“Coffee Talk” is a game released in 2020 that follows a visual novel format and tells a story of various customers that visit a late-night coffee shop in a Pacific northwest city populated by humans and a variety of fantasy races, including succubi, vampires, and elves.
The game requires the player to click through dialogue, with our playable chararcter being the shop barista, meaning you make characters drinks as you play.
Like any good coffee shop, your coffee shop has a great rotation of chill lofi hip-hop beats to carry you through late-night conversations with whoever may be visiting that night. The soundtrack was fully originally composed by Andrew Jeremy, the music director of Toge Productions, which is the studio that made “Coffee Talk.”
Although the game is fun and remains one of my favorite games, its soundtrack is truly the best part of the game. I can normally study with music on, but sometimes music with lyrics will make it harder to focus. The “Coffee Talk” soundtrack is my solution to finding instrumental music that does not leave me bored or annoyed.
The game has a 27-track album that only features one song that doesn’t fit in a chillhop category, that being “Gala Gila” (this song is more upbeat to match a climactic moment in the story). Every other song is calming and soothing in a way that makes me want to settle down in a cafe and write or draw with a latte nearby.
Some of my favorite tracks are as follows:
- “Moon Bright” — this song takes the tune of Debussy’s “Clair de Lune” and makes a lofi hip-hop beat with it.
- “Cup of Sweetness” uses a crackly background noise to add some coziness to this already smooth song that uses a cool array of snares.
- “Calming Drizzle” is dreamy and groovy; it represents the soundtrack as a whole very well.
I haven’t played it yet, but “Coffee Talk 2: Hibiscus & Butterfly” was released in April, and features another full-length soundtrack by Andrew Jeremy that I’m very excited to dig into and add to my study rotation.
— bel$
