Overcooked: All You Can Eat, a remaster of beloved cooking games Overcooked and Overcooked 2, will feature an assist mode and various accessibility features to make the game more welcoming to all. The remaster was announced back in July, and will be coming to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X when the next-gen consoles release this November.
Overcooked first released back in 2016 and quickly established a sizable following, as did its 2018 sequel, Overcooked 2. The game brought a delightfully dangerous cooperative culinary experience to players, forcing them to create simple dishes in increasingly outlandish and deadly kitchens, including swaying pirate ships, moving trucks, and even precarious lava-filled hellscapes. Players relished the chaotic cooperative gameplay and the emergent stories that arise when chefs struggle to complete a pizza before their oven is stolen by ghosts. Team17 provided a solid and admirable couch co-op experience in a world that has recently been seeing the decline of that classic genre.
One of the biggest selling points of the Overcooked franchise is its high difficulty. With that in mind, Team17 still seems interested in making sure its game can be played by all, and has put out a YouTube trailer to announce an assist mode for the upcoming remaster. The assist mode features longer games and an increase in points received to help players clear the score threshold needed to continue. Assist mode will also increase the amount of time before an order expires so players have more time to get it ready to serve. They can also toggle off order expiration entirely, and take as much time as they need. Team17 will also be adding accessibility options to the game, including dyslexia-friendly text and differently shaped player icons to help colorblind gamers quickly identify who's who. Check out all the updates in the trailer below.
Given how famously hard the Overcooked series is, an assist mode might seem like an odd choice. But it comes during a pretty significant push for increased accessibility in the games industry. Video games have never been especially welcoming to players with disabilities - or those who just want a less stressful experience. A notorious example is the Dark Souls series, which birthed an entire genre of games whose main selling point is incredible difficulty. As interested as players might be in a game like Dark Souls, they might skip the game entirely due to its difficulty.
The feeling of accomplishment that comes with beating a particularly hard game is difficult to match, but a growing number of developers are seeing the importance of making that experience available to more players . Players who beat hard games like Overcooked are right to feel proud of themselves, and someone else doing the same thing on a lower difficulty doesn't take away from that accomplishment in any way. At the end of the day, all it means is that more people get to enjoy a fun game together, and that's nothing but a good thing.
Source: Team17/YouTube