Cooking Mama 2 is a fun single player cooking game with a two player mode to go against each other. This game is for both kids and adults. It’s simple so people don’t have to watch any gameplays or extra instructions. This game isn’t just preparing dishes, you can also have a cook off with “Mama” and even learn a few things about cooking. If you don’t want to play Cooking Mama you can also play Gardening Mama where you help Mama plant vegetables, fruit, and more! Cooking Mama teaches us that mistakes are gonna happen, everything isn’t going to be perfect, but it’s the effort that counts. Cooking Mama is a great game for kids or adults who want to begin a cooking career and work on being more patient. Cooking Mama is only on Nintendo Switch, PS4, Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS. There are also spin offs on Wii, DS, and 3DS. You can play Cooking Mama offline but it is better if you play online.
Cooking Mama has 5 games and the first game is about cooking and preparing dishes; Cooking Mama 2 has 5 modes. The first mode is “Cook with Mama” where you can practice cooking and plating the food. The second mode is “Let’s Cook!” and it’s a more challenging mode where the player is not given instructions but cannot mess anything up because a character will try the food and rate it. The third mode is “Cooking Contest” and the player is given challenges to complete by solo or with friends wirelessly, and the challenges get harder over time. The fourth mode is “Change Design” where you can design and customize different parts and areas in the game, such as changing Mama’s outfit and giving her accessories, different utensils, kitchen background, and kitchenware. Now the fifth mode is “Write in Diary,” where players can review photos that have been taken throughout the game, and customize the photos by adding stickers, stamps, and decals. The last mode is “Options,” which consists of reviewing credits, sending a demo to other DS consoles, and clearing data when storage gets full or unorganized.
Now onto Cooking Mama 3: “Shop and Chop.” It is only for Nintendo DS, and is more advanced than Cooking Mama 2. Cooking Mama 3 has more modes and has a bigger customization category such as different outfit colors, accessories, kitchen, tools, and top screen with 15 different wallpaper options. Nintendo added 3 more modes such as “Let’s Match,” which lets the player pick two ingredients and try to match them and create the dish without Mama’s help. The second mode is “Let’s Shop,” this is one of the newest modes they added into the game where you guide Ichigo, (Mama’s and Papa’s daughter), to pick up groceries for Mama. The third mode is “Let’s Get Fancy,” which includes dressing up Mama in bandanas, earrings, accessories, and costumes. There are also more colors for “Change Design” as well as new mini-games such as “Let’s Help,” “Use The Vacuum,” “Put It Away,” “Separate The Trash,” and many more! The creators have added 80 different dishes to create!
Cooking Mama 4 is a game for Nintendo DS just like the other Cooking Mama games, but was taken off the Eshop on March 27, 2023. April 3, 2023 was the last day to redeem any download codes. Lastly, Cooking Mama 5: “Bon Appétit,” was published on November 21, 2013 and is only made for Nintendo 3DS. Cooking Mama 5 has 5 new modes. The first mode is “Cooking Dojo,” where you gain medals faster by doing fast time challenges, but creating too many mistakes leads to failing a dish. Thankfully, the player is given the option to replay each stage whether you failed or not. The second mode is “Let’s Help In The Shop,” which is helping out by working at the register and becoming a waitress at Mama’s Burger Shop. The third mode is “Let’s Help Harvest” which lets players help pick out ingredients before the player cooks. The fourth mode is “Let’s Help Mama,” and here a player helps Mama with some chores around the house. The last mode is “Let’s Study” and it is a fun little game to play around with numbers and word games. There are 60 dishes and the player gets to customize Mama’s room including wallpaper, clocks, items, and windows.
Many of the Cooking Mama games have been discontinued, but people are still able to get a free demo in the Nintendo Eshop which requires 199 blocks to download and has 5 uses. So play Cooking Mama while you still can!
