I had a few different posts in the works for today, but by the time I got home I just wasn’t feeling any of them. It was a busy week at work and I just wanted to play something cozy and then blog about something light.
So I dipped back into the Whimsy and Wonder: A Cozy Games Collection Humble Bundle to try out Lemon Cake. I love cooking and baking IRL (I usually prefer cooking since it’s less exact) and I usually enjoy ingame cooking as well. I’m also a sucker for any game that allows me to collect recipes. I’m still proud of myself for collecting every recipe in Super Paper Mario. 🙂
Lemon Cake is a cute and cozy little baking game that tasks you with bringing a ruined bakery back to life. There’s the obvious baking mechanic, as well as cleaning, a little farming, and a little animal care. Think a one-room greenhouse and a couple farm animals. There appears to be an option to upgrade to a cat cafe, but I haven’t played that far yet. It’s all pretty basic and I do not say that as an insult, since “simple and cozy” was exactly what I was going for.
Take an order, mix your ingredients, make sure your stove has firewood, and don’t forget to take your creations out before they burn! You will also have to clean tables and sweep up the occasional flour spill, while juggling care of your plants and animals. The game also introduces display tables early on, and you’ll want to keep those stocked or risk losing customers who just want something to-go.
One thing I very much like is that there’s bonuses for changing up the menu, giving an incentive to try new things and rotate the menu often. There’s also bonuses for having a good variety of food, as well as gluten free and vegan options.
I only got maybe a week (game time) into it before I paused to type this up, but I’m liking what I see so far. The controls feel better than I expected from the trailer videos, and days are short enough that there’s plenty of break time between days.
There’s a little bit of time pressure since each day runs for a set amount of time with customers coming and going, and when the day ends you can’t exit out of the “end of day” screen. Or at least, I can’t find a way to exit out and tie up any loose ends. This is balanced out by the game granting free time before the day starts to tidy up, do chores, and get a head start on the baking.
I always kinda struggle with this type of game because I want to enjoy the cooking/baking/serving, but any time crunch to serve customers makes it feel less cozy to me. I suspect it’s due to too many years in retail and customer service. I have trouble relaxing even with virtual customers waiting. It might just be a Me Thing I have to come to terms with to play some of the games I want to play. (As games like this go, Lemon Cake is not bad, to be clear. I’m positive it is intended to be relaxing and slower-paced.)
Plus, I’m not sure if playing a game like this without needing any sort of time management would hold my attention. I’ve tried free play options in cooking games before and they don’t always work for me either. If anyone has good recommendations for cozy cooking games that thread that needle super well, I am open to suggestions!
Overall, this is a nice chill-out type of game and I’ll be jumping back in to play some more tonight. I’d like to unlock some more recipes and start adopting animals before I have to call it for the night.
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LFGryph 