iPhone App: Hell’s Kitchen

February 9th, 2009

= 3 stars

Hell’s Kitchen is a video game version of the reality TV show of the same name. You play a chef whose tasks are to cook and wait tables without screwing things up and incurring the wrath of the notoriously hot-tempered chef Gordon Ramsay.

The Good

• Seems to accurately recreate the high-stress dinner service endured by the wanna-be chefs on the show. You wait on several tables of demanding customers while simultaneously preparing their meals. Although it boils down to timing exercise, you often know things are falling apart well before they actually do. That feeling of pure dread is, I suppose, entertaining.
• That dreadful feeling is compounded by a virtual chef Ramsay. He occupies the screen’s upper left corner, arms crossed, just waiting for you to screw up. A burning thermometer measures his satisfaction at your efforts, and he seems to start every dinner service already lukewarm. He tosses out verbal quips based on your performance.
• Two modes: career, where you spend several weeks trying to build up your skills day after day, and arcade, where you just handle the kitchen but with more ingredients and two meals to prepare simultaneously. The career mode is for long term play, while arcade is meant for short entertainment.
• Each level introduces a new, actual recipe so after completing the entire game, you’ll have a cookbook on your iPhone.

The Bad

• The game itself doesn’t contain any cooking techniques — you’re just presented with bowls of major food groups to touch and drag. The cooking experience is therefore more like fast food with a bunch of timers and buzzers. It could have been an interesting challenge to choose exotic ingredients and perform the motions of chopping, stirring, or flipping.
• You wait tables and run the kitchen at the same time. Essentially, this crazy restaurant is basically run entirely by two people: you, and a pissed off boss watching your every move.
• The game could have incorporated more aspects of the television show. One possibility would be other computer chefs to compete against. You would work side-by-side with them in the kitchen, and they could screw things up (maybe deliberate sabotage), or help you.
• The virtual Gordon Ramsay is oddly tame. I was expecting to get called “f***ing pathetic,” see burnt salmon fly across the screen, or see some risotto vomit. Maybe there’s a PG-13 setting that’s on by default.

Conclusion

I’ve enjoyed playing Hell’s Kitchen, but it feels a bit off on several counts: it doesn’t contain a lot of what makes the television show entertaining, and more frustratingly, I don’t feel I’ve learned much about cooking. What it does achieve is create a feeling of terror to where I do not want to work in a restaurant. Perhaps that is the true intent of game: to remind us all that cooking is hellishly hard, tedious work.

Recommended only if you’re a fan of his television shows — otherwise, the $5.99 would be better spent on one of Ramsay’s cookbooks.

iTunes App Store Link: