Overcooked 2 Turned My Living Room Into a Warzone and I Love It
When I wrote about the original Overcooked a few months ago, I spoke of its amazing ability to simulate the timing and chaos of a real kitchen, despite the lack of literal food preparation process. Now the frenzied little restaurant sim is back, with new challenges to face, and a fresh storyline with King Onion and his trusty dog Kevin as the cooks take on the Unbread.
In both Overcooked games, players are placed in a kitchen and are tasked with preparing meals for a busy restaurant. As the orders come in at the top of the screen, ingredients are retrieved and prepared according to the recipe (usually a simplified version with three to five key components), then put together on a plate and served out. The levels are time based, and each dish must be finished and sent out before the customer gets impatient in order to get a good tip. The successful completion of the level depends on how much money was earned by completing orders, and the big challenge lies in putting together the dish itself: environmental hazards like lava or conveyor belts, and prep techniques like chopping, boiling, frying and mixing complicate things along the way.
Overcooked is one of those games that’s easy to learn but difficult to master. But despite its appeasing sense of challenge, at a certain point, the levels start to become just a series of arbitrary obstacles tacked onto a simple mechanical premise, and it can be repetitive if playing in long sessions. To that end, I decided to up the ante for the sequel; I’ve previously played the original Overcooked in two player mode with my sister, but for this review of the sequel I also brought in the big guns, my niece and daughter. I figured a good way to put a new spin on my experience, naturally, was to make it far more difficult. The added stress of multiple bodies in a tiny space is a challenge no conveyor belt or kitchen portal could ever emulate.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
