Cuisineer Review

The social sim genre is one that I dip into and out on a very sporadic basis. The last game to really capture my imagination was the re-release of Rune Factory 4, which came out 3 years ago.

So, having Cuisineer pop up for review (and it being compatible with the ROG Ally) I decided to play it over the Christmas break.

You are put into the role of Pom, a cat girl restauranteur. Pom’s parents have left her with their old business but, shock of horrors, they are also massively in debt, and it is down to Pom to pay it off. She sets about repaying that debt by opening the restaurant, running errands and then going into dungeons to murder cute animals for food.

The art style is colourful anime, and there are some great anthropomorphic monsters. My favourite characterisation was the local carpenter who always enters frame with his head out of shot because he is so big.

Cuisineer breaks up the two parts of gameplay neatly and makes them tie into each other. Running the restaurant for the day generates money as people come in and ask for food that Pom must prepare. The money can be spent on upgrading the restaurant, buying new gear and potions (and paying off that debt); this will be essential for delving further into each dungeon to furnish the restaurant with the food demands of the creature-people of the town.

Played from an isometric perspective the combat is action RPG lite, with Pom being able to wield different cooking related weapons (spatula, chopping knife, tenderiser etc.) and then related special attacks. The dungeons are procedurally generated and are littered with resources and little critters. Pom can leave at any time with her loot, or push to get better stuff further down.

The “tension” here is rushing to serve all the customers, and balancing that with successful dungeon runs. There is a monthly calendar with specific days that Pom should aim to be ready for.

That said, I find the pressure is a little lacking. The restaurant running is fast paced but until the nobles get involved there isn’t much complication to it. I spent most of my time staring at meters like an idle game that commands too much attention. Due to the proc gen levels it is hard to feel like I was making meaningful progress in my exploration. The requests I was filling out felt even more perfunctory as a result. Basically, the downtime and missing joy of discovery had me too focused on the fact that I am working my way through a spreadsheet.  

This is made worse by the fact that the story feels a lifeless – each of the social sims I’ve played before has done a good job of hiding some of the repetition by rewarding the player with some genuinely funny lines, and sometimes thought provoking. I played Graveyard Keeper for much longer than I planned to thanks to the hilarious donkey and some of the weird storylines. Cuisineer is very cute but it doesn’t go much deeper than ‘capitalism isn’t great’ and ‘My kids are a pain’.

This is a great addition to the ROG Ally. Cuisineer runs really well, and the way it is divided neatly into days, it works as a short-burst treat on the bus or train. If you like this style of game then it also supports longer play and the slow pace of this game would work well being cradled in your lap while you watch a show, or film. Some of the text is a little small, but it is not so bad that you’ll be squinting. If Cuisineer sounds appealing then I would recommend it on the handheld device primarily.

ROG Ally corner

Now, as a social sim I think Cuisineer mostly hits its cues, the ARPG spin is just not enough to elevate it past its peers. I still think that anyone starved for a new social sim will get more out of it than me, but it did very little for me.

Conclusion

Cuisineer is a cute, comfy social sim with some Action RPG added in there. That said, this might be one of the most transparent versions of the genre, which does not feel rewarding to unlock new content.

This game was reviewed based on Xbox S|X review code, using an Xbox S|X console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.

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Good
  • Responsive controls
  • Nice spin on the Social Sim genre
  • Good on the ROG Ally
  • Bright 2D art
Bad
  • Writing not particularly exciting
  • The treadmill is a little too transparent
6.8
Okay
Written by
AJ Small is a games industry veteran, starting in QA back in 2004. He currently walks the earth in search of the tastiest/seediest drinking holes as part of his attempt to tell every single person on the planet that Speedball 2 and The Chaos Engine are the greatest games ever made. He can be found on twitter (@badgercommander), where he welcomes screenshots of Dreamcast games and talk about Mindjack, just don’t mention that one time he was in Canada.

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