Video Game / Coffee Talk

"But some few find solace in the embrace of bricks and wood and glass. They are told over drinks, then take up residence in some strangers' memories. In one corner of the city stands a coffee shop. A place that is only open when the sun is sleeping. A place where people share their stories. And these are their stories..."

—Opening narration

The year is 2020, the city is Seattle. The great war is almost nothing but a distant memory, and each of the different races coexist among one another in relative peace. On a certain street corner stands a certain coffee shop that only opens when the sun goes down- the titular Coffee Talk. You are the owner and lone barista of that shop, and your job is to serve a hot drink and lend a listening ear to each of the customers who visit.

Coffee Talk is an indie game developed by Toge Productions, a game studio based in Indonesia. The game mixes elements of Visual Novels with visual aesthetics inspired by 90s anime, classic pixel art adventure games, and the imagery associated with lo-fi chillhop music. Being a game about a coffee shop, the main game mechanic in Coffee Talk is naturally the drink-making feature, in which you try to serve each customer a drink made of three of the ingredients you have available. Over the course of two weeks you see several storylines play out through the conversations that take place within Coffee Talk, and whether you can fulfill each customer's order or not may affect what direction those stories take.

The game released on January 29, 2020 for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One, with PC versions available through Steam, GOG, Windows 10 and Itch.io. It also has a demo available on Steam and GOG.

A sequel, Coffee Talk Episode 2: Hibiscus & Butterfly, was announced in late 2021 and was released on April 20th, 2023. It adds two new ingredients, the eponymous hibiscus and butterfly pea, and features a new mechanic where you can give your customers gifts in addition to serving them their drinks.

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Tropes

#-M

• 100% Completion: There's an achievement for collecting all the other achievements, which encourages you to replay the game several times to see the other story branches, discover all the recipes, collect all the images in the Concept Art Gallery, and reach a high score in Challenge Mode.
• 20 Minutes into the Future: Released in January 2020 and set in September of the same year, although, the setting being a fantasy alternate reality, it's not actually trying to predict the future. Episode 2 takes place three years later, also in September.
• Achievement Mockery: There are achievements for messing up your order once and throwing away 25 drinks.
• All There in the Manual: Gala at one point mentions that Hyde got married not long before they met, but Hyde's spouse never comes up at any other point in the game and, tellingly, he doesn't wear a wedding ring. One of the side comics on the official Coffee Talk Twitter account reveals that Hyde did indeed get a divorce several years ago.
• Ancestor Veneration: Every April, Hendry takes his daughter Rachel to her mother's grave, and also to her grandparents' graves when her mom was alive, with their extended family joining them if they're visiting. As is customary for nekomimis, they clean the gravestones, bring food, and have a feast while catching up.
• Anti-Frustration Features: If the Skip Dialogue option is set to "Read", the Fast Forward button is disabled for new dialogue so you won't accidentally skip them in your subsequent playthroughs. Alternatively, you can set Skip Dialogue to "All" so you can speed through all conversations.
• Anyone Remember Pogs?: In Episode 2, Lucas gives you his contact card and a fidget spinner with his number on it, and he requests you to give either of them to Riona on her next visit. You can give the fidget spinner to Rachel instead on her first visit, but she'll remark that it's "so 2017" and return it to you. Giving it to Gala, on the other hand, will have him use it to entertain the hospital kids, but they'll think that it's passé. Lucas also makes a status update wondering if the fidget spinner is "that lame now".
• Bag of Spilling: All the recipes you discover in the first game aren't carried over to Episode 2 because the Barista had their phone serviced a month before the events of the latter.
• Bakeneko and Nekomata: The nekomimi- a race that can shift between average looking cats and people with cat ears- seem to be based on bakeneko youkai.
• Beautiful Singing Voice: In Episode 2, Lucas points out to Riona that sirens are better favored as sopranos because of their naturally alluring voices, to her disdain because she's a banshee who wishes to be an opera singer.
• Bilingual Bonus: Lua's all-French self-summary on Tomodachill is taken from the opening stanza of Clair de lune, the poem that inspired the famous Debussy song (a remix of which is on the game's soundtrack). The poem is about a tragic romance, and the first stanza, in particular, speaks of "charming masquerades and dancers... almost sad beneath their fantastic disguises," which speaks to Lua's fears that her relationship with Baileys can't last.
• Bland-Name Product:
  • When Freya talks about the non-linearity of her novel and how she plans to make it mainstream, she compares it to a Choose Your Own Adventure show on NetStream that strategically used its marketing to reach the mainstream audience. Strangely, she namedrops the original streaming service in her article "Loving in Silence", implying that they both exist in the setting.
  • In the bonus comic "Wanna Be My Mate?", Neil learns the name of the dating app with a fire logo that Earthlings use: Kindlr.
  • Episode 2:
    • Lucas wears a yellow Guxxi hoodie while Riona works as a Grüver driver making intercity deliveries. Strangely for the former, the real clothing brand is mentioned in the Evening Whispers poem "Sing Your Body Electric", implying that they both exist in the setting.
    • One of Lua's status updates has her asking Baileys if he was quoting a saying he found on Rumblr.
• Boke and Tsukkomi Routine: In Episode 2, Lucas rebrands his show into a talent showcase. He then asks Riona to be his co-host because her reserved yet talkative personality contrasts his chaotic nature.
• Book Ends:
  • The game starts with Freya as the first customer, thinking about writing her novel. The game ends with her as the last customer there, having had her book draft accepted by the publisher.
  • Episode 2 begins and ends with Jorji and Lucas as the first customers, meeting the Barista on a stormy night. The Barista lampshades it by saying that it feels like déjà vu, while Jorji orders the same drink you served him on his first visit^note unless you messed up, otherwise he'll order a Sweet Coffee and Lucas orders the same Blue Pea Latte with art that Riona ordered on that first day.
• Broken Pedestal: In Episode 2, Aqua reveals that the game company that she's working for looks down on small developers and gave her a shady contract. With Myrtle's advice, Aqua realizes that just because she loves the company's games doesn't mean that they treat their employees well, so she rejects the contract.
• Bunny Ears Picture Prank: In Episode 2, Lucas's group selfie has his orc co-worker doing this prank on one of his human co-workers.
• But Thou Must!: Of the "it doesn't matter which answer you pick" variety. Sometimes, when you brew up a drink for a customer, the story will continue even if what you brewed wasn't even close to what was ordered. The only thing that changes is the customer's dialogue, with differing reactions based on how close you came to what they wanted. There's even differing reactions if it doesn't have the ingredients they wanted, but had the right flavor.
• Call-Back: In Jorji's bad ending in Episode 2, Jorji vents to Hendry about the former's daughter planning to skip college to become a jeweler. Hendry understands Jorji's family issues and how tough it is to balance between discipline and freedom, much like he did with his daughter Rachel in the first game, where she wanted to become a solo Idol Singer despite Hendry's worries about the dangers the music industry might do to her.
• Calming Tea: The Gala Had remedy for Gala's Fury is described as "good to calm yet warm your nerve".
• Casual Kink: One conversation involves a rather frank discussion of kink: Hyde tells Gala how he's heard that some werewolves use BDSM as a means of calming themselves during their monthly transformations, to which Gala matter-of-factly replies that's only something that ever happens in porn, though vanilla sex as a calming method is actually fairly common. Gala lightly ribs Hyde about the fairly obvious implication that he was watching werewolf porn, telling him it's okay if he's into "that sort of thing." Hyde quickly claims that he just heard about it from a friend... Hyde and Gala's true ending, which involves Hyde presenting a flustered Gala with a fuzzy pair of handcuffs, implies otherwise.
• Casual Video Game: The overall vibe of Coffee Talk is meant to be mellow and relaxing. While there is conflict and drama in the plot, it's all of a personal variety that the barista helps out with through coffee orders and friendly chatting. You can still be penalized for losing, but Take Your Time is generally in full effect, and you generally don't have to get exactly what was asked for when a customer places an order — "close enough" is usually acceptable.
• Christmas Rushed: In-Universe. Myrtle mentions having to work overtime just to make sure her company's next game is released in time for the holidays. She also complains that overtime being "optional" is a passive-aggressive remark from the company because the workers are made to feel guilty if they go home early to rest and visit their families.
• Concept Art Gallery: The gallery not only shows pixel CGs of some of the game's best moments, but also shows its concept art.
• Crossover Cameo: In Episode 2, on Day 10. Jorji's old police friends show up to help him on a ghost case. Said friends just so happen to be Detective Francis McQueen and Officer Patrick Dooley from The Darkside Detective games.
• Curse Cut Short: In Episode 2, Jorji goes, "Holy f-" at Riona's sudden appearance after the first blackout.
• Cute Monster Girl: The game takes place in a Fantasy Kitchen Sink version of Seattle, and all of the female characters (apart from the lone human, Freya) qualify as this in some way or another. Among the cast, there's Lua the succubus, Rachel the nekomimi, Aqua the mermaid, and Myrtle the half-orc.
• Cuteness Proximity: In Episode 2, Riona giggles and comments on how cute Rachel's cat form is when she first sees her.
• Cutting Off the Branches: Episode 2 takes place after Coffee Talk's Golden Ending since the Barista reveals that Freya is traveling the world to write her new book, whose draft was accepted by her publisher.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • There's more than one possible reaction towards incorrect orders depending on how badly you messed up in them. Some customers will tell you that it's not what they wanted, but at least it has the ingredients or flavor they requested.
  • In Episode 2, Lucas gives you his contact card and a fidget spinner with his number on it, and he requests you to give either of them to Riona on her next visit. You can give them to Rachel on her first visit, but she'll return them to you because she already knows and follows Lucas on Tomodachill. You can also give the fidget spinner to Gala on his first visit, which he'll use to entertain the hospital children. These special reactions count as secret achievements.
• Donut Mess with a Cop: In Episode 2, Officer Dooley drops by the café with some donut crumbs and filling spilled all over him. He denies having donuts before his visit, but Detective McQueen points out that he's still holding the receipt from the donut shop.
• Do Well, But Not Perfect:
  • In Challenge Mode, when a customer orders a drink of a certain flavor, they will sometimes specify whether they want no flavor, less of it, or extra. However, if they don't specify, they want the flavor with 4-5 parts — not too much and not too little, so over- or under-doing it will count as an incorrect order.
  • Episode 2 has achievements for completing characters' normal story arcs, which is separate from completing their good arcs; this entails screwing up on an order or two but otherwise being a good barista for said characters.
• Drowning My Sorrows: Baileys says he will find somewhere to drink himself under the table after Lua breaks up with him when their families won't accept their relationship.
• Edible Theme Naming: Lua and Baileys, the two characters in a Star-Crossed Lovers storyline, are named after two different kinds of liquor (that also happen to sometimes be served in coffee-based drinks). When Baileys tells Freya the story of how he and Lua met, he comes up with the fake names of "Cognac" and "Rose" for the other two people involved in the tale.
• Effortless Achievement: Both episodes have achievements just for starting the game, brewing your first drink, trashing your first drink, making your first latte art, and serving a wrong drink to a customer.
• Endless Game: Endless Mode has two modes: Free Brew and Challenge Mode. In Free Brew, you're free to experiment with mixing ingredients to discover special drinks, while in Challenge Mode, you have to get as many correct orders as you can in 90 seconds, with correct orders giving you extra time.
• Exiled to the Couch: In Lua and Baileys' bad ending in Episode 2, their argument over wedding preparations becomes so bad, Baileys is made to sleep on the couch.
• The Fair Folk: In the late 50's, "fairies" were an umbrella term for any beings that didn't fit any of the racial categories at the time, meaning that any sentient being that was "incomprehensible", such as ghosts, was lumped with them. As the anti-racism movement progressed, the list of beings classified as "fairies" became shorter as more of them became legally recognized, until only the "true" fairies are left. It's revealed that the Gnomes of Gnome Noms were behind the car vandalism in Episode 2. They vandalized cars over a broken promise to keep the dead hawthorn tree because that was the "body" of their friend, the fairy vendor who was killed by a drunk driver in 1959.
• Fantasy Kitchen Sink: The game takes place in an average Seattle-based coffee shop in a world that's inhabited by werewolves, vampires, merfolk, orcs, dwarves, elves, succubi, nekomimi, aliens, and in Episode 2, satyrs and banshees, among others. Almost every race is represented by at least one of your customers.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • There are still tensions between the different magical races of Seattle. Lua and Baileys, a couple of a succubus and an elf, have a hard time as her parents won't accepting their daughter dating an elf, nor will his accept their son dating a succubus.
    Baileys: You don't know what they said about you.
    Lua: What did they said about me? Or about my race, I assume?
  • Aqua's Oceanic race is the most oppressed, as the newspapers will have headlines about the government imposing harsh restrictions on immigration from her kind. Aqua herself says it's extremely difficult for her kind to deal with the surface world.
  • Inverted in Freya's novel, where the plot is an Alternate Universe where humans are the only race, but the difference in their appearance such as skin color causes strife among them, just like in Real Life.
  • In Episode 2, the Vindication Act was passed to recognize the sentiency and rights of non-Sapient beings. Sapient beings are classified as "intelligent and bipedal", such as humans, elves, orcs, gnomes, and halflings. However, other races such as satyrs and banshees take a long time before they're recognized by international law. Because there are only a few banshees in the world and sirens are better favored as sopranos, Riona, an aspiring soprano, is extremely frustrated with the prejudice she gets as a banshee. She also carries the burden of her mom, who's the trader of her commune, because the latter turned insane from all the discrimination she gets from her negotiations with other races.
  • In the 50's, long before the Vindication Act was passed, the government first attempted to resolve the post-war racism among humans and fantasy beings by categorizing them for legal purposes. They believed that it was the first step towards peace, but the system was oversimplified, inefficient, and slow, leaving many beings in administrative limbo. These beings, some who were "uncategorizable", were considered "transient", and weren't legally allowed to start their own businesses.
  • In modern times, aliens seem to have it worst, as any extraterrestrials who are found out by officials are immediately extradited due to being potentially threatening unknowns that are not accounted for by any current laws. Aliens visiting Earth usually need to disguise or go into hiding in order to avoid agents on the lookout for them.
  • Nekomimis are stereotyped as "mediocre in all ways besides being pretty and cute", while satyrs are commonly perceived as reckless party animals. Rachel and Lucas had to battle rampant prejudice against their respective races on their way to stardom.
• FBI Agent: An agent from the Federal Immigration Regulation and Enforcement Division or F.I.R.E drops by your coffee shop on September 30 to look for an alien wearing a spacesuit. You get worried about Neil because they're one of your regulars and they don't know they're an illegal alien in the literal sense. The Stinger reveals that Neil has been aware of this, which is why he presented himself in his human form when he talks to you one last time.
• Fictional Counterpart:
  • Myrtle and Aqua are preparing to present their game in MAX West, which is a stand-in for PAX West, Seattle's annual gaming expo.
  • Rachel's next gig as an Idol Singer is at Coachella, or rather Couchella.
  • October 3's news is headlined, "Weirdstein Company Criticized for Unfair Depictions of Werewolf in Latest Box Office Hit".
• Fictional Social Network: The Barista has an account on Tomodachill, which they use to keep tabs on their patrons. Episode 2 adds a new feature where they can check their status updates daily and "heart" their posts.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: October 2nd opens with a conversation with Baileys where, among other things, the Barista mentions the importance of being able to read body language and being able to understand the difference between what people want and what they need. Not long after, Freya walks in looking absolutely terrible. It's a big hint that, in order to get her best ending, you need to serve her a Bedchamber instead of her usual triple-shot espresso, no matter how much she insists otherwise.
• Foreshadowing:
  • On one day, Hyde teases the barista about saying "we" and "our" when they're the only person who works at Coffee Talk. The barista raises the valid point that it makes sense to speak that way when you're the face of a business, but it's also a subtle hint that there's a connection between them and the other character who speaks that way: Neil. In addition, Neil can read the speech balloons — just like the player.
  • At one point, Jorji describes one of your drinks as "out of this world."
  • Every new day starts with the same animation of the coffee shop opening up, but notably, that animation also features a clear shot of the moon, which waxes (and later wanes) accurately from day to day, giving the player a subtle hint that the night of the full moon will be significant. Considering one of the main characters is a werewolf, it's not hard to guess what will happen.
  • Episode 2:
    • Hyde orders a "bold, red" hibiscus drink on his first visit, but inconveniently, you don't have ginger available on that day. He'll happily take any hibiscus drink you make for him, but he'll remark that there's only one drink of that kind that he had enjoyed, wondering if you can make something close to it. This is a hint that the drink in question uses ginger as one of its ingredients.
    • It's pointed out that it's unusual for the café to only serve drinks. When Riona breaks down crying over her regret in following her dream to be a soprano singer despite the prejudice against banshees, the Barista cheers her up by making her a Berry-Blue Hibiscus "Pie"... which is actually a drink that resembles the pie she ate the other day.
• Fur Against Fang: Werewolves and Vampires were in a rivalry for years until an 1865 peace treaty allowed them to befriend each other.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Neil reveals he knows that The Barista is able to engage in Save Scumming to improve his friends' lives, because that's their species' power.
• Gotta Catch 'Em All: There are 30 special drinks that are discoverable in your Brewpad and 55 in Episode 2, and there's an achievement for finding them all.
• Gratuitous Japanese:
  • The main social media app everyone uses, Tomadachill (stylized as Tomodachi!!) is a portmanteau of tomodachi and chill, "tomodachi" being Japanese for "friend."
  • Rachel's transformation is accompanied with a パー sound effect.
  • The Chocobee Miruku contains the Japanese pronunciation for "milk".
• The Great Offscreen War: The opening narration mentions a big war between the races taking place much, much before the game takes place.
• Guide Dang It!: Since you can only throw away a drink up to five times a day, if you're stumped with an order that only mentions the name of a special drink but you haven't discovered it yet, you might as well look it up.
• Guy on Guy Is Hot: Played with. When Freya talks with the Barista about Hyde and Gala, she says looking at them reminded her of a video, the Barista assumes that she's talking about something perverted and tells her to not start fantasizing. Freya though says it's about a video of a wolf pup playing with a baby tiger.
• Hidden Elf Village: In Episode 2, there aren't many banshees in Seattle because they hide away from the rest of the world in communes, with each member fulfilling a role to maintain them. Riona left her commune because she felt that she should reconnect with the outside world, and she learned to drive because she sees her truck as a "mobile fortress": to protect herself from danger.
• Hint System: The loading screen shows various special drinks that you can brew, but not their ingredients, though you can get a hint on what they are by their appearance.
• Hipster: Freya is a writer with green hair, tattoos and that spend her time writing short stories in a local coffee shop.
• Hired for Their Looks: Nekomimis are "naturally cute and perfect", and people assume that they get hired only because of their cuteness.
• Hooked Up Afterwards: If the player makes the right choices, the credits will mention that Hyde is looking to move to Seattle permanently. The accompanying photos and the name of the achievement you get for finishing this arc, "There's a spark," make it all but outright said that Hyde and Gala have made their relationship romantic.
• Horned Humanoid: Lua, and by extension all succubi, have horns. Lua's in particular have marks on them that glow when she's angry.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • Freya engages in this a lot:
    • One of her favorite ribs is “old man,” which she uses on more than one of the other characters. Naturally, she is quite put out when Rachel calls her “grandma.”
    • She is quick to scold characters for being blunt or pushy, forgetting that as a reporter she’s equally guilty of doing the same. This leads to more than one instance of her putting her foot completely into her mouth.
  • This happens in Episode 2 when Lua and Baileys exchange Sickeningly Sweet compliments during their wedding reception:
    Baileys: Anything to make you happy.
    Lua: Aaw, you always make me melt.
    Hyde: Disgusting.
    Gala: He said, wiping off his tears.
• Immortality Immorality: Baileys' family, and nearly all other elven families, uses the gift of immortality to force their offspring to do what they want. Baileys rejects his immortality to be with Lua, opting for a mere long life.
• I Need a Freaking Drink: In Episode 2, Hyde enters the café to see Lua and Baileys either exchanging sweet compliments or arguing over Lua "seeing everything as conflict". Either way, Hyde needs a spicy drink to wash it all down.
• Interface Screw: Trying to check your phone while Gala is having Fury will have him slam the table and not let you check the recipes for the Gala Had.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
  • At one point, Freya describes her novel to Baileys as being similar to a Gamebook, but with each choice being given a score that determines which route the reader takes... in short, like a video game or Visual Novel.
  • When giving Aqua advice for MAX East, Myrtle suggests ending her demo on a Cliffhanger. The original Coffee Talk demo did something similar.
• Limited Sound Effects: Every character apart from Neil gets the exact same sipping sound effect with their drink animation. This isn't particularly noteworthy, apart from one moment- when you serve milk to Hendry in his cat form, the "slurppp" sound plays even though he's lapping it off the counter.
• Local Reference: There are a few references to Toge Productions' home country, and by extension, Southeast Asia:
  • You can brew STMJ^note an Indonesian drink made of milk (susu), egg (telur), honey (madu), and ginger (jahe), jahe tubruk^note Indonesian coffee with ginger, and teh tarik^note Malaysia's national drink. In fact, the Barista traveled around SEA a few years ago to learn how to brew these drinks.
  • "The Anxious Boy and His Love Stories on Public Transport", one of Freya's articles for The Evening Whispers, is set in Jakarta.
  • In Episode 2, Hendry says that "the rice has turned into porridge" if the Barista gives him the wrong drink. It's an Indonesian proverb that means that there's no point in regretting a mistake that's too late to be fixed.
• The Mafia: In Episode 2, Hyde claims to know some dwarves whose grandkids are currently running the mafia like "some sort of start-up". He wishes to go back to being chased by them once he permanently moves back to Seattle because he remembers stealing Gala's car with them.
• Maybe Ever After: It's very heavily implied that Aqua and Myrtle are dating by the end of the game. Also, depending on what choices you make, Hyde and Gala's card in the credits will change to say that Hyde is looking to move to Seattle permanently... with their photo changing to Hyde presenting a flustered Gala with a pair of fuzzy handcuffs, making their relationship all but explicitly said to be romantic as well.
• Medium Awareness: Somehow, Neil sees Freya saying "your" instead of "you're". She remarks that he shouldn't be able to tell the difference between homonyms. Something the player can do.
• Mission-Pack Sequel: Episode 2 adds three new characters, two new ingredients, 25 new recipes, and new story threads, while the gameplay remains the same. This is because it was originally going to be DLC, but it became so big, the devs decided to make it a full-fledged sequel instead.

N-Z

• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: In Episode 1, the first sign that Hendry's anxiety concerning Rachel's manager might be more than fatherly paranoia is when an argument between them reveals that said manager's full name is Morris Lester.
• No Body Left Behind:
  • In Episode 2, semi-spiritual beings such as fairies don't leave behind bodies when they die. Instead, they may leave specific land-markers. The dead hawthorn tree that was uprooted in January 2023 was the "body" of the fairy that was killed by a drunk driver in 1959, but since it wasn't legally classified as a "remains", the witnesses couldn't prove that there was a body. The case was dismissed on the grounds of that and the victim being a "transient".
  • Other semi-spiritual beings such as banshees can't leave land-markers, so they simply disappear instead.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • According to her Tomodachill profile, Freya's favorite author is Geil Naiman.
  • In Episode 2, one of Lucas's status updates is him asking if "@mloydfayweather", the game's equivalent of Floyd Mayweather Jr., is available for a boxing match. It's also a reference to Logan Paul's match against the latter in 2021.
• Non-Indicative Name: Aqua points out that Russian Tea is actually an American tea despite the name.
• One-Gender Race: According to Lucas, who's a satyr, all satyrs are born male. This is why it took a while for satyrs to be legally recognized as "sapient" beings.
• Our Elves Are Different: According to Baileys in Episode 2, it's a common misconception that elves never get sick, because while they're immune to mild infections such as colds, they can still get sick from major diseases and die from them. However, elven society believes that living the right life will let them die peacefully in bed, so they just pretend that everything is fine until the last moment. This was why Baileys' family shut his great-great-aunt away during her final few weeks.
• Outcast Refuge: Two are mentioned in Episode 2:
  • The Society for Aliens and Various Extraterrestrials, or S.A.V.E., aims to help aliens who are trying to adapt to Earth life and are hiding from F.I.R.E. agents, who hunt them down, even those disguised as Earthlings, to extradite them. The café that Silver opened turns out to be a secret base for S.A.V.E.
  • In the late 50's, there used to be a flea market established by fairies, who were classified as "transient" beings or unregistered citizens, which included "uncategorizable" beings such as fairies at the time. The market served to help "transients" survive the changing times, and it also hosted "Fairy Week", where fairies would mark the intersection with flowers to raise awareness of their plight. Sadly, the market was forcefully disbanded in 1961 due to the accident that killed a fairy vendor two years prior.
• Pass the Popcorn: In Episode 2, when Lua and Baileys argue over their wedding plans, Hyde whispers to you that things between them haven't changed and that you should start serving popcorn as they continue bickering.
• Player Nudge: In Episode 2, Myrtle gives you a chance to remake her Shai Adeni if you mess it up the first time, telling you all the ingredients for it. Hyde also gives you a hint if you mess up his "bold, red" drink twice.
• Pop the Tires: In Episode 2, there's a car vandal that's been going around the city deflating the tires of some of your customers, including Jorji and Riona. Jorji heads the investigation to find the culprit, and Riona reports that her car's tires got deflated near a metered parking spot in front of an abandoned library, on a seemingly deserted street near a busy area that had a dead hawthorn tree surrounded by remembrance trinkets. It's revealed that the fairy-folk were behind the crime, as they vandalized the cars over a broken promise to keep the tree because that was the "body" of their friend, the fairy vendor who was killed by a drunk driver in 1959.
• Pun: In Episode 2, the Barista cracks one when they serve Riona Russian Tea.
  Barista: Russian Tea for the lady rushin' to deliver.
• Posthumous Character: Jorji's grandfather, who died before one of Jorji's daughters was born, was a war veteran who was honorably discharged due to a permanent leg injury. Bourne Street was named after him in his honor. Jorji became a cop to protect his grandfather from criminals after a burglary, even if the latter didn't trust the police, but he died just when Jorji entered training. Jorji's grandfather also used to talk to the fairy vendors in front of his place, which was where he bought his lighter, which Jorji holds onto dearly as a lucky charm.
• Punny Name:
  • The name of the drink you come up with for Gala to calm him down during his Fury is called the "Gala Had." The name of the achievement you receive for serving him the correct drink during his Fury-induced Freak Out is "Gala had a fit!"
  • Episode 2 introduces a few more punny drinks such as Bee'n Buzzy and Aqua's Tranquilitea.
• Relationship Values: Meeting each character adds them to your friend list on the social network site Tomodachill. The more you interact with each character by getting their orders right, the more information appears on their profile. Getting their orders wrong will likewise make them hide their profile info from you, but they stop doing this in Episode 2.
• Remember the Dead: When fairies die, so do their memories, so they rely on other beings to remember them to continue their existence after death. This is why in Episode 2, the gnomes running Gnome Noms vandalized the cars parked near the spot where the dead hawthorn tree used to be. The tree, which was the "body" of their friend who was killed by a drunk driver in 1959, was uprooted in January 2023, breaking the promise of the previous mayor to keep it in remembrance.
• Rock Monster: As seen on his album covers, Aremy Jendrew is a bespectacled stone golem.
• Sand In My Eyes: In Episode 2, Hyde cries at Lua and Baileys' wedding reception, but he claims that it's coming from his allergy to the city hall flowers.
• Save Scumming: You can reset a day any time if you mess up or want to see what happens if you serve your customer a different drink, and you'll keep any special drink you've discovered from the previous run. This is because you actually have time-travel powers like Neil's species.
• Saw It in a Movie Once: In Episode 2, Amanda tries taking their first order by yelling at the Barista to "pour [them] a stiff one!" They then claim it's what their research on Earth etiquette said, but Lua points out that they must've gotten the idea from Orc Westerns.
• Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: Towards the end of Lua and Hyde's argument, he drops this:
  Hyde: You can't have it all, lady. This is not a fairy tale. This is not a story where some fairy godmother will suddenly appear and grant your wishes. This is how things go in real life. You have to take chances and make sacrifices. And you choose which one is best for you. Pretty simple.
• Shoddy Knockoff Product: Mentioned in one of Myrtle's status updates in Episode 2, where she finds the number of copycat apps on the app store "staggering".
• Shout-Out:
  • The "GRA Media" publisher Freya talks about is one of the Indonesian Major Book Publishers: "Gramedia".
  • The description for espresso is "Blacker than a moonless night, hotter and more bitter than hell itself".
  • The description for Gingerbread Coffee is "Sweetened with brown sugar to satisfy the cookie monster."
  • The Chubby Bubbles Girl can be seen running away from a werewolf in the headline image of October 1's news.
  • Some of the special drinks you can make are called Midsummer Night's Dream, The Grinch, Lemony Snippet, Bedchamber^note an Indonesian indie band, Bitter Heart^note a song by Malaysian singer-songwriter Zee Avi, Spiced Lady, and Spanish Sahara^note the song used in the ending of Life Is Strange.
  • Episode 2:
    • The headline image of September 20's news is a parody of the Distracted Boyfriend meme.
    • Silver's outfit is inspired by a "fictional universe where all the stories take place in the stars", with its insignia loosely based on Starfleet's.
    • When Detective McQueen drops by the café to help Jorji with his case involving the culprit behind the vandalism case, the former asks him, "You need to bust a ghost?"
    • Detective McQueen talks about a case where his team investigated an apartment haunted by a widow's deceased husband. They had to exorcise the ghost, but he fled to the basement and played romantic music and shone a spotlight on them to cast an illusion on them. As McQueen further explains the case, the Barista points out that it's the plot of Ghost (1990).
    • The achievement for getting Silver and Amanda's good ending is called "How I Met Your Ancestor".
    • One of Aqua's status updates shows her playing Super Brawl Pals 2 on the Switch.
    • In Silver and Amanda's bad ending, Silver mentions that Amanda hid away from the F.I.R.E agent in a vent.
    • October 3's headline image in a "bad" run shows a person vaguely resembling Dora the Explorer telling a fox wearing a bandana, "Hacker no hacking".
• Shown Their Work: The lunar cycle is accurate to that of real life, since there is a full moon on October 2, 2020, the night Gala turns into a wolf during his Fury. Episode 2 also has an accurate lunar cycle, with the full moon on September 29, 2023.
• Show Within a Show: Overflowing Warmth: Comforting Beverages Around the World is a documentary about various drinks that Aqua recommends to the Barista on her first visit in Episode 2. She also introduced it to Myrtle, which gives her an idea to order Shai Adeni to try recalling its name.
• Source Music: The entire soundtrack (save the song that plays when a transformed Gala appears in the cafe) is a playlist of ambient music playing on the barista's phone In-Universe. The player can switch between songs by opening the phone.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Baileys and Lua's plot centers around how their families won't accept them dating each other due to their races. In their good ending, Baileys cuts himself off from his family to be with Lua while she slowly but surely convinces hers to accept him. They then prepare for their wedding in Episode 2.
• The Stinger:
  • After the credits roll, Neil returns to your coffee shop and tells you that he assumed human form because he was aware of the F.I.R.E agent hunting him down. He also reveals that he's aware of your Save Scumming powers because that's one of the powers of his alien race.
  • Episode 2 has multiple stingers, which change depending on how many endings you've seen. Once you've seen all of them, you can't see them again unless you create a new file:
    • The first stinger: Riona returns to the café to look for an item she dropped. She tells the Barista that she's found it, reminding them that they should double-check their drawer to make sure not to drop anything again. Riona then gives them a hint to replay the game to find out what's causing some of their items to mysteriously disappear.
    • The second stinger: An invisible customer enters the café, and the Barista serves them and tells them that they're welcome to visit anytime.
    • The third stinger: Lucas drops by the café to encourage the Barista to continue "checking things off their checklist", a subtle reminder to continue finding the other endings to see the next stinger.
    • The fourth stinger: Fahmi himself drops by along with Freya, the latter who introduces him to the Barista as her friend who'll be moving in with her to the writer's residency. Freya then excuses herself to prepare for the trip, while Fahmi reunites with his cat Tofu, the white cat that has been occasionally visiting the café. Fahmi then orders his favorite drink, Green Tea Latte, and tells the Barista that Freya will show him around Seattle the next day before they settle at the writer's residency the day after. The Barista wishes him and Tofu the best of luck on their journey.
    • The fifth stinger: The Barista turns off the lights before the scene cuts to black.
• Take a Third Option: A major source of tension between Baileys and Lua is that Baileys is willing to leave his family for her, and she won't let him do it because she's worried that he'll come to resent her for it if they ever fall out of love later. Baileys solves this by realizing that he hates his family anyway, and leaving them because he wants to, not for Lua. By making his decision without involving her, he takes things into his own hands and doesn't attach anything to Lua.
• Tempting Fate: Episode 2 begins on a stormy night, and the Barista struggles with working at the café with an intermittent power source. After serving their first two customers, the Barista remarks that despite the heavy rains, at least the power is stable, only for a blackout to happen right after saying that.
• That Came Out Wrong:
  • In Hendry's first visit, he tries to figure out how to relate to his daughter better by striking up a conversation with Freya and Aqua for ideas. Unfortunately, leading with asking about their age and about "what kinds of things kids like doing" comes off in a way he didn't intend. It doesn't help that he suddenly moves closer to the girls while doing so.
  • In Episode 2, Lucas tries helping Riona with her singing career amidst the prejudice by suggesting that she should "sell" herself, to Jorji's shock since he thinks he's talking about sex work.
    Jorji: Whoa kid, slow down. I might be lax, but I still work for the law.
    Lucas: No Pops, not that kind!!
• Thanking the Viewer: The credits thank the player at the end of the game for playing it.
• To Be Continued: The demo ends with Freya telling the barista what are her plans for writing about a cafe. Subsequently, the sound of the door opening plays before cutting to black with the words "To Be Continued" on the screen.
• Toilet Humor: In Episode 2, the Barista offers Jorji their new selection of drinks, which includes hibiscus and blue pea as new ingredients, eliciting a shocked reaction from him regarding the latter.
  Barista: It's actually "Butterfly Pea" but we call it Blue Pea for short. The color is really pretty.
  Jorji: Huh. I had no idea you offered alternative stuff, <name>. No judgment here, just sayin'.
  Barista: Alternative what...? ...Oh. It's pea. As in pea pods.
  Jorji: Oooooh.
  Barista: And not whatever else you thought it was...
• Trial-and-Error Gameplay: Sometimes, a customer will order something off the menu, so you'll have to experiment with the ingredients until you get their special discoverable drink. Ingredient quantity and especially the order matter since for example, the recipes for generic honey lemon green tea and Cough Syrup are not the same even if they use the same ingredients. Some customers will even give you a hint on this if you mess up their orders for special drinks this way.
• Vegetarian Vampire: According to Hyde, an experimental synthetic blood substitute was developed not too long before the start of the game. He mentions that he's one of the vampires trying a "vegan diet", and he used to get "blüdwyne", a synthetic blood drink, from the café back when it used to be a bar.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: You can deliberately serve the wrong drinks to your customers, and in Episode 2, there's an achievement for making Riona walk out on you for not getting her orders right too many times.
• Video Game Movies Suck: Conversed In-Universe by Aqua and Myrtle. They talk about Myrtle's involvement in Full Metal Conflict, and Freya tells them that it's getting a movie adaptation. Myrtle is concerned that Hollywood wouldn't be able to do the adaptation well, and Aqua says that it's because games have a unique storytelling method that can't be easily replicated in movies.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Rachel and Hendry, and by extension all nekomimi, can shift into cats. Apparently it's most usually done to make commuting easier, but towards the end of the game, Hendry transforms to hide his identity while taking on some thugs badmouthing Rachel.
• When It Rains, It Pours: It wouldn't be Seattle without it. Every single night that the coffee shop is open, it's pouring buckets outside. In Episode 2, it frequently thunders as well, messing with the neighborhood's power grid
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: On October 18, two weeks after the last day when you can serve drinks, you catch up with the patrons on how they're doing. The rest of their lives are then shown through a series of photos before the credits.
• Write Who You Know: In-Universe: Freya, after getting around her initial Writer's Block, decides that she wants to base her next novel on the customers of the coffee shop.
• Writer's Block:
  • Freya, your first customer, is a writer that will talk about her recent block. On the next day, she realizes that she wants to write stories inspired by the lives of the clients in the café.
  • In Episode 2, artist's block happens to Rachel in her bad ending. She doesn't feel inspired enough to make a new single with Aremy Jendrew, so she doesn't show the Barista her new song on her second visit.
• You Shouldn't Know This Already: Even if you know the recipe, there are some special drinks that you can't make in Episode 2 until you unlock them on certain days. If you try making them before they're unlocked, you'll end up with generic drinks instead.

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