City-State Brewing Company

Visited on a Wednesday afternoon right when they opened at 4pm. Stayed about 30 minutes and I'm pretty sure no other customers showed up. The space definitely has potential with plenty of indoor seating, arcade and board games, and outdoor seating right on the running trail (and next to the MARC/Metro tracks), but it was totally dead when I was there. I tried all the beers they had on tap (7 in all) and the 3 IPAs were mediocre. The black IPA was terrible. The dark lager and pub ale were both all right, and so was the grapefruit sour. All in all, I was not impressed with the beer. But they did have free goldfish for the kids, as well as house-made lemonade (for $3), so that was a nice touch.

It was kind of hard to find. You basically walk to the end of an alley, up a small staircase past a smelly dumpster, and walk around the corner to the "front" entrance. More signage would be helpful. Also, someone clean up all the litter! Yikes.

Overall, I have a hard time imagining this place staying in business long-term if they don't improve their beer and make it less of an unpleasant experience just getting to the brewery.