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Gordon Ramsay is a guy that you have a strong opinion about. Either you get him or you don’t. If all you ever saw was him on Hell’s Kitchen or Kitchen Nightmares, you might think that he was only pompous. But if you delve a little further and read his autobiography you might form a different opinion. He certainly is a guy who was driven to perfection, and deeper knowledge of his past shows that he was driven to seek that level at the end of a belt-strap. He was abused by his father, and the chefs who he worked under who were true mad men. Gordon’s legendary temper isn’t excused by his Charles Dickens upbringing, but it does set it context. I wondered how this could possibly be played out in a fashion that would work in a video game with a T for Teen rating. And on a Nintendo console no less, which is known for it’s kiddy park collection of games and uber family values dogma. It’s done with a significant amount of bleeps, that’s how. Yet you can tell exactly which colorful metaphors he is admonishing you with.
So why would you set yourself up for this sort of abuse voluntarily when your livelihood isn’t at stake like it is in Kitchen Nightmares, or to win a restaurant of your own, instead to listen to Gordon’s harangues merely for points?
The Brit-speak patois of peppery jargon is what makes the game very amusing. The spin takes the humor of cooking games to a little more realistic and less cartoonish place.
Clearly a a rip off of the huge seller Diner Dash, game - play is identical yet with a bit of finesse. You start off as a dishwasher. Then you are expected to make it to head chef, under Gordon Ramsay. You greet the customers, where is Jean-Philippe? You wait tables, cook the meals and then bus the tables.
Ingredients have to be tapped to be “prepared” and this is where I ran into a problem tapping, scratching and sliding my stylus 9 times out of 10 did not work. Is it possible that my original DS touch screen is wearing out? The food bowls are then dragged to the stove. If that isn’t enough stress there are challenging time limits.
With each successive day you are given more tables, and more ingredients all with different cooking times. If you fail Ramsay shuts the restaurant doors and you have to start over.
Peering down at you from the top screen is Gordon Ramsay with a flaming meter. Arcade mode has orders coming in non - stop.
The graphics on the realistic likeness of Ramsay are well done. But the game play screen has icons that are too tiny to see. The animations are also hardly noticeable. The game itself needed much more attention to detail. There are a few real world Ramsay recipes provided. I also played the PC version of the game which was better. Easier to see and the graphics were fuller.
Hell’s Kitchen is a fun cooking game. It can’t compare to Cooking Mama, but it is a fun game. If you are a cooking game enthusiast or if you are a Ramsey fan you may enjoy the game. I give Hell’s Kitchen DS an average score of 6 flaming skillets out of 10.
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