When first seeing Lost Recipes, I thought this is certainly a new avenue for the team at Schell Games – but with their track record of making excellent games, I was eager to see what they could do. I have now been in the kitchen cooking some lost recipes, but did the game leave a nice flavour in my mouth?
Gameplay
As you will get from the title of the game, this is all about making drinks and cooking up some dishes in VR. The game is called Lost Recipes as you are going to cook some old classics from Greece, China and the Yucatan Peninsula, as a chef for ghosts from around the time of the recipes.
The game comes with nine recipes over all, three for each region. This will see you making drinks like wines, cups of tea, and spiced hot chocolate, and sweet and savoury foods. With these being older recipes the is no ovens or any advancements, and will see you heating all the cooking pots with wood fires, using stone ovens, simple grills and even cooking under banana leaves covered piles of dirt.
Each region will start off with a simple recipe and end on a more advanced one, with them getting harder in each region you unlock and play. With each recipe feeling different even though some might have repeated steps. At the end the ghost your are cooking for will rate your food out of five-stars, after eating and drinking what you have prepared. If there is something wrong with the recipe they will give you a hint on the score screen, for example; ‘I could hardly taste the salt in the pita. Let’s add a bit more next time’.
All the cooking mechanics are fantastically implemented, from preparing to cooking, and makes for a pleasant experience when cooking these unique dishes. However, you will come across some interaction bugs that can annoy you at times. With the main issue being able to grab ingredients through the pots and dishes, which can sometimes see you remove items without noticing – effecting your star rating as something was missing.
Presentation
With the game coming from an accomplished VR studio, the visuals have been designed with the experience in mind. Bringing a visual style that although not hyper-realistic brings each destination to life inline with the timeline you are cooking in. Also bringing enough realism to make the experience immersive enough to land.
The audio in the game really sets the scene for the period you are in, with the atmosphere being perfect to keep you immersed in each kitchen and time frame. Add to this great voice acting for the ghosts teaching you the recipes adding to the overall experience of the game – with them all being voiced by people with ties to each historical culture.
Comfort/Controls
When if comes to comfort, the game can be played seated and standing and offers teleport movement to set points in the kitchen. With the option to grab work tops and move them up and down to place yourself correctly. This mechanic can also be used to navigate to other teleport points if they are next to each other, like moving from one Wok to the one next to it.
Where the lack of free-locomotion is something that seems to be a burning point in the VR community at the moment, I really don’t think the Lost Recipes experience is something that suffers from this not being included. So, if this is putting you off trying the game, I would recommend giving it a chance.
Control-wise, all you will be using is the analogues to teleport to the set points around the kitchens, and the trigger and grab buttons – which is a ll the game needs. The only other buttons with an action applied to them is the B and Y button, holding them will reset your view.
Longevity
Overall it took me around one hour to get through all nine recipes, and I got all of them apart from three with five-star ratings. I will go back in and get five-stars on the ones I never on the first play-through but, once I have those, I do not think I would go back to it myself. However, I will use it when introducing people to virtual reality, as it is a comfortable experience and a good introduction to VR.
Reviewed using Meta Quest 2
For the purposes of transparency, this review was created using a review code provided by the company or their respective PR company. The use of a press code does not affect my judgement of the product.
Review Overview
Lost Recipes takes a more relaxing approach to the cooking simulator genre, with not having exact measurements and giving you a clear indication when something is done – with gold sparks and a noise prompt. Making learning these ancient recipes more of a relaxing experience, with the touch of authenticity using people with historical links to voice the ghosts. With only nine recipes and how the game plays, it feels like it was made for only play-through for most users. Although, people who want to try and learn the recipes for their own kitchens, might find it educational enough to go back to learn. I do feel the team have taken this into account when pricing of Lost Recipes, and if you want a relaxing cooking experience, that is also perfect for showing friends and family VR, this could be for you.
