Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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46 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Exactly what you'd expect...and more!, December 10, 2007
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
The Cooking Mama series can do no wrong by me. These are near perfect games because you get exactly what you're expecting, and then some. As the title suggests, Cooking Mama 2 is a cooking game with 80 recipes from around the world, including favorites like kimchee and pancakes. You prepare food in steps, with Mama giving you helpful hints and scores along the way. The over-the-top cutesy graphics and intuitive gameplay make this a favorite with kids, but there's finesse involved that even adults will find frustrating. These games are perfect for the Achiever in your life, and Cooking Mama 2 pushes the idea further, adding unlockable customizations to your kitchen and Mama's wardrobe.
The most impressive feature of the Cooking Mama titles are their utilization of Nintendo hardware. Cooking Mama 2 continues to caress the DS with innovative stylus play. Move your stylus around a meat grinder's handle to make it go. Crack an egg by drawing a line to the bowl - slowly, or you'll wind up with egg on your hand. Blow into the microphone to ensure a pot of boiling water won't boil over. There are several dozen different mechanics available, and most of them are easy to grasp, but difficult to master. Most of the preparation requires that you beat the clock, but if you chop without stopping, or pull a piece of meat out of the frier at just the right moment, you can receive bonuses. This makes basic gameplay a snap, and advanced gameplay an ART.
After you've unlocked some recipes, you can cook for Mama's friends. Mama won't give you hints on what you should do, but since you've worked through the recipe at least once, you won't need hints. As a result, preparing food for Mama's friends is a much speedier process, and the rewards or penalties are greater. If you mess up when you're cooking for Mama's friends, Mama's not there to help you and your preparation is cut short before you can finish. If you do well, you receive presents and can unlock special items for customizing your game.
You can customize Mama's dress, accessories, the appearance of her kitchen, and the color of all the kitchen utensils you use in the game. There are 10 dress types (with several color options each), 5 accessories, and 5 kitchen settings to unlock. I like customizing everything to match to an unnatural degree, but many players will love dressing up Mama in wacky lemon earrings and strange cheerleader outfits. Not every friend you impress will unlock an item - sometimes the presents are just nice things to look at that don't stay in your game, like a kitten or a treasure chest.
As with previous releases, you can practice any part of a recipe, and set records for yourself in specific preparation techniques. Both Cooking Mama 1 and 2 for the DS offer wireless play, so you can challenge your friends to an egg-cracking contest. This isn't as cool as Cooking Mama Cookoff for the Wii, where you can execute an entire recipe against friends, but there's still something very appealing about proclaiming yourself the Queen of the Deep Fryer and laying the smackdown in an egg-cracking competition.
There are a few annoying parts of the game. Bonuses are now meaningful - each one you get earns you one star out of 5, and for every 5 stars, you get a present. But the presents aren't unlocked items, they're just cute graphic rewards. Calculating these bonuses takes a lot of time, and the accompanying music is very loud. It's nice that the bonuses have some kind of reward, but I'd prefer points or records to an overkill of praise. Some of the mechanics are still a little too hard to master. I find stewing and simmering to be a pain, because you have to wait for the food the food to cook until it's reached the green part of the progress meter, but you also have to control temperature and stir - not too often - to make sure the food doesn't pass the green sweet spot on the meter and remains exactly there until time is up. Adjusting the temperature of the stove and stirring will wildly change the food's progress meter, so it's very difficult to do with respect to the timer.
This is not my favorite Cooking Mama title, but the improvements significantly enhance the replay value and enjoyability of the game. Within a release or two, this game will be perfect, deadly addictive, and completely free of design flaws. Let's hope the world doesn't run out of interesting recipes in the mean time!
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26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Fun like the original, December 3, 2007
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
This sequel is just as fun as the first game. This time you get bonus stars for doing things extra good (I guess) and you win presents, which I have yet to find. If you get gold medals and more of these stars you can change Mama's outfit and the style and colors of the kitchen and your utensils. It's fun but again the replay value is low once you get all gold medals. Now however you can challenge your friends via wireless instead of just sending a demo. The recipes are different and there's some new utensils to use as well. I only gave it four stars because of the replay value and the sort of annoying new graphics.
update: OK, the presents you win can be used in the Diary to decorate pictures of your food. It doesnt serve much of a purpose, but it's still fun.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
More of Mama - and that's not a bad thing!, January 3, 2008
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
I myself have only played for a few minutes but those few minutes were a blast.
On the other hand, my children had a sleepover where they played COOKING MAMA, both 1 and 2 ALL NIGHT LONG!! The game kept their attention, they helped each other and there were a lot of laughs. The game helps to learn to work more adeptly with the stylus and is fun.
Nice additions are enabling the player to change mama's outfits. This time, we can also hear Mama, my girls LOVE hearing the "even better than Mama!!", the ultimate compliment.
We still have loads to go on this and I suppose some people will get through it quickly and the replay value will just not be there but for the younger ones, there seems to be a LOT of replay value.
Working towards the rewards is enjoyable and an attainable goal for those little hands not quite as skilled with the stylus. While it seems that some games seem to be near impossible, the game here really does seem geared towards a younger crowd. I'm not saying that's a con. Additionally, just seeing the wide variety of recipes and what countries they are from can add a little learning to the mix as well.
Well done! (no pun intended).
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