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.