Bar Games

Billiards, poker, darts — everything you need to not embarrass yourself at the bar. Bar Games from 1989 is a light simulation of three games you can play against the computer or against a friend on one keyboard. Nothing sensational, but back then it was nice to have a bar program on a floppy disk instead of Minigolf.

Each minigame works similarly — clear menu, simple controls, no unnecessary frills. With billiards you set the power and angle, then you find out if you actually understand pool. Poker is card playing against a bot that takes your money just like in a real bar. Darts are the most interesting — you have to hit the target, and here timing plays a role in whether you succeed or embarrass yourself in front of your opponent.

The graphics are DOS-style, as they should be — simple, legible, unpretentious. The sounds are more like notifications than any work of art. The controls work intuitively, even though there's no mouse and everything is done with the keyboard. The game lets you play, it doesn't grind your brain with any phrases. You just play and move on. That's where its strength lies — it's not a bombastic simulation, but a quiet waiting room you can slip into after work.

Bar Games doesn't age badly because it doesn't really rely on graphics. Today it looks like an old computer program, which is exactly what it is, and that's OK. Three simple games were played the same way all along, so nothing really changed about it. It doesn't pretend to be anything, it doesn't try to be more than it is — bar games on a computer. That's exactly why someone remembers it.

These days you can find it in an emulator when you remember what the nineties looked like. It's not a game for long evenings, but rather something to kill a few minutes of boredom at a café. When you have a few minutes and want to play some poker or billiards without an online account and without updates, Bar Games still works. This simplicity won't spoil you much anymore.