Cuisineer

While this game is kinda cute, it's also really bad, with plenty of bad design choices. - The gameplay is okay-ish during the first few hours, then gets annoyingly repetitive. - The dungeons are meh and the fighting system is quite bad, the same monsters are everywhere and the boss fights are tedious. - The 'main' quest of the game is just ... give money to a NPC, once, twice, once again, and yet another time. Every single side quest is a glorified 'fetch' with bland, boring text. Also some NPC will give you a quest and then disappear for a few days, leaving you unable to turn it in - Some important shop NPC just ... disappear for entire days ? Little blacksmith lady, I have a full inventory of gear that I need to sell ?? - The upgrade system is terrible, NPCs will simply take away your item (and only one item) for an entire day and you'll only get it back the next day. Alright but I have four items to upgrade several times ... ?? - There's nothing close to a sense of progression in the entire game. The repetitive restaurant keeping never gets upgraded for the entire experience. You could maybe automate things or hire staff (which Dave the Diver did right !) but nah. It's the same thing all along. The advanced dungeons give you the exact same gear as the day one dungeon.

awesome little game whose objective is to explore dungeons to collect ingredients to later cook and sell in your medieval restaurant. its really good and addictive, although it gets repetitive over time bc the cycle of going after ingredients and making new special dishes goes on day after day with not that much variation. still the idea behind the game is really good and the gameplay is satisfying and casual, plus the graphics are super cute and colorful :3

The bones of a good game are here but the balancing, quality of life and progression mechanics are just... missing. Almost like the developers were told to ship, ready or not, and never came back to tweak the small things that would make this game fun. Example: Every single "quest" is to turn in a stack of resources, and get a new recipe in return. You need the actual resources in your inventory (can't pull from your home storage). So - to turn in the quest, you need to talk to the quest giver, go to your restaurant (after a 10 second loading screen), go to your room (after another 10 second loading screen), grab the resources, go back through the restaurant (10 second loading screen), and then turn in the quest. This unlocks another quest... where you need to do the whole thing again. Actually running the restaurant is also a slog. It's the only way to make money, but you will acquire resources and ingredients far faster than you could ever actual sell them in the restaurant. Even as you unlock higher-tier recipes that use multiple ingredients at once, the majority of your customers will still order a single boiled egg, meaning you make a whole $14 per ticket. You'll have 500 eggs sitting in your inventory and go through maybe 30 over the course of the 10-minute restaurant phase. At times I was literally watching Netflix while 'running' the restaurant. There's a game very similar to this - Marenian Tavern Story: Patty and the Hungry God - that is also... not great? But is the same concept and executed much, much better. It's a 6/10 where this game is a 3/10. If you're in the mood for something like this, you might check it out instead.

---{ Graphics }--- ☐ You forget what reality is ☐ Beautiful ☑ Good ☐ Decent ☐ Bad ☐ Don‘t look too long at it ☐ MS-DOS ---{ Gameplay }--- ☐ Very good ☑ Good ☐ It's just gameplay ☐ Mehh ☐ Watch leaves fall instead ☐ Just don't ---{ Audio }--- ☐ Eargasm ☐ Very good ☐ Good ☑ Not too bad ☐ Bad ---{ Audience }--- ☑ Kids ☑ Teens ☑ Adults ☑ Grandma ---{ PC Requirements }--- ☐ Check if you can run paint ☑ Potato ☐ Decent ☐ Fast ☐ Rich boi ☐ You need a Quantum Computer ---{ Game Size }--- ☐ Floppy Disk ☑ Old Fashioned ☐ Workable ☐ Big ☐ Will eat more than 10% of your 1TB hard drive ☐ You will want an entire hard drive to hold it ---{ Difficulty }--- ☐ Just press 'W' ☑ Easy ☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master ☐ Significant brain usage ☐ Difficult ☐ Dark Souls ---{ Grind }--- ☐ Nothing to grind ☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks ☐ Isn't necessary to progress ☑ Average grind level ☐ Too much grind ☐ You'll need a second life for grinding ---{ Story }--- ☐ No Story ☐ Some lore ☑ Average ☐ Good ☐ Lovely ☐ It'll replace your life ---{ Game Time }--- ☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee ☐ Short ☑ Average ☐ Long ☐ To infinity and beyond ---{ Price }--- ☐ It's free! ☐ Worth the price ☑ If it's on sale ☐ If u have some spare money left ☐ Not recommended ☐ You could also just burn your money ---{ Bugs }--- ☑ Never heard of ☐ Minor bugs ☐ Can get annoying ☐ ARK: Survival Evolved ☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs ---{ Replayability }--- ☐ One and done ☐ Maybe after a year ☐ Worth a second run ☑ It's a Rouge-like play it until bored ☐ Played it 20 times and still not bored ☐ Hunt must go on! ☐ It's an MMORPG ---{ Microtransactions }--- ☑ None ☐ Only cosmetics ☐ Slightly pay-to-progress ☐ Pay-to-win ☐ More shops than gameplay ☐ Casino Simulator ---{ ? / 10 }--- ☐ 1 ☐ 2 ☐ 3 ☐ 4 ☐ 5 ☑ 6 ☐ 7 ☐ 8 ☐ 9 ☐ 10 ---{ Summary }--- Cuisineer is a charming little roguelite that clearly takes a lot of inspiration from Hades. While it doesn't quite reach the same level, it's still a fun experience, and I definitely think it's worth picking up on sale. The core gameplay revolves around exploring dungeons, defeating food-themed monsters to gather ingredients, and using those ingredients to run the restaurant you inherited from your family. It's a fun concept, but unfortunately both halves of the gameplay loop have some noticeable flaws. The biggest issue with the dungeon side is that enemies appear in the exact same order on every floor. Once you realize this, there's very little reason to push deeper into the dungeon beyond collecting specific materials. As a result, the sense of challenge and progression gradually fades, making the roguelite loop less engaging than it could have been. The restaurant management also has one major drawback. No matter how much you expand or upgrade your restaurant, you can never hire staff. This means you're always responsible for every single task yourself—cooking, serving customers, and collecting payments. While this is enjoyable at first, it eventually becomes more exhausting than rewarding and weakens the feeling of progression that restaurant management games usually provide. The story is fairly simple and doesn't leave much of an impression, but that's not really the game's focus. Cuisineer shines as a relaxing game that you can play at your own pace without feeling pressured. It took me around 28 hours to complete the game 100%, and I enjoyed taking my time throughout the experience. If cozy roguelites and management games sound like your kind of thing, I'd definitely recommend giving Cuisineer a look during a sale. It's not without its flaws, but it's a charming and relaxing game that offers a unique blend of dungeon crawling and restaurant management.

This was a hard one to rate, but ultimately, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone unless it's on sale AND you have a lot of spare time on your hands. The game starts off very simple with a good introduction and feel for your progression, but spirals instantly into what seems like endless fetch quests and bland dialogue from NPC's. The gameplay loop is to run your restaurant with food you cook using ingredients you scavenged. There's nothing else. The dungeons you run through are the exact same layouts with the same annoying enemies unless you cheese them to oblivion. If you like simple games, then this would be up your alley, but honestly? You probably have better games in your backlog.

Another worthy representative of dungeon crawling shop management sim. It is a lot like Moonlighter but with cuter graphics. So, same as others genre - gameplay is divided into two parts - shop management and dungeon runs. You’re managing restaurant, so what you could do in hub city is improve your weapons - you those are dropped from dungeon or bought in city, improve few abilities you have, improve your establishment, get cosmetics for both you and your house etc. In restaurant itself, there is cooking requested dished after you open it and placing furniture\cosmetics in most efficient manner with limited space available. Oh, also quests are received in hub area too. Dungeon runs share time with your business, so you have to choose where you’ll be spending precious work hours. Dungeon floors are procedurally generated and consist of a bunch of medium sized areas where you slaughter or gather cooking and crafting mats, ofc since your inventory is not infinite, if you go far enough, some sacrificed would have to be made and hard choice of what to throw away or keep will present itself constantly. After a number of floors boss could be encountered that would provide some gear and mats. Moving through the story, reveals new areas that provide new type of ingredients. Recipes are mostly received from completing town quests. Combat itself is pretty simple, you got attacks and rolls to dodge danger or move faster and that’s pretty much it, however what type of attack there is depends on weapon equipped, giving some options on what fighting style one would like to choose. Audio is fine, it’s mostly cuteish and bubbly to match visuals and thankfully does not go that far to become nuisance, but would win no awards or get viral. Sounds are kinda same too. Graphics as mentioned before are quite cute, especially 2d character pics in dialogs. So there will be no dark or brutal or realistic places or npcs, everything is aimed to keep you uplifted and relaxed, except for combat. Plot is very much like others in genre - you inherit shop, you got to take care of debt, befriend locals, develop your business and here also discover some family lore. And as with everything else - this aspect of game is also made to be lighthearted and warm. Nothing complicated or any unexpected twists, just very simple fuzzy questline.

先声明，看在美术的份上打了个好评。这游戏真正能给你新鲜感的，只有开头四五个小时。至于后面的二十个小时那是完全重复的一套流程。 刚开始进游戏确实觉得画面很可爱（事实上也是被画面骗进来的），食物画得精致，小人立绘也很不错。但是差不多玩到第6个小时，那种对画面的喜爱就变成了“我不想再打一遍这个地图去收集材料了.....”。地图就那么三四个场景来回换皮，非常的没意思，也就打boss的时候能够稍微有点激情。 经营玩法也是机械化流水线。做菜就是对着料理台勾选项，选完自动完成，没有任何烹饪过程可言。顾客要啥你就去地下城刷啥，但背包还是太少了，如果能够多升级几次就好了。而且食材只能够从地下城获取，有时候攻略地下城的时候也会想如果能有一个种田系统缓解下攻略地下城压力就好了，这样我就能天天开店了，但终归是没有种田系统，于是循环变成：下城→收集食材→做菜→开店卖完→再下城……中间没有任何变奏，除了给交钱还债和做无聊的跑腿任务。 至于剧情？我玩到现在，唯一的“剧情推进”是[spoiler] 还清了父母欠的三笔债。然后我以为终于结束欠债生活了，结果之后也是需要继续交钱，只是换个名目。[/spoiler] 我是在PC和Steam Deck上断断续续玩的，靠着deck能够躺着玩的惰性才撑到这个时长。老老实实坐电脑前，我玩了5小时就腻了。就这个体量，现在这价格，只能说制作组全员都该给美术磕一个，因为画风几乎是它唯一的遮羞布。总结就是，原价是及其不推荐的，打折了且游戏荒了可以考虑一下。

Fun little time killer you shouldn't play on an empty stomach. Or maybe you should play it while waiting for your next meal. Runs well on the steam deck.

+++ Interesting and novel relationship between dungeon-crawling and cooking. +++ Cutesy character design and artwork. --- Utterly, offensively tone-deaf storyline. --- Tediously over-extended game sections. --- Uneven difficulty spikes, especially around bosses. --- Shallow and unsatisfying upgrade system. --- Poorly optimised, with heavy particle effects causing significant slowdowns. Like an abusive relationship, this title performs the despicable feat of putting the player down while playing it off as harmless comedy. Perhaps this could've worked with a softer touch, but as things stand now, the player character is essentially a non-person who gets bossed around by everyone they encounter, and this vibe unfortunately kills most if not all enjoyment that can be had. The gameplay feels like work being imposed on the player, with sequences that have a tendency to overstay their welcome, and goalposts that feel like they get moved back with every milestone of progress. The backhanded comments and the thinly veiled insults never once relent, lasting all the way to the very end, and it's the kind of toxic environment that makes one want to hit retirement as soon as possible. And here, retirement quite simply comes in the form of a red X.

[h1] Análise informativa. [/h1] Cuisineer é um jogo que eu [b]amo[/b], mas, não posso simplesmente recomendar sem dar várias ressalvas, pois seus problemas são notáveis, e certamente de desagrado de muita gente, portanto, o teor dessa análise será informativo: salientando pontos positivos e negativos para que possa auxiliar a pessoa em sua decisão de compra tendo em mente se o produto é para ela ou não! [b] Sobre o jogo [/b] Primeiro de tudo, o jogo é lindo, a arte dele é maravilhosa, extremamente fofo, um jogo completamente aconchegante, cozy. A ambientação dele nesse aspecto é excepcional, claramente feito com muito carinho e amor pela equipe, as animações dos modelos muito fluídas e agradáveis, é satisfatório, há uma grande dedicação e valor nesses sentidos. O mundo e conceito bem criativos e trabalhados, tem grande harmonia com todo o jogo. A Gameplay se dividi em duas partes distintas: [list] [*]Explorar masmorras para derrotar os ingredientes e consequentemente os coletar (sim, você luta contra os ingredientes). [*]Gerenciar seu restaurante preparando comidas e servindo os clientes. [/list] — Porém, aqui que vem o principal potencial problema desse jogo para muitos: as mecânicas do jogo são extremamente rasas e simples, o que em jogos cozy pode não necessariamente ser ruim, mas, aqui facilmente passa a ser negativo para boa parte dos jogadores, tentarei explicar e listar tudo a seguir. Vamos começar pelo gerenciamento do restaurante, para um jogo de culinária, resumidamente não há nenhuma mecânica de culinária, no restaurante você basicamente instala fogões, que funcionam como uma bancada de craft, ao qual você clica em um botão, seleciona o prato e espera ele ficar pronto, 95% dos clientes pegam o prato no balcão sozinho, então nem se mexer para entregar é necessário, além de que a variação de clientes é praticamente nula, não mudando nada entre eles. O sistema de combate é muito simples, bater e esquivar, o que no caso, é ok. As masmorras são poucos interessantes, com inimigos ainda mais simples e repetitivos. Certo, é um jogo que a proposta claramente não é ser profundo e complexo, pelo contrário, simples, fofo e para relaxar, porém, você vai fazer essas duas únicas coisas repetitivas e rasas, que são muita pouca coisa a se fazer, sem mudar absolutamente nada pelo resto do jogo, que dura cerca de ≈34horas se for fazer a principal e secundárias. O jogo se torna simplesmente extremamente maçante e com um grinding de pouca progressão muito longo, algumas vezes me sentia de fato exercendo um trabalho no CLT. São extremamente raro os casos ao qual vou julgar o preço que os desenvolvedores avaliam sua obra em uma review sobre o jogo, mas, nesse caso é inegável que R$79,99 acaba saindo muito caro para um jogo com tão pouca profundidade em conteúdo, muito provavelmente por esse preço você vai encontrar muitas outras obras que vão lhe agradar ainda mais do que esse produto e ainda sobrar dinheiro para outras. Sim, eu pessoalmente adoro esse jogo, não atoa o joguei por 60 horas totais, ele é fofo, relaxante, agradável — além de se aproveitar sozinho, também é muito bom para se jogar enquanto assiste vídeos, ouve podcasts de fundo, conversa em call com amigos, etc. mas, seus defeitos são consideráveis, o tornando um jogo que não é recomendado para todos, acredito que ele é bom pra ser jogado por umas ≈6h, ≈8h ou no máximo ≈10h totais antes de se mostrar uma experiência cansativa a depender do tipo do jogador. Cuisineer de forma imparcial, é no máximo um jogo um pouco acima do ok, longe de ser ruim, mas, difícil de o considerar perto de um jogo muito bom.