Claire's Cruisin' Cafe

Review

You overhear talk between the owner and the head chef of The Sneaky Fox restaurant. You hear that the Chef is going to leave the Sneaky Fox, and that there’s a perfect replacement right under their very nose. Thinking that this must mean you, you’re full of joy and happiness at the prospects of running the kitchen as head Chef. However, you later discover that the owner has totally overlooked you and hired another Chef, leaving you a bit down in the dumps.

Although Frank (your brother, a talented photographer) says that your talents are being wasted at The Sneaky Fox, you know that you’ll never invent new recipes or write a book. So it’s now or never to take a leap of faith and follow your dreams, quit working for someone else and become your own boss. It’s going to take some hard work and you need to earn enough money to buy a food truck. Frank has a friend who has an outside café; it’s not the fanciest café by any means, and the menu might not be what you’re used to cooking, but you’ll get a cut of the revenue.

You will have to enter a name upon starting a new game, followed by selecting the game’s difficulty. There are three difficulties to choose from: Easy (a relaxing experience), Normal (this offers a balanced game) and Hard (here you’ll need to be quick and play smart in order to earn enough pennies). The higher the difficulty the more money you will need to earn before you beat a level. You can change mode at any point in the game and your progress in each difficulty is saved separately. If you are unsure on how to play the game, you can visit Gameplay on the main menu screen. Here it will explain how the game is played; everything is pretty straight forward, though, so you shouldn’t have any problems.

Starting your first day working at the outside café will have you making and serving some basic food and drinks. Currently on the first level you have Burgers, Donuts and Coffee.  Once you open the café people will start to wander in and sit down, read the menu and then order what they want. What they want is indicated above the characters; if you see a Burger, they you must serve them a Burger. They might order two or three items from your menu at once, so they may want a burger, coffee and donut. You can serve these items individually, however serving all three at the same time will give you better tips and likes.

Foods like Burgers need to be prepared.  Early on, you just need to click on the burger and bun then add the top half of the bun; this will then appear on the table at the bottom of the screen.  Items here are ready for serving to the customers. Once you have the items a customer wants, you need to click on that customer who you will then serve. Once they have finished eating, they will pay for their meal and you will have to click on them again to collect their money, after which the customers will move on and new customers will fill the void.

The food menu will get more and more complex, and you’ll start making cheese burgers, fish, kebabs, steaks, pizzas with sides along with all kinds of drinks and desserts as you progress through the levels. You will get some help from Frank and other characters as you try to keep on top of things, although sometimes you’re left on your own to cook, serve and even clean up. You will also have to put up with more and more customers, some of whom are there to write about their experience.

Make the experience a memorable one for the customer by getting their order ready, quickly serving and then collecting the money from them. Doing this will allow you to earn more Money, bigger Tips and Likes. On each Level you have the chance of gaining One to Three stars depending on how much money you have earned. How much you have earned and how many stars you are currently are aiming for on any level is indicated in the top left corner of the screen. Once you’ve opened the doors, there is also a timer which details how much time is left before the shop closes for the day. Besides the Star indicator is a large Heart, which will fill up when you get Likes for giving prompt service. Before starting the next level, if you have enough cash you can spruce up the place with any cash you have earned; you can upgrade the seating, cooker, coffee machines etcetera to make the place more appetising to the customer.

There are Sixty-Six Levels in total; Levels One to Ten take place in the Outside Café, then every Ten Levels you visit a new location to tout your wares. There are some A and B bonus levels to play. You can unlock the A’s as you complete certain levels; the A’s bonus levels are to find the Matched Pair of Face Down Cards. I’m unsure of what the B’s bonus levels are, as you need to unlock Level Sixty first and I’m not quite there just yet.

Rewards on the main menu contain any unlocked achievements you may have earned (these also appear in Steam). In Bonus on the main menu screen, you will find Heroes, with information on the characters within the game. Wallpapers and Music bonuses can also be found in Bonus, and you’ll unlock new wallpapers and music as you proceed through the game.

In the options there’s settings for Sound and Music Volume Sliders, Full Screen and Show Hints, and that’s your lot.

So, far I’ve enjoyed playing the game, it’s easy enough to play and can be challenging also. It looks and sounds great and I haven’t had any problems with the game thus far.

Review written by Piston Smashed™ for Zeepond.com!