Road Food Simulator Review (PC)

If all business simulation games were toppings on the one pizza, then I’d imagine that the cooked product would look a lot like a calzone with one too many fillings. The simple truth here is that, flavorful as it may be, it’s often hard to stomach a meal with oh-so many ingredients. Such is the case with most, if not all chore core-based simulators—the same games that rely on that very simple, and very predictable formula that either involves stacking shelves or serving dull-eyed customers for extended periods of time. And I won’t lie to you, but the bitter reality here is that Road Food Simulator isn’t all that different from its fellow topping-heavy counterparts. There are shelves, and there are wooden customers. The only thing that sets this apart from its competitors is the product — which is pizza.

Aside from the swap of product, Road Food Simulator has a lot of the same basic ingredients as its peers: a slow sense of pace, minor upgrade trees that aid the business’ development, and an ever-looming feeling that, if you spend just enough time hacking through the same motions on a clockwork basis, then great things will eventually swing your way and provide you with the tasteful satisfaction of a hard day’s work. All of that is here, along with a co-op mode that allows several players the opportunity to alternate between jobs, including but not necessarily limited to creating pizzas, boxing them in a timely and professional way, and making deliveries to the impatient customers who polka dot themselves around a densely populated world.

Of course, there’s still a lot left here that we’ve yet to touch base on, and so, for the same of establishing the whole image, perhaps we ought to dial it back to the beginning.

30 Minutes or Less

Road Food Simulator aims to develop an image of animalistic gluttony, chaotic workplace culture, and bite-sized incentives that make worn colleagues fight tooth and nail to meet monthly quotas. It does this by introducing a time-based system to the generic food preparation aspect of a traditional culinary simulator. In other words, if you, the player, aren’t able to rustle up “quality” food and deliver it in an efficient manner, then, surprise surprise, the chances of being able to make swift progress in the field suddenly becomes slim to nonexistent. But that’s where Road Food Simulator finds its moment to feed you with an idea — that working with others is the key to success.

While you can shovel through the same basic duties as a lone pepperoni flipper, Road Food Simulator does make an effort to spoon feed you the promise that, if you happen to make the effort to form a team, then greater things will happen over the course of your career. Regardless, the goal of the game remains the same: earn cash, purchase better pizza recipes, and become the talking point of the town with a business model that sustains itself both financially and economically. The only thing that you have to do, of course, is make the pizzas, and serve them. And if you think that sounds like a bit of a slog, well, that’s because it is. A fun sort of slog? Eh, maybe, though I suppose it boils down to who you choose to employ for your team.

Made to Order

As the timeless saying goes, if you’ve played one job simulator, then you’ve probably played ‘em all. Sure enough, the same thing applies here, with the bulk of the game centering itself around the ideologies of a textbook business model. In a nutshell, it consists of carrying out the same tasks as before, such as placing toppings on a pizza base from one of several containers, using various kitchen appliances to heat and store food, and manually shifting boxes around the premises to make a quick buck. The quicker you are, the more money you earn, similar to how most rags-to-riches simulators work.

There’s fun to be had in mulling over the above tasks, even if they are a little played out and painfully predictable. It’s hardly busy work, I’ll admit, but with a good amount of upgrades to pursue and team-based goals to achieve, there is a good amount of bang for your buck, so to speak. There’s just one thing holding it back: the lack of originality in the design. Scratch that, there are two things holding it back: the lack of originality, and the sloppy AI.

Mechanically, there isn’t too much to pry at, more so given that the entire control suite is condensed into a small pocket of easily accessible buttons and triggers. That said, the NPCs, or just the population in general, has its drawbacks, with a mixture of erratic behavior and questionable execution of their movements being the two things that ultimately drag it down and detail the immersion.

Verdict

Road Food Simulator is just as tedious as it is weirdly satisfying. Or at least, it’s satisfying to watch unfold alongside a couple of other ne’er do wells who are as equally incompetent as you. There’s fun to be had in that regard—in the chaos of a world that’s partly on the brink of collapse, and partly on the precipice of becoming a sandbox for mass destruction for all the right reasons. Is it enjoyable, watching the kitchen flutter and wade as you navigate the toppings several times over in the hopes that something will pop out to make it feel more worthwhile? Eh, yes and no. While the gameplay itself is painfully dull and repetitive, the process of succumbing to the pressure of running the business with friends is surprisingly comical. Swings and roundabouts, I suppose.

If you’re desperate to get your mitts on something that dares to break the norm and isn’t afraid to experiment with raw materials, then you’re probably going to be in for a rude awakening here. Of course, while it does make a conscious effort to generate its own series of multiplayer-based shenanigans, the fact of the matter is, Road Food Simulator doesn’t do anything different to what countless others have done in the past. It’s a lot of the same bits and pieces that we’ve seen dozens of times before, right down to the copy and paste UI and carrot-on-a-stick play-to-win reward schemes. It’s laughable, yet it works.

To state the truth, if you can ignore its shameless attempt to imitate a dime-a-dozen career sim, you should be able to scrape enough enthusiasm together to romp through Road Food Simulator and all its toppings. It won’t wow you, but it ought to satisfy that hunger for a short period of time.