Yesterday, I brought up the new game, Cook, Serve, Forever (David Galindo). It’s in Early Access, and I had been stoked to play it because I love the series. But, alas, it’s not to be. I’ll get more into it in a second, but I do want to give major props to a few aspects ofthe game. One, the music. The music has always been slamming in the games, and it continues to be so in this one. It’s fantastic, and it really bolsters my spirits as I play.
Also, the graphics just make me smile. Somewhat cartoon-y and lots of vibrant colors. The characters are varied in size, color, genders, and age. I just love the whole design vibe of the games. I like that you are a talking character in this game. You haven’t been in the past. You have loved cooking since you were a young girl and you grew up to be a cook in a food truck. You live with your (Asian!) girlfriend, and you have aspirations to be a great chef.
The conceit of the game is that there is a competition in which you want to get three stars like the famous chef, Rhubarb. She is the only one to have ever done it, and you want to be like her. I love that there’s a story and the characters are voiced. The two robots were voiced in the last game, but that’s it.
I love the voice actors in this game. They are great! I’m not crazy about how stereotypical the men are (they are the shopkeeps for Nori, the main character)–racial/nationality-wise. The main shopkeep is Baz from Australia, and it makes me wince that all his comments are very g’day mate-like.
But aside from that, I really enjoy the characters in general because they are fun and quirky. Ok, one other exception. The pastor in the church, but that’s because I have a bad history with churches. I don’t want to listen to a sermon while I’m playing a game.
But I do love the style of the game in general. Each game has iterated and done better than the one before. This is the best lookswise, and I’m impressed with how much effort Chubigans (the name he uses for Twitter) has putinto updating the look and feel of the game. This is eleven years after the first one was released, and I can really see the growth in the design of the games.