Video Game / Closing at 2

Closing At 2 is a free indie horror game by Natalie Reyes where you play as a recently hired bartender of 6 months who has 3 regulars that come in for their own specialized drinks. The game can be found here.

It’s just a normal night at the Lakeside Inn. Summer is coming to an end, the temperatures are getting lower, and the leaves are starting to transition into their Autumnal colors. You’re then introduced to the Inn’s regulars; A beleaguered accountant named Henry, a low-key anxious college student named Lisa, and Marcus...a real stand-up guy who everyone comes to for their problems. They ask for an Old Fashioned, Mojito, and Tequila Sunrise respectively.

Everything seems like it’s just going to be business as usual after that...until they start returning.

As of 2024, a full version of the game is currently in development, with no release date or details made public.

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Closing At 2 has the following tropes:

• The Alcoholic: Played for horror, they come back looking rather decomposed and even more rattled as they return for their favorite drink.
• Ambiguous Ending: After the bartender cleans up his station and equipment, they themselves end up drinking their problems away in the very same manner that their regulars did and abruptly ends on that note. Nothing is elaborated on what happened with the bartender or the regulars who started to go mad, or if they even were going mad.
• Ambiguous Situation:
  • It's not entirely clear whether or not the bartender is seeing them as a manifestation of their internalized problems or if the regulars are really decomposing and going mad...Given that they seemingly come after them should they mess up their request, one can only assume the latter.
    • The alcohol itself also falls into question. It's not clear whether you're serving them fresh drinks or if they are actually glasses of sludge simply masked, which would explain why they're either going mad, decomposing, or both.
• Appearance Angst: Implied; Lisa knows full well she's pulling out her hair in disturbingly large amounts, and she does not like being reminded of the fact.
• Deadpan Snarker: Henry's most notable attribute is that he's constantly in a negative and snarky mood, frequently complaining about his job, making him the bartender's least favorite customer given his increasingly hostile attitude with the bartender. He starts to go from snarky to psychotic very quickly when he comes by a third time, however.
• Drowning My Sorrows: Implied to be the case with Marcus, as he rarely talks about himself despite his sunny demeanor, and the bartender notes to themselves that Marcus has been frequenting the Inn lately. This begins to hit a head as he becomes increasingly more depressed as he returns to the point he's dying on the outside as well as the inside.
• Jumpscare: Fail to make any of the drinks correctly on the third encounter of any with the Inn's regulars, and you'll end up a close-up shot of their distorted, mutilated face accompanied by a loud screeching noise.
• Kubrick Stare: Expect one of these from Henry on their second arrival. It gets worse by their third and final return to the point the bartender loses their notebook with the recipes in it.
• Madness Makeover: Exaggerated; Henry and especially Lisa in particular are practically looking like trainwrecks when they return to the Inn. Downplayed with Marcus, as it's less madness and more overwhelming pain and depression he's descending into.
• Make Them Rot: Every drink the bartender serves their customers causes this to some degree. Upon each return, Lisa and especially Marcus appear decomposed and dismembered. Averted with Henry, as he's just slightly bloody and has a creepy smile and an unnerving stare.
• Nervous Wreck: Implied; Lisa, prior to finishing her thesis, was mentioned to have been very tense every single time she came to the bar due to academia, but most likely was repressing that anxiety as to not give off a bad impression. The repressed anxiety clearly starts to manifest as she's yanked alot of her hair out and is bleeding from the head by her second encounter.
• Repression Never Ends Well: If Lisa and Marcus' mental state by their second visits are anything to go by, it's clear that drinking and repressing emotions did not help her anxiety or his depression.
• Rule of Three: Three regulars, three drinks to make, three encounters.
• Sanity Slippage: Henry and Lisa start to show signs of this on their 2nd arrival, and then they really go off the deep end by the 3rd encounter.
• Senseless Phagia: When the Bartender messes up a drink, whether through wrong ingredients, failing to shake it properly, or adding the ingredients too soon...it turns into a glass of sludge with worms and human eyeballs...Yet their regulars still drink it anyway, but not without criticizing the Bartender over it. They aren't so lucky if it happens the third time around.
• Slasher Smile: Upon return, Henry and Lisa begin to exhibit these. Averted with Marcus, who instead is crying blood and is clearly overwhelmed with depression rather than smiling psychotically.
• Soul-Crushing Desk Job: Definitely seems to be the case with Henry, if his disdain for his workplace is anything to go by.
• Surrounded by Idiots: This is Henry's main reason for constantly visiting the Inn for an Old Fashioned; he frequently talks about how both his clients and coworkers are stupid and how he's tired of dealing with them.
• Overcomplicated Menu Order: Double Subverted; The drinks you're asked to make, despite having complex recipes, seem simple enough since you have a notebook with the recipes written down...That is, until they start requesting for altered variants of them that deviate from the original recipes. Eventually, Henry causes the bartender to drop their recipe book out of fear, and they have to make all 3 drinks for him and the other 2 returning regulars based on pure memorization with different enhancements than the ones they previously asked for, with no indication of what to add extra off unless they can successfully decipher what they want.
• The Pollyanna: Marcus is frequently known to be optimistic and is always willing to lend an ear to someone's troubles, but given the bartender brings up the fact he's a frequent customer who never talks about himself, it's obvious he has troubles of his own.
• Sanity Slippage: Every time a customer returns, they begin to go off the deep end.
• Stepford Smiler: Lisa and Marcus are this as the former has repressed anxiety issues due to academia, and the latter is suffering from things he doesn't talk about that are eating away at him. Lisa still keeps the smile and facade even as she descends into insanity, but Marcus doesn't bother with his anymore.
• Tears of Blood: By their second return, Marcus starts crying these.
• The Un-Smile: Henry's smiles after his first encounter become this, as he's dripping with blood and slowly going insane.
• When He Smiles: Get Henry's drink right the first time, and he'll display a genuine smile.