another one of many multiplayer games I've been going through with my gf in the last couple months. we both agreed it's pretty scuffed but very well designed. each level is a diner dash-esque score attack scenario where you're given ingredients for a subset of a bunch of recipes and forced to navigate around obstacles (including your partner) while preparing the meals, plating them, and then serving them. it's meant to be a total mess, and often on first runs of a given stage we'd fuck up tremendously or barely scrape by with a passing score. it pretty quickly ramps up the chaos, with various pits, rotating platforms, conveyer belts separating the players, and other hazards getting thrown around liberally. there's no levels that feel too similar either, as even when obstacles are reused they're combined in unique ways per level.

probably the biggest issue is just the presentation, which is pretty typical for a unity engine game. every human chef looks like the corporate memphis version of a muppet, and the animals aren't much better. there's also occasional glitchiness here and there, which was exacerbated by me playing over remote play instead of us doing proper couch co-op. none of these are serious issues really, but I did notice them frequently while playing. the story is also very odd, though in a tongue-in-cheek way that I thought was cute. the final boss was well-designed and a good test of everything presented in the levels prior. it def feels like there's a lot of avenues to go down with this concept, and I'm sure I'll see a lot of growth in overcooked 2 once we get to that one.

"An Undercooked Mess"

"Overcooked" was a title I was meaning to try out for quite some time, and managed to give it a shot alongside my girlfriend. We were intrigued by its cute aesthetic and simple to understand, hard to master gameplay, and were looking to see what else we would enjoy from the experience. Unfortunately the gameplay did not evolve very well throughout our adventure, and after some incredibly frustrating sets of levels, boring repetition, and a barebones "plot" we decided to give up on this title.

The aesthetic of "Overcooked" is something that will drive many to give it a shot in the first place. It has inoffensive graphics and a goofy charm to its world and characters, all wrapped up in a fairly colorful and bright package. The music is a little repetitive, but the levels are designed with some good attention to detail. It's a shame that this is where it stopped with its creativity...

The story in this one is essentially absent. There is some weird shtick where you must open successful restaurants in order to stop some evil monster, but honestly it takes such a backseat that it doesn't even matter after a few levels. The characters are also bland despite their aesthetic, which was quite disappointing to say the least.

The gameplay loop is also really boring. You start off with a single recipe and slowly get used to making it in a batch of different levels. However, this game contains only a handful of recipes and subtle variations of maps, so you'll not only get tired of what you make, but also WHERE you make it. This led to some really bad pacing for the levels following the first five, and afterwards felt like a slow decrease in quality with each new level set.

Lastly, the gameplay is also really frustrating. One minor mistake will throw off your whole operation, and the controls are finicky and at times less responsive than one would hope. There is also the stage that you must fight against at times, and this feedback loop starts to feel less exciting and more irritating with each progressive level. The maps are also designed in a weird way where certain tools are scattered around in obscure spots, or so close together that you will accidentally keep placing yourself on the wrong station. Some smarter level structure would have helped tremendously, and the neat visual design of them was sadly wasted on some sloppy layouts.

Overall, I would Not Recommend "Overcooked". It's a bite sized game in design, but it tries to be something much larger and greater than it is. This ends up hurting the pacing and exposes the flaws in level design, the weak story, and its finnicky controls. It ends up being more frustrating than fun, which is never a good pairing for a co-op title. While it is cute and colorful on the surface, the gameplay lacks the same level of charm.

Final Verdict: 4/10 (Below Average)