Overcooked! is an essential purchase for anyone looking for an unforgiving but fair, exasperating but enlivening party game for friends that hopefully won’t end the night as enemies. It is a thing as close to perfect as I have played in a long time.

Overcooked is possibly one of the best smaller titles out on console right now.

At just $20-odd dollars on consoles and Steam, and with so much replayability with friends, it’s hard to go past this charming little indie title. It’s as simple as they come in terms of what you need to do, but actually doing it is an entirely other thing and you’ll find yourself wanting to wave your cleaver at your teammates in pure, ecstatic frustration, such is the sum of its basic ingredients.

If you have three friends near your couch, this game is a blast. Otherwise there are better options available on the market.

A tasty multiplayer morsel that tests eye-to-mouth as well as hand-to-eye co-ordination. [Oct 2016, p.96]

Once I played the multiplayer mode, Overcooked truly surprised me. This can easily be one of the main multiplayer games any gamer will pull out when they have friends over, as it’s very simple to learn and will have everyone laughing when barking orders at one another. It’s got a unique concept, great gameplay, and almost anyone can enjoy its simple premise. If you don’t have anyone to play with though it’s going to be a frustrating and dull experience, but if you can get even a single person to play with you, Overcooked will have you coming back for one more order.

The lack of online will clearly put off a few people; however, some odd design choices in scoring and the lack of any true single-player gameplay really stops Overcooked from being the game it could be.