Gourmania 3: Zoo Zoom:

In Brief:
We've now received three different Gourmania tiles over the last fortnight; getting Gourmania a week last Saturday (it was first given away HERE on the 27th Jan 2013), then last week we were given Gourmania 2: Great Expectations (previously given away for the first time HERE on the 23rd of Nov 2013); and now we get the third in the series, Gourmania 3: Zoo Zoom. It was last given away on July 20th, 2019, where it received a positive 100% from 17 votes with 4 comments which you can see HERE. It was also given away for the first time on June 21st, 2015, where it received a positive 60% from 306 votes with 24 comments, which you can see HERE


As with the previous two titles, todays giveaway is a cross between a low-level time management game combined with a hidden object game, where the hidden objects are items of food. Today's game also includes a simple building program where you repair your restaurants and create a zoo, repairing various part of the zoo and buying items to build up the attractiveness of your zoo.

What I mean by a low-level time management game is that the amount of money you earn is factored in on how quickly you can complete the orders of the day. If you are too slow, you'll fail to reach your target amount for that day so will be awarded the title of Sous Chef. If you earn the specified amount within an unspecified time, you'll earn the title of head chef for that level. There are buffs such as coins and percentage increase tickets that can improve on your earnings for each level. The results are calculated on a combined total of the amount you earn for completing each dish, a speed bonus and if you earn the target amount for that level you get an achievement bonus.

You can see a few videos of game play HERE, HERE and HERE.

The Game:
The Gourmania series hasn’t been without its faults through its previous two iterations, but Alawar is hoping that the third time’s the charm with Gourmania 3: Zoo Zoom. This instalment follows Victoria, the heir to a fortune who is shunned by her father (and cut off from her money) until she can learn the value of a hard day’s work. With her family crest to guide her, she sets off to master the restaurant business in this continuation of the time management / hidden object series.

Unfortunately, the game’s story goes from semi-believable to downright silly as you’re introduced to a chef who has also let your father down and is determined to earn back his respect. Your father, for all of his apparent hatred of your lazy attitude, has given you complete control over all of his restaurants, which range in theme from Mediterranean to Mexican, and include some specialty shops like a Coffee Shop or Ice Cream Parlor. For someone that’s upset with your lifestyle, you really don’t have to do that much “work” to get going.

The majority of gameplay will see you working day to day in each restaurant (your location changes at random), with each restaurant containing a single scene that varies in its amount of clutter. Food items and themed accessories are scattered as though a tornado has had its way with your pantry, and you’ll need to search the shelves, windowsills, counters and even floors for items like cheese blocks, olives, peppers, etc. to fulfil orders placed along the top of the screen.

In this instalment perhaps more than ever, you’ll need to focus on working on one customer’s order at a time. If you choose to play the game while being timed (you have the option of an unlimited time clock), the customers that you choose to ignore will become upset, and your profits will suffer because of it. You’ll need to ignore them though, as working on a single order at once earns you speed and service bonuses. Each dollar counts in Gourmania 3, as your day’s goal earnings are incredibly high, and mostly impossible to reach without taking advantage of every bonus you can.

Other bonuses include coins scattered in each scene that must be clicked on to claim, presents that instantly finish an order if given to a customer, lollipops that raise each order’s cost, and even percentage tags that can double the cost of a single dish if given to a customer. With all of these bonus items, that’s even more time wasted searching for them to up your score, while customers lose even more patience. Of course, simply choosing to play the game without a time limit eliminates this stress, but also eliminates any challenge you may have been wanting from the experience.


Perhaps the biggest problem with the gameplay here though is the fact that many objects have similar names or odd appearances. For instance, the word “Pepper” may appear, and your restaurant may have Black Pepper (the spice), Bell Peppers, Chili Peppers and more available. You’ll have to use trial and error the first time you see these words to figure out which item is appropriate (in this case, you’d click on the Bell Pepper). Furthermore, a red apple in one level may be a green apple in the next; grapes may be green or red, tomatoes may come on a vine or as a single fruit and so on. Don’t get comfortable with an item’s appearance, as it will likely change as you enter the next level.

After each shift in a restaurant, you’re sent to work on Victoria’s side project – a small zoo that will house each animal represented on your family’s crest. You’ll need to use your funds to purchase habitats, decorations, and even the individual animals for your zoo, which then sees you taking part in short and very light puzzles as you’ll need to repair everything you’ve purchased. I still would have appreciated seeing a complete removal of these cleaning and repair tasks from the entire experience, but I’ll take a toned-down version for now.

All told, Gourmania 3: Zoo Zoom fixes some of the issues found in the previous game, as there isn’t as vast a focus on cleaning and repairing as before, although it’s still there (and still unnecessary). The environments are highly varied, which is appreciated, but some are so cluttered that it makes things downright confusing. There are still a lot of issues plaguing this kitchen adventure, so you’ll need to use your past experience with the series’ other instalments before deciding to give this third one a chance.

Reference accessed HERE 21st June 2015, originally posted by Brandy Shaul on the 20th of June 2011 and reposted by Whiterabbit-uk on the 14th of October 2022.

You can also see a second review of the game HERE

Conclusion:
If you enjoyed playing the first two Gourmania games given away over the last fortnight, you'll probably enjoy this one as well. I recommend downloading it and see what you think; please post some feedback if you enjoyed playing it. If you found it boring, please post some feedback on why you thought it was boring. Thank you.

I did find that the further in you got, the easier it became because most of the food in each of the restaurant's pantries stay in the same place on the shelves or work surfaces, so eventually some of the items you require to complete a meal are easier to find; especially if you've got good spatial memory.

After playing it for over an hour, I'd score it a 7.5 out of 10 (I'm not really into TM/HOG games, though this combination of both I quite liked; plus the additional building and repair aspect of the game added to the game compared to the previous titles; though, with respect to building games, I much prefer fully fledged building games like Cities: Skylines (though I don't like their cash cow, money grabbing DLC content that costs well over £200. Thankfully I got a large chunk of the DLC via The Humble Bundle for about £17 that included more than half of the available DLC, so was a bargain); however simpler dedicated but less expensive building games also appeal to me such as the Sim City franchise that aren't burdened with excessive DLC content.

Gourmania 3 was one of the last games I βeta tested for Alawar. They sacked the lot of us in favour of getting Alawar community members to test demo's and give a 30% reduction on the games they tested. We used to get the full version for free; I continued for a short while in that way, but decided most of the games I was testing (apart from only getting a small discount - back then games were $19.99 each, with expansions/ addons costing $14.99 each) only allowed a short time to test due to the demo limitation of 1 hour) plus most of the games they sent me were either Time Management or Hidden Object Games, which I'd had enough of. So finally stopped βeta testing with them.

(Before I started βeta testing, I used to post reasonable feedback on all of the games I purchased (I paid over £100 for the complete Hyperballoid breakout because I purchased every add-on that they released) and was invited to their official βeta test team after reviewing Magic Ball 3. They sent me a package of goodies for Christmas that year as a thank you for all of my reviews, that included a mug, calendar, courier bag, a cuddly soft toy for the kids and a few other goodies all themed on Magic Ball 3 game.