Quick Time Event Simulator? (Update)

[LucidCypher]

I've added the developer response to the top of this because I feel like that's the most important thing to take away from it. This developer is very responsive to community feedback (which is why I'm giving it!), and I have high hopes and expectations for this game. I do implore everyone to wait for the full game before making any final decisions.

Publicado originalmente por chubigans:

First off I want to thank you for your feedback! I do completely understand where you're coming from.

When we transitioned from CSD 1 to CSD 2, I had a lot of negative reviews from people that were angry about how the game played from the first game- it no longer felt like you were running your own restaurant, the difficulty spike was massive, and so on. The launch itself was extremely rough. Eventually we added a lot of new features and CSD 3 was the evolution of CSD 2- and with that came another enormous spike in difficulty. I love difficult games and I think the series thrived on this notion.

Looking hard at the possibility of CSD 4, I realized we hit the ceiling. There was not going to be a way to make this game more difficult than it already was. At the same time, we were losing our audience along the way- I could see what a turn off CSD 3 was at the initial outset when we did a lot of sponsored streams.

Now I think CSD 3 is a fantastic game and we nailed a lot of it- and that 95% rating proves it. But I also think making CSD 4, and essentially keeping the same kind of gameplay, would be a mistake. After making a series of games that average 100-200 hours together, I was ready for something new. I wanted to hit the reset button.

Making this demo was very difficult- do we make a very brutally hard game so we can show our superfans that this can scale up really hard? Do we make it super easy for newcomers? We ultimately settled on a more moderate difficulty that is still proving to be a bit too hard for some, and we're going to patch the demo with a chill mode.

I'm really excited and encouraged that people are loving the direction we're going with this demo- getting feedback from Twitter, ResetERA, our Discord, it's all been really great. At the same time I recognize that this is a fundamental departure from our last games and some won't like it, and that's why we released this demo- so that you don't buy the full version and leave a bad review, asking why the game does not play like the others.

This is the new direction and I understand if it's not one that appeals to you, but I do hope this helps put it in a bit more perspective.

-David

--

OG post:

I mean ... that really is what it feels like. You all know those parts in games. Your character starts to fall off a cliff. A zombie jumps on you and tries to bite you. Suddenly, a sequence of buttons appears, and you press them as quickly as you can to fend off the threat! Only, once you've successfully pressed them, the game is supposed to continue. In Cook Serve Forever, that is the game.

The developer's other works made sense. In the Cook, Serve, Delicious trilogy, when you were fixing a burger, you might press "P" for "patty" and "C" for "cheese", but in this newest game, you're thrown random arrow key/button prompts with various numbers of presses. It could still be fun except that the pace is so quick that all you really get a chance to do is ... stare at the prompt.

As a typing game, with letters related to the ingredients, this works. It works masterfully, and I adore it. This demo, unfortunately, falls far short of their other games. Unless they find a way to make the button presses feel like anything more than a QTE, this won't work, and that's overwhelmingly disappointing.

I'm posting this opinion here in the discussions while the demo is out because I don't want this opinion to end up a review. I want this game to succeed. It's clear that it's a work of love, and there was a spark of fun in here. I played through the demo five times before I started to feel this way. I don't want this to feel like a slam or ridiculing. What I'm trying to do here is to express how I felt while playing it--the initial excitement, then the sort of confusion, and then the realization of what was happening. First impressions can be so important for a game, and I wanted to share mine so that the developer (I have faith in you!) won't have opinions like this feel like they're coming out of nowhere and has a chance to consider how to address anything they may feel is an issue.

Edit: Changed the name of the thread. It was meant to be playful, but after looking at it for a bit, I feel like it came off more as mocking, and that was not my intention.

[Limitbreakz]

Mostly....

[axios2006]

Hi,
just a note... This is "Cook Serve Forever". It's not "Cook, Serve, Delicious 4". It's a different game, as the store page says...

"Chop, stir, and sauté your way through the bustling solarpunk city of Helianthus as Nori Kaga, a food cart chef aspiring to make it big like her role model, the Culinary Queen, Chef Rhubarb.

The dramatic fully-voiced story stars Elspeth Eastman (League of Legends), Maya Aoki Tuttle (Destiny 2), Emme Montgomery (Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!), Broden Kelly (Aunty Donna), SungWon Cho (God of War: Ragnarök, Boyfriend Dungeon), Jennifer Roberts (Triangle Strategy) and more!"

[LucidCypher]

Publicado originalmente por axios2006:

Hi,
just a note... This is "Cook Serve Forever". It's not "Cook, Serve, Delicious 4". It's a different game, as the store page says...

"Chop, stir, and sauté your way through the bustling solarpunk city of Helianthus as Nori Kaga, a food cart chef aspiring to make it big like her role model, the Culinary Queen, Chef Rhubarb.

The dramatic fully-voiced story stars Elspeth Eastman (League of Legends), Maya Aoki Tuttle (Destiny 2), Emme Montgomery (Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!), Broden Kelly (Aunty Donna), SungWon Cho (God of War: Ragnarök, Boyfriend Dungeon), Jennifer Roberts (Triangle Strategy) and more!"

You're missing the entire point.

[LucidCypher]

On different note, I've added a paragraph for more clarity regarding my intentions here.

[axios2006]

Publicado originalmente por Dredgy in the Straw:

Publicado originalmente por axios2006:

Hi,
just a note... This is "Cook Serve Forever". It's not "Cook, Serve, Delicious 4". It's a different game, as the store page says...

"Chop, stir, and sauté your way through the bustling solarpunk city of Helianthus as Nori Kaga, a food cart chef aspiring to make it big like her role model, the Culinary Queen, Chef Rhubarb.

The dramatic fully-voiced story stars Elspeth Eastman (League of Legends), Maya Aoki Tuttle (Destiny 2), Emme Montgomery (Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?!), Broden Kelly (Aunty Donna), SungWon Cho (God of War: Ragnarök, Boyfriend Dungeon), Jennifer Roberts (Triangle Strategy) and more!"

You're missing the entire point.

Given that you start from a comparison with the first 3....

Publicado originalmente por Dredgy in the Straw:

....

The first three entries in the Cook, Serve, (Delicious?) series made sense. When you were fixing a burger, you might press "P" for "patty" and "C" for "cheese", but in this new installment, you're thrown random arrow key/button prompts with various numbers of presses. It could still be fun except that the pace is so quick that all you really get a chance to do is ... stare at the prompt.

.....

Anyway, be sure that Dev read all.

[LucidCypher]

Publicado originalmente por axios2006:

Given that you start from a comparison with the first 3....

Publicado originalmente por Dredgy in the Straw:

....

The first three entries in the Cook, Serve, (Delicious?) series made sense. When you were fixing a burger, you might press "P" for "patty" and "C" for "cheese", but in this new installment, you're thrown random arrow key/button prompts with various numbers of presses. It could still be fun except that the pace is so quick that all you really get a chance to do is ... stare at the prompt.

.....

Anyway, be sure that Dev read all.

I've fixed it for you. It now reads, "The developer's other works made sense. In the Cook, Serve, Delicious trilogy, when you were fixing a burger, you might press "P" for "patty" and "C" for "cheese", but in this newest game, you're thrown random arrow key/button prompts with various numbers of presses. It could still be fun except that the pace is so quick that all you really get a chance to do is ... stare at the prompt."

And I think you're not giving the dev enough credit assuming that the post won't be read.

I would also like to point out that the game is literally under the category: All Games > Simulation Games > Cook, Serve, Delicious! Franchise > Cook Serve Forever

[chubigans]

First off I want to thank you for your feedback! I do completely understand where you're coming from.

When we transitioned from CSD 1 to CSD 2, I had a lot of negative reviews from people that were angry about how the game played from the first game- it no longer felt like you were running your own restaurant, the difficulty spike was massive, and so on. The launch itself was extremely rough. Eventually we added a lot of new features and CSD 3 was the evolution of CSD 2- and with that came another enormous spike in difficulty. I love difficult games and I think the series thrived on this notion.

Looking hard at the possibility of CSD 4, I realized we hit the ceiling. There was not going to be a way to make this game more difficult than it already was. At the same time, we were losing our audience along the way- I could see what a turn off CSD 3 was at the initial outset when we did a lot of sponsored streams.

Now I think CSD 3 is a fantastic game and we nailed a lot of it- and that 95% rating proves it. But I also think making CSD 4, and essentially keeping the same kind of gameplay, would be a mistake. After making a series of games that average 100-200 hours together, I was ready for something new. I wanted to hit the reset button.

Making this demo was very difficult- do we make a very brutally hard game so we can show our superfans that this can scale up really hard? Do we make it super easy for newcomers? We ultimately settled on a more moderate difficulty that is still proving to be a bit too hard for some, and we're going to patch the demo with a chill mode.

I'm really excited and encouraged that people are loving the direction we're going with this demo- getting feedback from Twitter, ResetERA, our Discord, it's all been really great. At the same time I recognize that this is a fundamental departure from our last games and some won't like it, and that's why we released this demo- so that you don't buy the full version and leave a bad review, asking why the game does not play like the others.

This is the new direction and I understand if it's not one that appeals to you, but I do hope this helps put it in a bit more perspective.

-David

[chubigans]

As a quick side note- I do think there are improvements to be made with the flow, and we're doing just that! Expect a lot of fixes between now and April. I think my primary point is to set expectations right as the core flow of the game will be built upon and not necessarily changed. The reason I called it Cook Serve Forever is both to not make it seem like it's Cook Serve Forever 4 while also not excluding the possibility of a CSD 4 in the far future.

[LucidCypher]

I appreciate your response. I'm hoping that my post here came off as honest but not mean. I'll be keeping an eye on this. I'm a massive fan of CSD 1 and 2, and I probably would be of 3 if it clicked a little better in my brain--but point being, I'm a longtime fan, and I want to see your newest game succeed even if it does turn out that it's not my kind of game, and I know there will be additions. I gave my feedback because I know that you listen. I still remember, in CSD2, people (myself included) were sad to see the random daily challenges go away, and you added an option, after release, to be able to randomize your menu items so that we could still do something similar. I'll be watching this game until the day you've decided you're done with it, and if I never end up feeling it, I'll still be watching out for your new ones. Take care, and I'd say good luck, but you don't need it. ;)

[FL]

Publicado originalmente por chubigans:

First off I want to thank you for your feedback! I do completely understand where you're coming from.

When we transitioned from CSD 1 to CSD 2, I had a lot of negative reviews from people that were angry about how the game played from the first game- it no longer felt like you were running your own restaurant, the difficulty spike was massive, and so on. The launch itself was extremely rough. Eventually we added a lot of new features and CSD 3 was the evolution of CSD 2- and with that came another enormous spike in difficulty. I love difficult games and I think the series thrived on this notion.

Looking hard at the possibility of CSD 4, I realized we hit the ceiling. There was not going to be a way to make this game more difficult than it already was. At the same time, we were losing our audience along the way- I could see what a turn off CSD 3 was at the initial outset when we did a lot of sponsored streams.

Now I think CSD 3 is a fantastic game and we nailed a lot of it- and that 95% rating proves it. But I also think making CSD 4, and essentially keeping the same kind of gameplay, would be a mistake. After making a series of games that average 100-200 hours together, I was ready for something new. I wanted to hit the reset button.

Making this demo was very difficult- do we make a very brutally hard game so we can show our superfans that this can scale up really hard? Do we make it super easy for newcomers? We ultimately settled on a more moderate difficulty that is still proving to be a bit too hard for some, and we're going to patch the demo with a chill mode.

I'm really excited and encouraged that people are loving the direction we're going with this demo- getting feedback from Twitter, ResetERA, our Discord, it's all been really great. At the same time I recognize that this is a fundamental departure from our last games and some won't like it, and that's why we released this demo- so that you don't buy the full version and leave a bad review, asking why the game does not play like the others.

This is the new direction and I understand if it's not one that appeals to you, but I do hope this helps put it in a bit more perspective.

-David

Thanks for the explanation and i feel like this should becomes a dev post on the News section at some point because there are going to be many ppl judging this game by comparing it to the previous titles.

I had many thoughts about the demo before reading this too but now i guess they all make more senses now. If the game is going to the new direction then you can't really say it is right or wrong.

[BACON WARRIOR]

This game use to be good I don't know what they were thinking changing it to an qte game. It's not good at all

[axios2006]

Publicado originalmente por BACON WARRIOR:

This game use to be good I don't know what they were thinking changing it to an qte game. It's not good at all

Hi, it's not CSD 4 and the Dev has not excluded the possibility of creating a CSD 4 in the future...

[Dimanche]

I wish the arrows QTE was it's own game mode...