Epic Chef

Similar to Overcooked, but in single-player format, Epic Chef is a deft blend of adventure, cooking, and management (of a farm and then a restaurant) set in a pirate world with 3D graphics and plenty of magic. The characters have loads of personality and the situations are hilarious. A real gem!

If you're familiar with cooking games like Cooking star, culinary party games like Overcooked!, and life simulators like Hokko life and Animal Crossing, this game has a bit of all three. It's a surprisingly delicious recipe that combines farming, management, cooking, and humour.

From growing your own ingredients to competing in cook-offs judged by a donkey, in this game there's always something to keep you laughing.

Setting sail aboard a ship as a stowaway, after a long journey Zest ends up on an island that's home to the new house that he buys without so much as a viewing. But there's a hitch: the residents of the island all say that the house is haunted.

Your job is to uncover the truth, and along the way remembering to repair your home, open a restaurant, play some golf, start a farm... and much more besides.

We loved the graphics, story, and characters. Every resident has their own unique personality, and the cartoony graphics are a beauty to behold. The quirky plot has lots to keep you smiling, and the simulation aspect promises hours of fun. This isn't a short little game, but rather a full adventure with hundreds of hours' playtime in store.

Our favourite part? The way that Epic Chef has so much more to offer than just cooking. There's the cook-off battles, of course, but before you compete you'll need to grow the right ingredients. And this couldn't be easier: your newly purchased property comes with grounds that you can use as a field to grow magic vegetables. You'll need to cut down trees and sow seeds, which is where the farming part of the game comes in.

It's satisfying to watch your crops grow, but once you've harvested your produce you can sell it to make some extra money or, better yet, cook up a storm. And that's where Epic Chef really shines through its cooking component. Not only will you be cooking up recipes, but you'll also need give your dishes plenty of flavour, just like a real MasterChef. You'll have to master which ingredients go best together, combining the best ones to create extraordinary meals. All of the items in Ambrosia can be used as ingredients, and there's plenty to learn with 100,000 possible combinations!

When you create a dish, be that in a cook-off or in your restaurant, be sure to give your imagination free rein. Try to use the most extravagant ingredients to crush to competition and win the day.

We loved the freedom to explore to your heart's content. While it's true that you need to follow the story to unlock particular areas, you can also spend your time completing side quests for the other residents of Ambrosia. For example: if you want to go catching rats for the cat at the fountain, go right ahead!

Two little tips before we go: if you're looking for roast chicken, try bashing some particular walls. And if you manage to hatch the mysterious egg you come across on your journey, you'll gain a trusty mount with some very useful items that will speed things up for you.

But you didn't hear it from us!

Where Epic Chef is really surprising, though, is that behind its cute graphics and plenty of laughs lies a bona fide strategy game.

It's a great game for fans of quirky stories, budding chefs, and management and life simulator fans.

A real must-play! Worthy of three videogaming Michelin stars!