Overcooked! 2 Review

I played a few stages of the original game, Overcooked, and did find it enjoyable, but didn’t really get deep into it. The main reason I got into Overcooked 2 was me trying to get my wife into gaming. Overcooked 2 proved to be an amazing gateway game of sorts for her.

The main campaign mode has a little bit of a story going on too. Previously in the original game, our fearless chefs had to serve dishes to invaders in order to save the Onion Kingdom. This time around, the Onion Kingdom is being invaded by a swarm of undead bread, known as the Unbread. Not too sure how serving food will help them solve the predicament they’re in (I skipped the reading bits), but that’s how it goes.

The gameplay is pretty much similar to its predecessor where you assume the roles of chefs that are supposed to prepare a series of dishes by performing actions like slicing, frying, boiling, and even cleaning dirty plates. It isn’t too hard to grasp, my wife being a total newbie was able to do pretty well with the controls, but to this day, I still cannot fathom why she refuses to dash during gameplay.

A few upgrades to the gameplay are the ability to throw food, which is a timesaver as well as a necessity in levels where 2 chefs are separated by a body of water or cliff. The throwing feature allows you to throw food right into a utensil without you having to walk all the way there. For instance, I could chop up a piece of meat and throw it into a frying pan, which automatically initiates the frying process. Then I could reach out for a second serving of meat to be placed into another frying pan. Sadly, the throwing feature is only limited to raw ingredients. You gotta do it, old school style for semi-prepared, finished meals, and dirty dishes.

The set of recipes can be challenging at times, and it can get really frustrating when you give in a dish that isn’t in the order (it happened a lot to me). Especially when you have to give in a set of burgers with different contents and you mistakenly added, omitted, or replaced the contents. A new addition to the cooking is a mixing process. Where chopped meats, etc, are mixed with other ingredients such as eggs and flour. This is the go to process for dishes like pancakes, cakes, and steamed dishes. One advantage I noticed in this was that you don’t need to have all the ingredients ready before dumping them into the mixer. By simply adding them one at a time is fine too. Following the mixing, there is always another step such as, frying the pancake batter, baking your cake, or steaming your steamed meat. This coupled with finding clean plates is a recipe for fun (and disaster) when playing together with your partner.

The layouts of the kitchen are very imaginative, where throwing is mandatory to get the job down at times. The layout employs devices such as switches, levers, floating platforms, portals, conveyor belts, and sometimes having to cross a busy street. All these obstacles and challenges in the way, make it all the more fun (and stressful) to play. When you have a kitchen full of random ingredients, it could be challenging selecting the intended one when you’re in such a rush for time. However, this has seemed to improve from its predecessor. The ability to put an ingredient on a freshly washed plate on the sink is a very convenient improvement from the original game too.

The environment too is dead set on making your life miserable. Strong gushes of wind pushes you from reaching your goals. Cooking on a set of water rafts (I have no idea why), hot air balloons spewing fire along your path, all in turn can lead to frustration. But overcoming all those odds makes it a lot more sweeter.

My wife and I managed to get 3 stars for all main quests in arcade mode, and our marriage seems to have gotten stronger. The optional Kevin stages and New Game+ with an additional 4th star for each stage, adds to replayability. I haven’t even checked out the other modes like versus mode too.

Overcooked 2 is a super fun game, which can cause so much stress too (but immediately pays off after winning a stage). Very enjoyable game to play with a significant other or frankly anyone. So many improvements are observed from the original game, from game mechanics (such as throwing ingredients) and graphics. A must try!

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