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Author Topic:  [Review] Gochi-Show! for Girls -How To Learn Japanese Cooking Game-  (Read 5756 times)

kokoro-cafe

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Gochi-Show! for Girls
-How To Learn Japanese Cooking Game-



~~~

Foreword

Recently, Kokoro Cafe was invited to review Creative Freaks’ (creators of Burn Your Fat with Me! for Girls) newest game Gochi-Show! for Girls -How To Learn Japanese Cooking Game-. I saw this game on Tumblr before it was released and was immediately intrigued by it so I’m very excited to get the chance review it.

Just to clarify, I received the Steam version of this game so I will be primarily reviewing the PC version in terms of interface. I suspect the Steam version is a direct port of the mobile version, so there shouldn’t be too much of a difference.
 


(Kanata Tachibana)

A Little About Gochi-Show! For Girls

Gochi-Show! for Girls is a story about you, the daughter of a well-known researcher (father) and a cafe owner (mother). Your father travels all over the world conducting research and your mother runs a local cafe called Campus. After receiving a letter, your mother has to fly abroad to help your father move. This leaves you to manage the cafe for two weeks with only one other employee, Kanata Tachibana, whom you barely know. Unfortunately, you have absolutely no cooking skills and soon after your mother leaves, your customers start diminishing day by day.  To add to your problems, your dad gets into an accident and your mom won’t be able to leave his side for a while. In order to keep the cafe going, you have to learn how to cook. Luckily, Kanata has some cooking skills which he has kindly offered to teach you.

This game is similar to many mobile otome games in that you read through an episode then complete missions in order to unlock the next episode, however, these missions aren’t like the ones most otome game players are used to. In order to complete these missions, you actually have to complete the mission in real life. In terms of Gochi-Show!, you will need to pick up a pan and cook!



(Recipe collection list)


Art, Interface and Music

My initial impression of the game from the screenshots is that it’s a very well-made game. The graphics, from the characters to the interface look professionally done. The backgrounds were my favorite, it’s definitely a cafe I would love to visit if it were real. The only graphic improvement needed is the character art which looks a little pixelated whenever the character gets too close.
The music was well chosen and matches the mood of the game very well. The voices were a nice addition even though it was all in Japanese. It would be nice to get some English audio eventually, just because it would be easier to cook and listen than to cook and read.

The interface is very straight forward and easy to navigate. My only real complaint about the interface, and this applies to Steam version only, is that the window of the game doesn’t expand at all. The game seems to be permanently stuck at a mobile phone screen size for the computer, which makes it quite difficult to play or read on the computer, especially, if I’m expected to use this game to guide me in cooking. It would really help if the game could go into an optional full-screen mode on the Steam version.

Update 10/5/2016: Creative Freaks has told me that if it's possible, they hope to fix the window size for the Steam version in the future.




(Size of the game compared to the rest of my screen)

Gameplay

This game is made up of two parts, the story part and the cooking tutorial part. In order to gain more tutorials, you have to unlock the recipes by completing an episode of the story. Like a normal otome game for mobiles, there is a prologue to introduce you to the overall theme of the game and its characters and the character selection screen which unlocks after the prologue. There are three playable characters: Kanata, Ayato and Reo. Each character specializes in a certain cuisine. Kanata specializes in Western cuisine, Ayato specializes in Japanese cuisine and Reo specializes in Chinese cuisine.  In order to proceed to the next episode you need to answer most of the current episode’s questions correctly (it will be obvious, as it will chime a happy tune after each correct answer) and gain enough points through reviewing or practicing cooking to unlock the next episode.  If you fail to give the right answer for most of the questions in the current episode, you will fail to clear it and you will need to earn enough points to unlock the same episode again.




(Screenshot during gameplay)

Characters


The characters are pretty stereotypical in terms of otome games. Kanata is the bad boy, flirty type of guy. Ayato is the studious, good looking guy but dislikes people in general and Reo is a happy go lucky, but shy little brother kind of guy. Right off the bat, my favorite would have probably been either Kanata or Reo but Ayato started growing on me as well towards the end of the prologue.  If the three routes weren’t included in the Steam version I would probably still end up buying all three characters even without the incentive to add to my recipe list.



(Boys from left to right: Reo, Kanata, Ayato)

Story


The main storyline is basically just you running a cafe day to day and how your relationship with each boy evolves into a romance.  The build up to the romance is pretty gradual with the guy dropping hints here and there between teaching you how to cook. For the most part, it’s a very innocent love but there’s a satisfying amount of it. Think SakeVisual otome games like Backstage Pass or Re: Alistair.


Recipes and Tutorials

Recipes and tutorials are the number one reason I’m interested in this game.  I love Japanese cuisine and it is hard finding restaurants or recipes as good as places I’ve eaten in Japan so when it comes to this game everything else tends to take a backseat (well almost).  

The game is structured so that after each episode, a single recipe is unlocked. The only exclusion to this rule is after the first episode of the prologue, you will receive four recipes and after the last episode of the prologue, you will receive 10 recipes.  The first four recipes are the most simple, they are tamago yaki, steamed rice and miso soup.  This game attempts to make cooking easy for the beginners by offering step by step, simple to follow instructions but it also offers invaluable tips for the more advanced cooks as well.  Take for example, steamed rice. Quite possibly the easiest item to make. I make rice almost daily, but I never knew that if I let it sit in a colander to dry for 30 minutes it would make my rice the perfect consistency when cooked, not too soggy and not too dry. It’s all about the fine details when you are making the perfect meal and this game provides plenty of helpful tips for even the more advanced cooks.

Aside from the rice, I have also tried making the Japanese curry and it came out delicious, even my family agreed. I’m always so skeptical of recipes packaged in a game because they always sound like a gimmick which is why I made it a mission to test out at least one recipe before I wrote this review. I’m very happy to report that at least two of the recipes I’ve tried in this game are quite delicious. I’m actually really excited to try the rest!


(Japanese curry recipe screenshot)


(Curry I made from following the recipe)


Summary


I have to admit I really love the concepts of Creative Freaks’ games. I really like the idea of playing a game but also improving yourself at the same time. For me, cooking is one of those necessary life skills that everyone needs in their arsenal and because of our busy lives, it’s so much easier to just go out and eat or buy quick frozen meals. Unfortunately, you never really know what companies put into those foods and eating out gets expensive. When you make your own food you are at least 90% sure what you put in it and your body will reflect those good choices.  Working out is only one part of the battle to stay healthy and this game is the perfect complement to Creative Freaks’ other game, Burn Your Fat With Me.  For the most part, this is a very well made game and it doesn’t hurt to have good looking eye candy to cheer you on as you learn to cook! I’m really looking forward to seeing other games Creative Freaks will come out with in the future.


~~~


For more information, visit:
Official Site
iOS
Google Play
Steam


Linkback: https://kokoro-cafe.net/index.php?topic=1831.0
« Last Edit: October 06, 2016, 04:36:00 AM by kokoro-cafe »



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Sakuragawa

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Cool, didn't know this game had been translated. I like voiced games. I'd like to give this game a try. But the screen/image size might be an issue.


kokoro-cafe

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@Sakuragawa Yeah, I would definitely suggest getting it for the smartphone version at this point, the ratio of the game window to the screen size is like a sixth of my laptop screen at the moment... I was really surprised when I first opened it.

Oh yeah, did you get my email? You won the grand prize for the birthday event.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2016, 04:25:26 PM by kokoro-cafe »



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