What better day than Thanksgiving to play a game about cooking and preparing food? My family came to visit, so it was the perfect opportunity to try Overcooked! + Overcooked! 2 on the Switch with four people. The games were… a little different than I thought they would be. I had seen a few previews and was expecting games about making and serving meals in restaurants, not about trying to make food in a kitchen that’s moving around and trying to kill you! Utter mayhem, lots of shouting, and lots of fun. And I guess we’re supposed to be saving the Onion Kingdom.
Some stages get pretty difficult though, and those little food icons are hard to see. Overcooked! is definitely not a casual party game. My elderly dad had trouble keeping up, so we dropped to three players (my husband, my sister, and me). Three players is a little awkward… sometimes it works, but other times (particularly on stages that are split in half) the work is unbalanced, and you’re better off dropping one person and playing with only two people (the point requirement to pass the stage will be lower, too). Even though we still had fun on the hard stages and passed every stage we unlocked, the first Overcooked! game had a problem with ridiculously high point requirements in order to unlock stages in story mode. It’s not good enough to simply pass… you have to get 3 out of 3 stars (so… complete mastery) on most stages in order to complete story mode. We made it a little more than halfway through before we gave up and moved on to Overcooked! 2. Fortunately, Overcooked! 2 does not have this problem. Overcooked! 2 also has a practice mode and is a little better at teaching you how to play. In addition, there are new game modes like survival mode, arcade mode, and online play. Lots of great improvements!
Later I tried playing by myself just to see how hard it was. It actually wasn’t that bad. You get two chefs to control, which is actually helpful. You can do things like leave one by the stove while the other is running around, so you don’t have to worry about not getting back to your food in time. I made it through most of the free DLC on my own. It’s definitely more fun with more people, though. Just… try not to shout too loud when the baby is sleeping…. haha.
Check out the newest Overcooked! collection, with new content, online mode, and all the DLC: Overcooked! All You Can Eat [affiliate link]