I just beat it a few minutes ago.
As a fan of puzzle games, fantasy and Iron Chef, this game was awesome.
Good
- The theme is ridiculous and yet it works flawlessly. I found myself taking the world and the threats seriously, despite it having basically the same premise of Yu-Gi-Oh where the world's problems are solved with cooking. But it works. The game never points out how silly the concept is, so you just roll with it
- This game was made by fans of Iron Chef. The long winded stories by the chairman on the ingredients, the random C-List celebrity judges, the pomp and flashiness of the whole show is on display. The really captured the feeling of doing an Iron Chef duel.
- The puzzle mode mechanics are very simple, but progress slowly over time into a more and more complicated system.
- The characters are amazing. I felt bad when they felt bad, I felt happy when they felt happy. I really got into these characters and their lives and personalities. I even got attached to a random NPC, who I felt very happy for after he appeared in the background of a certain cutscene, since it meant he achieved his dream.
- The character designs are top notch. All of the different chefs have really unique designs.
- The art style is gorgeous, with hand drawn fluid animation.
- The alchemy puzzles were a fantastic addition, and I spent a good 30 minutes on one of them.
- The music is relaxing and enjoyable.
- Everyone in this game is so nice and friendly. It's chill to just listen to them talk to each other.
- The voice acting is fantastic
Not good
- Magic feels sorta useless. I didn't even realize Thrash had magic until his quest was almost over. I'd just spam daggers and then not really touch magic. You kill enemies quick enough without it.
- The right combination of gear can almost break the game. The Slow Cooker is especially ridiculous in longer matches. The final few matches of the game, it wasn't uncommon for me to serve a maxed out 400 star dish to at least one judge, allowing me to focus on the other judge(s). The orchid item that makes vegetables better, combined with the fire frying pan, with those red berries from the caves, made any cave themed match comically easy. Just drop one of those berries and it's like +50 points. The wrong element? Just go find the treasure with the sauces in it, it's always in the same spot and it's never hard to get to. I only lost 2 matches, the first match of the 3 cook gauntlet, and the final boss.
- Thrash's story breaks the flow, especially since he's so slow, and his quest is super easy. He uses mostly fire, but all the matches have at least one fire judge, so you're never really in any danger of being resource starved. His story is great, but maybe it should have been a post-game extra.
- Poison is pointless. You can just avoid poisoned ingredients, the game never forces you to use them. None of the items that are only poisonous (like mushrooms) ever come up as the theme ingredient.
- The game doesn't tell you (I don't believe?) that bones are not considered bad for the judges. I desperately tried to clear all bones before judging, only to find out, accidentally, that they don't really matter.
- There are chefs you never get to face if you don't pick them to challenge. They just either disappear (like hawk dude) or hang around and you never fought them. There was this guy in a blue coat I never fought as well as hawk guy.
- It just sort of... ends. After Thrash's story wraps up, you're flung into one last cut scene, and then the final boss. Then you beat the game and there's really nothing to do. There's daily matches, but I did one and it was stupidly easy. There's a few hunting and restaurant service challenges as well, but I didn't bother with those. There aren't any puzzle stage challenges, sadly. The last chapter is kind of lame overall.
- I ran into two bugs. One was that the game progressively got slower the longer I left the Switch in sleep mode (and was easily fixed just by restarting the game), and the other is during Thrash's finale, there's a cutscene and a sound effect from it got stuck, and looped endlessly on top of itself, causing a horrible static noise that didn't go away until I beat the round. These aren't huge issues, just noting them.
This game is a must own for Switch players. It is extremely charming, fun, and has an excellent story. I won't know exactly how long it took to beat until my Switch updates with the time in a week, but I'd estimate about 8-10 hours. Maybe more.
On that note, the OP says this
Three playable chefs with their own short campaign which delves into each character's personality and cooking.
From what I've seen, there is only two chefs? Is there a third I need to unlock or something? Just Mina and Thrash as far as I can tell.
