I just met her and she already expected me to hand-feed her. This was moments after dumping a bottle of ketchup on her empty plate and knocking two bottles of wine onto the floor. My dinner date wasn’t exactly going well.
But that’s to be expected when I can’t fully control my only hand.
Table Manners gives players loose control of one hand and tasks them with completing simple tasks that are made entirely too difficult due to the control limitations. It’s all in good fun, but this type of game certainly isn’t for everyone.
Using the WASD keys moves your hand up, down and side to side. Moving the mouse scoots your hand closer to or away from you while holding right-click rotates the hand from palm-down to palm-up. If it sounds obtuse, that’s because it is. On purpose.
While pouring a glass of wine is typically an easy task for someone capable of using their hands. Pouring a glass of wine in Table Manners is a process that can take upwards of a few minutes. Unfortunately, players don’t have much time to get their pouring technique just right. Players must complete the task in a short window of time or they risk their date growing bored, annoyed and potentially raging right out of the restaurant.
Each level is based on a particular dining experience. The dates you can pick (both men and women) will sit across from you at the table, but regardless of who you choose for the level, the tasks will remain the same.
Light the candles. Pour the ketchup on their food. Salt their breadsticks. Order some beer. Pour the beer. If you do it all right (or even just “alright”) you’ll be rewarded with hearts which you’ll need to unlock the next level and progress through the game.
There are layers for players to peel back if they feel like really going for the whole dating sim element in Table Manners, but it’s by no means integral to enjoying the game. In fact, I’d say that the dating sim elements is supplementary to the absurdly fun experience of trying to complete basic, restaurant-related tasks with the funky controls.
Table Manners is one of those games where you can just look at the game and know if you’ll like it or not. If you can laugh at your own mistakes and have fun at your own expense, you’ll be able to get far more mileage (and enjoyment) out of Table Manners, compared to a player who is looking for for a dating simulation experience — since you don’t really interact with the date beyond completing the specific, level-related tasks.
I had fun with Table Manners and I recommend it to anyone looking for a silly game to check out with their friends and family. There are some physics-related bugs and glitches I encountered, but they hardly affected my regularly sloppy etiquette.
A retail copy of Table Manners was provided to Epic Brew by the publisher.
