Battle Chef Brigade is a fantastic addition to the Nintendo Switch’s lineup of indie titles that everyone should give a try. The game ran beautifully in both portable and docked modes at a crisp 60 FPS and I never encountered a glitch or bug to ruin my experience, showing the studios talent to provide a properly polished game. I fell in love with this game during my time at E3 and now that the final product is finally here, I can safely say the game not only met my expectations, but surpassed them as my new favourite Indie currently offered on the Nintendo Switch.
A delightful snack-sized game that combines its disparate elements in a whimsical, entertaining way. I loved the style and the occasional clever puns. The kitchen battles to be a lot of fun, especially because they were timed, and used match-3 mechanics in an innovative way. If you’re a fan of Iron Chef, Studio Ghibli, or both, you’ll like enjoy this foray into the world of Victusia.
This game is soooooooooooo much fun the characters are great the story ok and the game play is super good the only downside are the long loading screens and the short campaign.
Battle Chef Bridge is breezy and fun, offering roughly 8 to 10 hours of stressful cooking with a decent narrative and beautiful pastel visuals to pull it along. It may seem lighthearted and innocent, but it succeeds more in being overly chaotic in its match-three gameplay.
Battle Chef Brigade is the first game of its kind, a rarity in this day and age. Everything about it is fresh and original, from its story to the handrawn graphics, to the brilliant voice acting. The combination of fast-paced action, RPG-style gear collecting and puzzle elements wrapped into a game about cooking is something that sounds absurd but works incredibly well. Like a well-made dish, each element of Battle Chef Brigade's gameplay is perfectly prepared. You could separate out each of the three main components of this game and have the foundation for something intriguing on its own, but it's the combination of them that forms something truly memorable. Whether you think you'd like this or not, we recommend at least giving it a look. Battle Chef Brigade is a must-play for all Switch owners.
I love the premise of this game, which folds together so many of my favorite things: platformers, mobile-style brain-suck puzzles, sexy orcs and overly complicated meals. And I love so, so much of its execution, especially the gorgeous art and music...But everything feels, from top to bottom, like it knows it ought to be a movie instead of a game — at times, it even comes off like it’s apologizing for not being one. Some titles can walk this line between movie and game, soaring with cinematic intensity while the gameplay itself enriches the plot. Battle Chef Brigade, sadly, isn’t one of them.
This game wanted to sell us a fantasy rpg story featuring cooking with battle chefs. It delivers in both themes thanks to an amazing art and story direction, solid music and fun mechanics.
Duration: 9 hours. Easy and hard mode and online challenges for extended replayability.
Pros:
-The art direction is gorgeous. Hand-made and vivid.
-Realistic and relatable characters
-The story and settings are introduced very well.
-Fun combat and cooking mechanics.
-Customization allows for a lot of styles of playing.
-Cons:
-No loose ends on the story, but somehow you are left wanting more of the world.
-The battle and cooking idea limits the overall product. The game is perfect on its own but It's hard to see how it could be improved.
I hope to see more from the studio and congratulations in such an amazing feat.
A weird mix of mechanisms (a light platform for collecting, a light match three for cooking, a light rpg for the story) which works together nicely with nice graphics. Not the best game ever, but fairly good enough.
I tried really hard to like Battle Chef Brigade. It's by no means bad, but after finishing it, I feel like it has some big issues that will prevent me from going back.
The cooking part is pretty fun, but I can't say (after finishing the game mind you) that I have any idea what I'm doing. The mechanics are fun, but I find some of the time limits a bit too strict for me to be able to actually plan out more than one meal, and instead I just throw stuff in based on color rather than what might actually work out together as a meal.
The action is pretty weak. Controls are floaty, hit boxes seem kinda wonky, and there is basically 0 difficulty involved in the action sequences. The idea of fighting interesting monsters to cook their innards is cool, but there aren't that many types of enemies, and there are basically only 3 areas with 3-5 different enemies to beat. After a few chapters, you'll basically have seen every ingredient in the game.
The graphics are nice, but the hand animated anime-styled sprites are probably animated 'on twos' for a lot of actions, which looks pretty jarring with the game running at 60 fps. Some battle animations look really good, Mina's dash/parry looks great, and her somersault kick attack also looks good. But the walking animations all look kinda floaty, some attacks seem/feel really slow, and it annoyed me.
The story is pretty bland, and the first 3 (of 6) chapters have nothing going on, then there's a bit of plot in chapter 4. Finally, I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next... then chapter 5 is filler.
The big bad is unremarkable, we only see him for the first time in the game in the second to last scene in the game. The good guys are also unremarkable, although nice and pleasant, their personalities are so weak and interchangeable that I wouldn't be able to tell who is talking without looking at the names on top of the text bubbles. There's basically no personal growth going on for anyone, good or bad. The voice acting is pretty good at least. The fake accents may annoy some.
All said and done, I'd like to see a vastly improved sequel. With good action, a solid story, and interesting characters, it would be right up my alley. I suppose you could say that about any average game, but I do like the concept. I'm just disappointed with the execution.
I finished playing BCB (Battle Chef Brigade) yesterday and gave myself time to reflect on the game itself. I bought this when the day the game was released, but with finals and adult responsibilities I put off playing the majority of the game until recently. That being said, the game is not long by any means and if you don't completely **** at bejeweled-like puzzles, the game should take you no longer than 10 hours to finish the story.
Without spoiling too much of the story, 100 years ago monsters had wiped out most of the animal population which led to a chef and a soldier creating a culinary school designed to train "chef-soldiers," to fight monsters and cook them. You play as Mina Han, a young cook who's dream is to be free from her nest and showcase her cooking, through join the brigade. She makes a few friends on the way while weaving through twists and turns at almost every corner.
BCB in its basic form is a puzzle game tied together with a side scrolling brawler, with some elements of RPGs included. During hunting portion of the game, players are required to go kill these monsters for monster parts, in which the parts will be made into some delectable creations. Each monster part has a combination of 1-4 orbs ranging from 3 different colours. During the cooking portion of the game, the player "stirs" the dish and combines orbs of the same colour. You are given cooking utensils and accessories to assist you in your conquest to be there best chef at the brigade, as well as items that help you out while hunting.
BCB does a lot of things right. It's a lighthearted, fun adventure and the art and scenery fit hand in hand with the overall theme of the game. The dishes in which you create look awesome and I found myself trying new ingredients to see just how many dishes I could create. While there's not a lot of actual animation, the game looks tremendous and the attention to detail is incredible. The voice acting was unexpected, but I thought it was well done and add a bit of depth to the characters. Unfortunately, that's everything positive for the game.
The game is short on actual things to do. Yes the cooking and hunting is fun when combined, but when you're not battling to be the best chef, part time jobs are offered for you to make money, and split the core game into hunting, stirring, and puzzle solving on their own. Without the competitiveness of a timer and trying to score higher than your opponent, these mini versions of the game fall flat.
The story starts off good, but becomes a tangled mess through the end. I won't spoil anything, but I will say you don't change characters suddenly when you're like 70% through the game already, and then change again. It breaks the flow and narrative already established. And kind of a nitpicky thing for me, there were times when I was playing the game undocked and I couldn't hear the voice acting over the music. I know this is something small and not really game breaking, but if you add voice acting, it's sloppy if you can't actually hear what the actors are saying.
This is a clear indie game, and I had high hopes coming into this. I love cooking and was hoping this would scratch an itch for me, but I was overall disappointed. If Trinket studios were to revisit the world of Victusia, I think they can do better. Mix the sound better, make a story that flows and if you want to take the game to the next level, let me make my own character. I thought Mina's story was fine, I just wished I got to customize her appearance a bit, you know, give me a little bit more freedom.
SummaryBattle Chef Brigade features fantasy chefs, including Orcs, Elves, and Humans, who need to hunt dangerous monsters for ingredients. With those ingredients, before the critical eye of the judges, the chefs create culinary masterpieces in an intense tournament.