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Food-themed titles are pretty much a rarity in the western gaming world; there are some RPG's that have some cooking components to them (Tales of Phantasia comes to mind, for example) and, if you're a retro gamer, you've surely played Food Fight and Root Beer Tapper. In Japanese gaming, such titles are a lot more common, some titles that I can remember off the top of my head: Ore no Ryori, Nabe Kazoku (both PSone), Burger Burger Pocket (GBC), Curry House CoCo Ichibanya (PS2). This shouldn't come as too much of a surprise if you've visited Japan because Japanese tend to be near food-obsessed - watch the classic '85 film Tampopo for reference. At first glance, it's fairly obvious that Taito (this title's publisher in Japan) really went out of their way to create a quality title: graphics are very cute with lots of color, the dixieland-ish music somehow matches the game, and the game really makes use of the touch screen and microphone. In fact, I would venture to guess that this game makes the most use of these features; the touch screen is used for tons of actions: cooking, pressing, kneading, turning, mixing, to name just a few. The mic is used solely for blowing to cool food when boiling on your stove. In essence, Cooking Mama is a bunch of simple minigames disguised as phases of cooking a dish: cutting, mincing, boiling, etc.; the ultimate goal of which is to produce a set-recipe dish. Think Warioware and Feel The Magic/Rub Rabbits and you have a fairly good idea of what makes this game tick. However, unlike these games, Cooking Mama has no central story. That's right, there's no real motivation to cook all these dishes except to unlock other recipes of which there are quite a few, some 50+. There are a few game modes available such as a practice mode, mini-game challenge mode, and a recipe combining mode that yields odd combinations like potato salad over rice, but they are all centered around the same throw-a-bunch-of-minigames-together frame. For those of you who happen to purchase the import version of the game, there is a fair amount of Japanese in the game but it's all in kana so it's easy to read (or look up, if that's what you do). A small amount of trial and error might be necessary to figure out which actions are required at certain times but the game is friendly enough to hold your hand when it's most necessary. For Japanophiles, there's not really much to ooh and ah at, except for the cooking theme, but (though not guaranteed for the US version of the game) one thing of note is the types of dishes that are used in the game. Lots of dishes that are true to real Japanese home cooking: wonton, croquette, spaghetti napolitan, curry, tonkatsu and all portrayed and "cooked" as uniquely as Japanese themselves do. Overall, Cooking Mama is a fun diversion but probably not a game that will be played for extended periods of time. I hate to harp on the point again that a story mode would have really helped the game because, just like how spices are used in real cooking, it would have made an OK dish even better.Read full review
Cooking Mama can be described as a cute, interactive cooking game for Nintendo DS. All controls in the game are done with the Stylus pen: chopping vegetables, boiling water for pasta, stirring soups and adjusting the heat (you actually blow into the DS microphone to cool soup down!), breaking eggs, spreading sauce, kneading dough, folding dumplings, and my personal favorite - flipping and pan-frying food! If you love cooking, or want to learn more about it, this game could be a good starting point. It actually features some pretty healthy and diverse meals, perhaps with a stronger asian influence than other world regions. Meals don't take long to make, so you can cook a quick meal while waiting in line, and easily save/quit the game when you want to. Each time you cook a meal you get new meals to make, so there is no shortage of foods to make. The game may lose some of its luster and value after repeated playings, but it is still a great game for kids, or to pass the time. Highly interactive, very cute and creative, and best of all, you learn about cooking without running the risk of losing a finger!Read full review
This game is a light hearted, slightly educational and silly way to pass the time. I don't know if I'd call the game addicting but it definitely has some decent quality playtime value to how it was designed even for us adults who are supposed to be to old for this type of thing. The more you successfully play game then the more recipes you can potentially unlock. There is a pretty decent variety in the types of things you can cook up and there is a different playing technique in the game for how each of those different items get made. From my point of view even just being able to show people this kind of game is sort of cool. I mean at least its worth a few laughs when I show it off to most of my non video game playing friends.
This review is from my 10 year old daughter. When I received it for my birthday, I was so excited that I immediately charged up my Nintendo and started playing it. My first impression was that it was very "Asian". Kinda like Japanese Anime. My sister had a DS too, so on the box it said that you can send recipes that you get to another person on their DS. But I have no idea how to, and the instructions were not clear. Besides that the game is very fun, and make sure if you want to do the recipes again, you have to clear it off the memory, or you will not get anymore recipes.
i bought this for my daughters 6th birthday. i had to make sure it worked before i gave it to her so i tried it owt. it seems like a pretty cool game. it is pretty much as i expected it would be i guess. you gotta chop meat by slicing it back and forth, tenderize by tapping on the screen, make shish ka bobs by memorizing the order they go onto the stick then roll them back and forth in batter and stir them in a bowl then put them on baking pan all with a time limit. if you can it says "just like mama" if you cant it says "mama will halfto fix it" and what i thought was a bit odd is that mamas eyes burn on fire if you fail. but for a video game i guess thats not so bad. i think she will like it although i may halfto get her started on how to play it because of her age but i dont think it will be a problem as kids are good with those kinds of things.Read full review
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