You have to give the casual game market a lot of credit. What other industry would make matching or serving millions of people food and drinks quickly fun? In fact, the whole dining house could be considered to be a cliché by now. How many games are there about overworked people tending a diner of some sort for a change of pace? This was in the forefront of my mind as I played Amelie’s Cafe.
Amelie’s Cafe follows a young woman by the same name who goes to take care of her grandfather’s cafe while he is on vacation. However, when she arrives, she finds the shop in disrepair. She’s then recruited to be the new and only waitress for the restaurant.
If this sounds highly familiar, it is. The game does not tread any new plot ground that any other casual game has not covered. The 18-year-old college girl goes to help her overworked grandfather and the various cooks who work there. There is no real plot or character development as you read little tidbits about them in Amelie’s diary and in the few comic-book screens.
You point and click the proper grill for hamburgers, fries, pop, steak, pizza and alcohol. Each chef creates their signature dishes at various speeds and makes varying degrees of debris on the grill. Different customers have various degrees of patience and can be annoying by requesting multiple items in a row. So you have to juggle the customers’ requests with keeping the grills clean. Then you get a power-up tip for serving the customers quickly. Matching three grill brushes quickly cleans all the grill spots, three candies improves everyone’s mood, dollar signs provide a quick boost to your score, and snowflakes freeze’s everything on screen and allows Amelie to catch up with all the insanity. Furthermore, every few levels the restaurant gets renovated. As far as I can tell, it just improves the aesthetics of the cafe.
Graphically, Amelie’s Cafe is cartoony. Think something along the lines of a Saturday morning cartoon. Each character has their own little quirks. Amelie looks like the traditional female college with a passion for looking hip. One cook loves music and constantly wears headphones and a hat. Another cook always has her blonde hair in a braid. Amelie herself moves around the screen quickly and will raise and lower her hands depending on the situation. Customers even display their discontent if you take too long.
Audio wise, everything is solid. The stoves grill, icy winds chill the screen, magical “drops” clean the grill and the sound of the cash register dings for every purchase. Then there’s the perky instrumental music that plays as you fulfill requests. It doesn’t get annoying, but it would be nicer to hear more variety. And to its detriment, or advantage, is the lack of voice acting.
Yet, I found Amelie’s Cafe to be a decent way to spend 20 minutes of my time. Yet again, I am not a casual gamer. I do not find this type of game highly enjoyable. I feel it is boring as there is no character interaction or growth. There is nothing unique about this game that can suck the player into its world. But what it is there is well-done. I also find it highly disturbing that teenage girls can order alcohol without any consequence.
For casual gamers, this is a solid purchase. It’ll keep you busy while you search for other games to play. If you found certain games too formal, Amelie’s Cafe is the opposite. Its hip and casual feel will appeal to your the inner teenager. For $7, there are few games in the genre that perform this well. So who’s up for some cafe-styled comfort food?
