn or whatever movie-watching snacks strike your fancy because you’re about to watch a cinematic masterpiece. Seriously, the opener is about a minute-long intro that serves no other purpose than to be absolutely awesome.

And, as if that didn’t prime me enough for excellence, the voice acting is sublime. I’m not even kidding, whoever did the vocals needs a raise. It’s The Stanley Parable level of amazing.

So, four paragraphs in isn’t the standard practice to tell you about a game, but I really did need all four to properly espouse Tavern Keeper. Naturally, you’re the proud new owner of a tavern smack dab in the middle of a swamp. Lucky you.

Your job is to maintain and grow your tavern which you do by hiring employees, keeping your wares stocked, and advancing your tavern one star at a time. As far as I can tell, the employees have autonomy and you can’t really direct them, so paying attention to their skills is important.

Each applicant has some positive and negative things about them. Some may be good at paying attention to the stock and customers but have a negative trait as well. If you play your cards right, you can get Cuthbert to apply to your tavern. Who doesn’t want a skeleton handling the drinks? Well, about 20% of your customers will have a negative reaction to him – a jumpscare, if you will. 

Oooh, rattling bones.

Others might get upset over the tavern getting dirty, so if you don’t have someone on staff who is going to prioritize that, they may sleep for 24 hours or drink to excess. My game never had that happen, but I’ve learned this game doesn’t tell you things for funsies. It’ll definitely happen under the right conditions. 

A merchant comes by every day that you can buy from, but he will only stick around for a few hours and has a set time that he comes back. You’ll want to make sure you have enough stock for the day. To my knowledge, a barrel has about 10 drinks in it which will last most of the day at the start, but I regretted not getting two barrels.

There are several rooms that you can build to help grow your tavern including a store room and an eventual kitchen. The demo doesn’t cover the kitchen, but I’m assuming it will add a level of difficulty in juggling the stock for food and drink orders at the same time.

As you play, you may notice a patron come in with a book icon above their head. This denotes that this character has a unique story – Hello, Cuthbert! Don’t worry, for those who hate lore and reading, this isn’t Skyrim. When you click that patron, a book will open and then the phenomenal voice actor reads to you – and delight of all delights, he does voices!

Here, you have some autonomy over the story in that you can choose one of two options that generally amount to, “Hi, I’m compassionate and listening” or “Yeah, you’re kind of in my light, go away.”

I think we’ve established in other reviews that I am a sweet baby angel – why are you laughing? – and I can’t be mean to pixels. The two books that I saw had good endings, so I’m not sure if there are repercussions to being a curmudgeon. 

I really am a sweet baby angel, though. Seriously, stop laughing.

Obviously, we have to talk about the details. It looks like there is quite a bit in the way of customizing your tavern. Not only do you have a lot of options available, but you have an “x” and “y” axis that allows you to get the perfect fit. You can move and spin objects to your heart’s content.

There’s, also, a bit about designing items and being able to upload those for other players later, but that part wasn’t available yet.

As far as music goes, I don’t want to call it generic because it wasn’t. However, there was something familiar in it, like hearing the music of a really good, old classic. I know, I’m ever so good at descriptions. I’m, also, really good at sarcasm.

In terms of graphics, the cinematic intro was miles and leaps more hardcore than the actual gameplay and I’m fine with that. While the intro looked amazing, it would have slogged my computer and I wouldn’t have been given all the nostalgic feels.

The graphics reminded me strongly of the remasters of the Monkey Island series. I can’t say for sure why that was since pulling up references to make sure I didn’t sound crazy only confirmed that they look very much… different from each other. It’s just the vibes, y’all. I don’t know. I was so confident that I named my tavern, “The Groggery.”

Kind of embarrassing now, huh? It’s even more embarrassing when I realize as I’m typing this that I didn’t have to share my shame.

Oh well. The last thing I wanna talk about is the tutorial. I am the biggest hater of tutorials. I’m not saying they’re not necessary. I suffer from what I like to call, “the big dumb”, so I need them. However, I have an attention span issue and if it feels like I’m reading stereo instructions, I will wilt like a sunflower on a cloudy day.

Perhaps someone should make a tutorial on how to make a good tutorial…

Happily, the tutorial was an absolute joy! It was guided by my new favorite voice actor and had a lot of humor interspersed in it. Plus, the UI system has built-in notes if you forget something. I’m not kidding, you can hover over basically anything and get more information.

Hell, you can hover over information to hover over more information. I wish I was kidding. There’s a drop-down system of sorts if something needs more explaining. To show you the joys of such a system, you can literally open tabs to your heart’s content in the tutorial.

And I did. I didn’t count, but it was more than 50 little tabs open. I was hoping for a reward. Maybe in the full game, it’ll give a nice little achievement to literally cover your game in info-tabs. Hint, hint, Greenheart Games. 😉

All these words to say that I had a very good time with the demo of Tavern Keeper and you should follow them on Steam and add this gem to your wishlist!