Pub Mania

It's often said that we Brits are fond of queues. The high street is positively clogged-up with them. In post offices, fast food restaurants, supermarkets and elsewhere, there are always lines of glum-faced patrons tutting at the person at the checkout who, despite having been in the queue for some 15 minutes, is still rifling through a little purse of change, looking for that last elusive five pence piece.

However, in the pub, all bets are off when it comes to queueing. Loosened up with a few pints of the black (or golden) stuff, too many people left tetchy from waiting behind the OAP in the post office earlier in the day are only too willing to screw over those around them. They do this by trying to coax the attentions of the bar staff through the ostentatious waving of notes in their face.

If this sounds familiar, then maybe you'd enjoy setting things to rights with Pub Mania. It sees you taking on the role of a pub worker who has to keep the masses supplied with grog. Some creative licence has been used here since you don't actually work behind the bar, but as a waiter who takes drinks to people's tables.

In each of the pub levels, you can move about freely between the tables through the '2', '4', '6', '8' keys and their '1', '3', '7' and '9' diagonal equivalent. All other actions are done using the context sensitive '5' key.

The process is as you'd expect. Customers wait by the door for you to direct them to a table. They spend a while perusing the menu, you then take their order up to the bar and wait for the bar staff to pour drinks. Then you take those to the tables, wait for them to drink, get their money, their empties and, hey presto, you're done.

To complicate things, you only have a limited number of tables, and although you can put different groups on the same table, some won't get on, meaning your tip will nosedive. Conversely, others get along famously, increasing your tip.

The range of different types of people that frequent your pub is large, stretching from pensioners and families to businesspersons and rich folk. Those who tip the highest are generally the least patient but the way to get the best results is to keep the various social strata separate and do a bit of matchmaking to keep everyone happy.

One of the game's main assets is the variety of the locations you get to play in. The central idea of the plot is that your character's dream is to one day own a pub, but they need an extra ten grand to buy it. So Pub Mania sees you lending your skills to a number of venues throughout Great Britain. The first few are fairly conservative 'old-man' pubs, but things soon diversify and you'll find yourself in charge of Spanish cantinas and discos. (As we said, there's been some creative licence used.)

Each of these locations is relayed brilliantly as a result of the lovely cartoon-like visuals. They offer a blend of cuteness that is immensely cheerful, but not to the extent that older gamers will be put off. In fact, the game has a kind of cheeky sense of humor thanks to the dialogue that goes on between characters – little speech bubbles appear when you approach other characters and each level starts with a conversation between your and your pub partner – that suggests the game has really been designed with an adult demographic in mind.

In between levels, you get to purchase items like extra tables, glasses and jukeboxes for your pub. These are bought with money gained during the stages. In practice, you'll generally have enough cash to get all the items available, since you have to make a certain amount in order to pass a level, but it's a welcome feature that enables some of the more interesting features that appear later in the game.

Despite these additional touches, Pub Mania belongs to a genre that has gotten rather busy in the last year. Games like Manic Medic, Cake Mania and Diner Dash mean that anyone with an urge to serve has been quite well looked after.

But while it is very much a game of this type, the fun presentation and the satisfying progression of the play mechanic achieved through the introduction of elements like extra outdoor beer gardens, as well as the added gameplay richness afforded by the free movement, mean that this is probably the finest service sim we've yet seen on mobile.