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Video games allow us to escape to places where we rescue princesses and vanquish evil. But with Cooking Mama on the Nintendo DS, you can hang up your sword and shield and just, well, cook! Choose from over 70 recipes and cook meals via sequential stylus themed mini-games. Chop and slice veggies, roll meat around in flour, and stir and boil stews all by using the DS pen and touch screen. Sometimes you must blow into the DS microphone to cool off hot food, too. Each challenge is timed and the faster you complete the task without any mistakes, the higher your rank. Combine recipes to make crazy new dishes or practice individual cooking skills in Practice Mode.
Mama resides on the top screen and doles out advice, directions and your rank. Mama's directions are clear and they even give you arrow pointer clues and lines on the touch screen to get you going. But sometimes, particular mini-games take an extra try or two to figure out exactly what you are supposed to do. Many of the tasks in the recipes are similar and get a bit repetitive, and the game as a whole is very simplistic. But for twenty bucks, it's not so bad. Graphics are basic and cartoony, but you can at least tell what everything is. Music consists of tinny piano ragtime ditties, and the cooking sound effects seem authentic. Cooking Mama serves up creative gameplay that anyone can have fun with in small portions.  
Kids love to cook. What child hasn't pulled up a chair to the kitchen counter to watch grandma bake cookies, or play pretend in their own toy kitchen? The activities are simple enough most of the time that even the youngest chefs can feel a sense of accomplishment. While there are visual cues on the touch screen to help players know what to do, reading skill is sometimes required to understand Mama's directions. There is no violence or blood; you can't cut yourself with a knife or anything. The ESRB descriptor says there is alcohol reference, but the only thing you may do in the game with that is add wine as a cooking ingredient, and that's very rarely done. Strict vegetarian parents may object to the many meat oriented recipes you can cook.
The back of the box says, "Learn to cook," but nobody can learn to cook by simply playing this game. While you may fool around with basic ingredients and preparation, it doesn't have exact measurements of food to use or cooking temperatures, so you won't know the exact recipes just by playing the game. But Cooking Mama might still at least encourage kids to ask questions and learn how to cook from a parent or older family member or friend. Kitchen safety tips are also absent. It would've been a nice reinforcement for younger gamers to know the importance of washing up before handling food, having a parent handle sharp knives and hot ovens, and not undercooking food. There are no warnings or tips about that. But still, for only 20 bucks, the game lets kids play chef on the Nintendo DS, and that's a heck of a lot cheaper than an Easy Bake Over or play kitchen. And it may pique their culinary interests, too. This review edited by Dave Long Comments? Chat about it in our forums! Format For Printing | Tell A Friend | Digg | Slashdot | del.icio.us | Buy This Game Browse Amazon.com's selection of "cooking mama" themed games Home > Review Archive > Video Games > Results: Cooking Mama |
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