Games create phenomenal environments, vast landscapes and immersive surroundings to discover as you carve your path through the story. All this exploring can be thirsty work.
Welcome to the third and final instalment of Drinks in Games! We’ve gone on a virtual bar crawl, we’ve trekked through the most beautiful drinking locations in games but now it’s time to look at the drinks themselves. Which game has the perfect pint? The best beverage? Grab your glasses and allow me to take you through some of my personal favourites…
Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask
Starting off the list with milk may seem like a weird choice but let me explain. Chateau Romani is the beverage of choice in Majora’s Mask. It’s sold in various Milk Bars across the region, which is something I would like to see more of in real life. However, some gentrified areas refer to the beverage as ‘Milk of the Night’ and charge 200 rupees for a bottle, a steep price for some cow juice. They also refuse to serve it to children, which makes me wonder – what is in the mysterious milk?
Upon consuming Chateau Romani you’ll feel energised within an inch of your life. Your magic meter rejuvenates and you’ll burst at the seams with unlimited power for THREE DAYS. I’m glad they don’t give this to children. It’s clearly not normal milk, this milk has been tainted. Suddenly the 200 rupee price tag doesn’t seem so extortionate considering you’ve got a bottle of LSDairy in your bag. This drink puts the ‘moo’ in ‘moonshine’ and I want a pint of it.
Tapper
Onto a much more conventional entry here, a classic if you will. Tapper was a game you could find in the majority of arcades across America in the early 80s. The task sounds simple enough – you’re a lone barman and you have to serve frosty Budvars to your thirsty patrons. However, the game reflects bars in real life and hundreds of people will try to get a drink at the same time leaving the poor bar staff overwhelmed.
Like most people who have seen any western film, I have a weird desire to be served a cold beer slid down the bar into my clutch. However, I can’t help but acknowledge the most satisfying part of playing Tapper, when you finish your busy day and pour yourself as many beers as you like. Imagine the taste of that first pint after you’ve finished a day of serving them. Bliss.
Extra fact, Budweiser had to change the drink served in Tapper from their classic Budvar to a rather ambiguous ‘Root Beer’ due to various complaints about the game encouraging dangerous levels of alcohol consumption and subconsciously pushing drinking on the public. Which I think is a load of Budvar.
Fortnite
Slurp Juice is a consumable item in a little indie game called Fortnite that you might have heard of. A bright blue liquid found in bushes, treasure chests, vending machines and of course llamas. Like most drinks in games, Slurp Juice will rejuvenate some of your precious health points – there’s nothing too extreme about the effects of this beverage. So why does Slurp Juice make it on the list? Because of sheer audacity to call a drink ‘Slurp Juice’.
Nobody knows what the drink tastes like or what consistency it has, it’s just a jar of ominous goop that will save your life. I wanted to find out more about the lore behind Slurp Juice so I messaged Fortnite expert Ben Walker (@bnwkr) for some insight. He revealed that the drink is made by Slup.Co, a huge conglomerate that has cornered the beverage market in Fortnite. They make a number of mysterious Slurp based products and their factory is located in the Slurp Swamp which makes me question the contents of the drink even more. Ben confirmed that though no taste notes are listed in the game, Slurp Juice was actually served to players at the Fortnite World Cup and it was a raspberry flavoured slushie.
I haven’t had a slushie since the days of those giant Tango Ice Blasts you’d get for £248824 at the cinema so I’m game to try Slurp Juice. Though I’m worried I’ll get addicted to the bright bev and become ‘Big Chuggus’, an in-game character that resembles Bane with a Slurp addiction. It also sounds like what Elon Musk might call the Tesla Truck.
Oblivion
Sounding like a beverage that you’d consume before being blocked on Twitter, ‘Shadowbanish Wine’ is a rare brand of booze found in the Cyrodiil province of Tamriel. This wine was created by an alcoholic alchemist, an alchomist if you will. Made as a gift for the Legion soldiers, the drink allows them to see in the dark which must help enormous amounts in a world before the invention of electricity.
There is a very finite amount of bottles but some can be found in the occasional chest every now and then. Collectors will offer you a pretty penny if you bring them a six pack but after a long day traveling across the region to retrieve the sacred booze I think you should enjoy it yourself. Thanks to the drink’s weird ability, you’ll be able to stumble out of a tavern in complete darkness and still find your way home. You could even stop for a khajiit kebab on the way.
Once again I didn’t want to be the only contributor to this boozy adventure, so I took to Twitter to ask other virtual drinkers
Fallout
Suggested by @xLeninaCrowne
The thing that I find funniest about Nuka-Cola is the fact that the Nuka-Cola Corporation named their whole business and product line around nukes just a few years before the entire world erupted into nuclear warfare. What are the chances of that? Someone in the marketing department is due a promotion if they weren’t disintegrated by the radiation.
Before the Great War, Nuka-Cola was the beverage of choice across America. Much like the large conglomerate the drink is parodying, Nuka-Cola targeted children with their marketing and pumped their drinks full of sugar. A recipe for success. Alternative flavours started to appear left and right, from a refreshing cherry version to the intimidating Nuka-Cola Quantum. A bottle that glows bright blue, doubling down on the caffeine and calorie contents. If that sounds too sweet for your blood then have no fear, there’s a Diet Nuka-Cola for you waist watchers out there.
If you are coming across these bottles post-war then they may not taste as good given the radiation and dirt everywhere but you can’t put a price on the taste of pre-nuclear nostalgia. Actually, you can, the bottle caps from Nuka-Cola have become the currency of this dystopia. I would head straight to the shutdown factories and start filling my pockets with any leftovers, taking the time to use their mixing machine to knock up some of the Nuka-Cocktails. A few Nuka-Bombs will take my mind off the wasteland situation.
My Summer Car
Suggested by @king_hernan
My Summer Car is the driving simsation that’s taken over Twitch. People drive endlessly through poorly rendered backdrops, only stopping for food and drink. That’s where my interest lies, it has been brought to my attention that there’s an ale in the game people can enjoy on their break from driving. Simply listed as ‘booze’ in the game, I had to find a clear image and zoom into the label to find the brand name. ‘Kännikala’ is a Finnish expression that roughly translates to ‘drunk fish’ – exactly what you’ll feel like after four bottles.
Much like alcohol in real life, this drink will reduce your stress levels drastically whilst also playing havoc on your bladder. Are you wanting something a bit harder? The game has you covered. There’s another alcoholic beverage called ‘Spirit’ or ‘Bereznik Spirytus’ when zooming in on the label. This drink can only be found in your friend’s bathroom which should start the alarm bells ringing, it’s an imported spirit from Poland that’s 96% proof which breaks all alcohol laws in Finland. Consuming this paint stripper will net you an achievement for blacking out called ‘Methanol Man’ which could be my new wrestling name.
PS: Don’t drink and drive.
VA-11 Hall-A
Suggested by @WriterBlades
When it comes to writing these drink lists, this game is suggested time and time over. I even delayed writing this article so I could go away and play VA-11 Hall-A and I’m so glad I did. The game is incredible, you are a cyberpunk bartender in the year 207X and your job is to serve the patrons of your intergalactic dive bar. The creators describe the game as a “booze ’em up” and that’s spot on – you can create a large range of cocktails from just five ingredients.
Looking down the extensive menu we can find such gems as the Brandtini, a classy and clean number for the upper echelons of space society. Not quite my bag though, my interests lay a little more in the ‘Fringe Weaver’, the strongest drink on the menu. Described as ‘ethylic alcohol with a spoonful of sugar’ I want to take one sip of this cocktail and attend some form of space disco. You are welcome to join.
A feature of VA-11 Hall-A that I love is the fact you don’t always need to pour someone a drink to fix their problems. You can simply sit and talk to customers for a while and sometimes that’s all you need to get through something. You don’t always have to turn to the bottle, whilst it has been fun looking through drinking culture in gaming please don’t forget alcoholism is a real issue. Look after yourself out there, I’m off to go put more hours into this great game.
Last Call
We have sadly reached the end of our journey, which drinks did I leave out? Please feel free to tell me on Twitter (@panoparker)!
Writing Drinks in Games has been a lovely distraction from all the awful news lately, so thanks to Loading Bar for letting me rant on about booze. Please check out the rest of the series and let me know what you think!
I hope you all stay safe and hopefully, some normality will return soon. We’ll be back in real pubs talking about our favourite games before you know it. The first pint is on me.