There's a cooking game I like a lot more than "Cooking Mama," but which still might have a big problem.
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One of the unsung gems of last year's Wii third-party flood was "Order Up," a cooking game that combined "Cooking Mama"-style interactive recipes with very light strategic management of a restaurant.
Last night, after cleaning enough dishes to appease the game's health inspector, I managed to serve every one of my customers a dish with the spices they each like. I still haven't been visited by a food critic, so I may play more until that happens.
But I don't see myself venturing deeper into the game to unlock the next three restaurants in "Order Up."
Why?
Because the basic mechanics of the game seem too easy. Shake the remote to chop a tomato. Dip the fries in a fryer. Flip burgers with the remote. Etc. Even juggling two orders at once isn't that hard. The prospect of playing this game for many more hours seems unexciting, like I'd just be waving my hands without much challenge rather than feeling like I was putting in effort to have fun.
What I'd like, I guess, is a Wii game that has the kind of "casual"-gamer design of an "Order Up," but has interesting enough gameplay mechanics that I would want to play the game for the long haul. That's what "Rock Band" and "Guitar Hero" are: non-threatening, non-narrative games with mechanics that are fun to return to. I'd hope a cooking game could offer that too.
As much as I like "Order Up," I'm not sure if it pulls that off.
Next: Tonight, I'm going back to "Mushroom Men" on the Wii to give it a little more time, but I don't think it's a game for me.