Mana Bar Review

Review By Larissa Willems

Now you can leave the house without feeling like you’ve left the house! Located at 420 Brunswick Street in Fortitude Valley, this popular bar offers the incredible combination of video games and drinking with friends. Open seven days a week, Mana Bar boasts exclusive prizes and giveaways as well as different events every night such as trivia and suit up Sundays. Another great thing about the Mana Bar? No cover charge!

The inside of the bar is well decorated so there’s plenty to look at while you’re waiting for your turn to play. With the walls filled with game memorabilia and posters, it makes for a relaxed atmosphere without feeling like your little brother’s room. It’s relatively dim inside, although they still endorse smart casual attire. The prices are relatively cheap offering all the conventional beers and spirits you would find in any other bar. What are unique about the drinks list are its 15+ creative cocktails. Themed drinks such as; The Ocarina of Lime, Princess Peach, Elixir of Fortitude, and the popular Mana Potion all enhance the gaming experience and actually taste good too which is a bonus.

The bathrooms are surprisingly clean for a bar in the Valley and despite there only being one female cubicle there was never a line up, even when I frequented it throughout the entire night. Like a lot of restrooms there is bound to be graffiti, but unlike the tasteless scribbling often containing profanities, the Mana Bar displays – and almost encourages – these doodles. Mostly well drawn fan fiction or random quotes from movies, these bathrooms left me well entertained for those brief moments.

The ratio of men to women at The Mana Bar was almost equal, which is an observation I was pleasantly surprised by. The general demographic of the crowd were young to mid-twenties individuals who looked like university students or young professionals. There were even some who looked like they were ‘in between jobs’ as well, but that didn’t mean they weren’t welcomed. With the maximum capacity of the bar around 50, it fills up relatively quickly – if you want to secure your place at the Guitar Hero table, you’d better get in early. The bar staff are friendly and fast and because the Mana Bar isn’t that big you won’t be waiting at the bar all night.

They also take photos of patrons which create a fun atmosphere and ensure you have some new photos to tag yourself in on Facebook. With Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles with games like Tekken, Batman, Halo, Mario Kart, Wii Sports, Call of Duty and Guitar and Band Hero it caters for hard core and casual gamers alike. You can even buy some new release games behind the bar. The bottom line of the Mana Bar? If you’re looking for a chic, quirky bar without the pompousness and a great way to spend a few hours with friends without breaking the bank, the Mana Bar is the place to go. It’s friendly, it’s charming, it’s fun and now it’s easy to meet someone new without cringe worthy pick-up lines.

Achievement unlocked – Left the house




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A 2nd Mana Bar Review

Review By John Warwick

Gamers and gamers at heart, get ready to enter a world where alcohol and video gaming is fused into a super combo that doesn’t involve you being alone in your pyjamas at home. Mana Bar in Brisbane is Australia’s first video gaming and cocktail lounge, which creates a cohesive combination of the latest games and drinking in a social and casual environment.

You can find Mana Bar on Brunswick Street in Fortitude Valley. This video gaming lounge drives on the novelty of playing coordinating games while intoxicated. Mana Bar is built within an older style building, yet has been revamped into a geek chic lounge. When entering Mana Bar, LCD television screens and playable consoles surround the sides of the room. The games change every month, but classic games such as Mario, Guitar Hero, and Halo are always a crowd favourite. A section of the room is dedicated to a collection of modern and retro video game figurines and memorabilia that pay tribute to the history of gaming. The cocktails and shots at Mana Bar have a unique video game theme, such as Princess Peach, Health Potion and Finish Him, which fits well with the concept of a video gaming lounge. Being a video gaming lounge, the usual crowd at Mana Bar are 18-30 year old male gamers. This ranges from your hardcore video gamers to people who like to play video games with strangers while drunk.

Mana Bar is open 7 days a week, with a unique event held every night. There is no cover charge so you get to play video games for free until the sun comes up. Mana Bar has a capacity of 50 people, which quickly fills up. Don’t get discouraged though, the line moves quite quickly and you’ll be in drinking cocktails and gaming in no time. A great thing about the patrons at Mana Bar is that no one stays on one console all night. Everyone rotates and let others partake in playing different video games. Another unique thing about Mana Bar is that you can’t do in other clubs is buy video games over the bar.

Though gaming is not for everyone, Mana Bar provides elements that everyone likes – good drinks, casual atmosphere, and no cover charge. It has a geek chic funky atmosphere where anyone (gamer and non-gamer alike) can relax, have a couple of drinks, and play video games while getting drunk. Visiting Mana Bar is a great opportunity to master playing a two-handed video game while holding a drink. This is quite a difficult task so skulling your drink is the best option at beating your opponent. However, an increase in drinks may decrease your coordination and ability to video games. So accept this challenge and drop by Mana Bar tonight.

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