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There's some serious Cooking Mama drama going on right now
The game’s license holder and publisher have taken to the internet to squabble over exactly who has control over the title.
Cooking Mama 5 spices up 3DS on September 16
Is your 3DS library coming up short in terms of food preparation sims? Don't worry; Mama will fix this. Cooking Mama 5: Bon Appétit! will hit retailers in North America next month with a gaggle of new recipes in tow. Cooking Mama 5 features 60 new recipes, allowing players to virtually prepare international dishes like sushi, parfaits, Hawaiian pancakes, and the most exotic food of all, chicken nuggets. The game also offers a variety of side-missions and activities like pet-feeding and food delivery, and its multiplayer mode supports single cart download play for up to four competing chefs. Cooking Mama 5: Bon Appétit! premieres on September 29. [Image: Majesco]
Cooking Mama 3: Shop & Chop your troubles away
Today, Majesco released new screens and the box art for Cooking Mama 3, revealing the subtitle Shop & Chop. Unfortunately for us, that subtitle, meant to reflect the new grocery shopping element in the minigame sequel, sounds kind of like "Slap Chop," and now we've got the "Rap Chop" remix stuck in our heads. We're going to be in a great mood all day, apparently! The "Let's Shop" game, in which players dodge distractions to pick up ingredients at a grocery store, leads to the other new mode, "Combine and Create," which somehow allows players to invent their own recipes based on ingredients used in existing in-game recipes. It's an iterative upgrade, sure, but here's a secret: Cooking Mama continues to be fun even when it's just new recipes. %Gallery-70003%
Cooking Mama vs. Regular Mama
We're so pleased to present this upbeat, non-disgusting trailer for Cooking Mama: World Kitchen. However, even this innocuous "As Seen on TV" style video is not without controversy: certain statements are made regarding your mama. Specifically, her ability to cook, contrasting with the abilities of the game's fake cartoon mama. The trailer disclaims these statements, but it's possible that by then the damage could already be done. Consider yourselves and your mamas warned. Hopefully we can look past this shocking material and enjoy the gameplay footage and cute presentation. Because it is really cute, and it would be a shame if some kind of awful publicity marred such cuteness. %Gallery-28210%
Mama has skills: Taito trademarks Pet Shop Mama
Oh Mama, is there nothing you can't turn your versatile hand to? With Mama cooking games now out on DS and Wii, and a gardening game due out this winter on the handheld, Japanese publisher Taito isn't done milking the money-printing franchise.Last week, the company trademarked Pet Shop Mama, which seems self-explanatory. There's no hint of what platform this will release on, or even if it will end up being a real game (our bet: it will), but Mama's past cosy relationship with the DS makes it an obvious favorite. Our minds boggle at the potential minigames for this: will we be balancing hats on cats? Brushing dog teeth? Fending off fuming PETA campaigners armed with disturbing parody games?%Gallery-35505%
Cooking Mama goes outside for Gardening Mama
According to the latest Famitsu, Taito is spinning Office Create (now called Cooking Mama Limited)'s hit Cooking Mama series off into another creative field: gardening. All we know so far is that there's a DS game on the way from Taito called Gardening Mama and that it's scheduled for this winter. There's an infinitesimal possibility, we suppose, that the game is about the "Gardening Mama" terra cotta protectant, but it's much more likely to be a minigame collection about planting and caring for different plants starring the lovable Mama mascot.DeviantArt user whitebelt247 correctly predicted the announcement of the game in the above artwork, posted in late August. He just made the box for the wrong system (for now)!
Cooking Mama gets a new perspective
According to a press release sent out by Majesco today, Cooking Mama: World Tour is going to represent a significant revamp of (formerly Office Create) Cooking Mama Limited's signature cooking game series. Mysteriously, the press release describes an "upgrade to full 3D graphics." Yes, that means that Mama has gone 3D. It also means that the game's view has flipped: instead of playing in first person, you now look directly at your avatar as he cooks. For the first time, you'll be able to control Mama herself in spontaneous minigames, as she rushes in to fix your mistakes -- for example, she can catch mis-flipped burgers in her apron. "Additional rhythm and motion" has also been added to the main Wiimote-based gameplay. Whatever that means, at least Cooking Mama Limited is taking steps to avoid stagnation. [Screens at IGN]
Cooking Mama serving again this October?
Back in March, Majesco quietly announced a new Wii Cooking Mama game called Cooking Mama: World Kitchen, to be released in fiscal 2008. We haven't heard or seen anything about it from Majesco since, but GameFly is providing evidence that the game is on the way, having just listed the game in their "Coming Soon" area with a release date of October 30. The Cooking Mama series continues to make tons of money for Majesco, allowing them to fund some interesting games. In addition, it's hard to imagine something as basic as motion-based food preparation getting stale, so we say bring 'em on.
Friday Video: Mama's famous recipe
This series of videos makes us happy, but it also makes us a little sad. Why? Because we had the idea a while ago to try a recipe using the exact ingredients, instructions, and timings found in a Cooking Mama game, and never actually had time to try it. And now Thwomp Factory has undertaken a very similar experiment. It's actually part of an ongoing series of theirs about making recipes based on video games! Check it out if you want to try some Contact or Harvest Moon-inspired cuisine.They skip to the last hilarious step in Cooking Mama 2's chili dog recipe: catching all the ingredients with the bun. "Why does Mama make her chili dogs like this?" Thwomp Factory's Amelia wondered. "Does it improve the flavor, allowing the subtle spices of the chili to mature in the open air? Does it work up an appetite, with all that running around and panicking?" Mostly it makes a risible mess. But it's a surefire recipe for awesome videos.%Gallery-20248%[Via GameSetWatch]
Taito takes Cooking Mama too far
You know, sometimes we just don't get Japanese marketing. Probably most times.The latest one to leave us baffled is this Cooking Mama flyer, put out by Taito to promote the next game in the series. For some unknown reason, the Japanese publisher felt that Cooking Mama 2 would sell more copies with a scary cosplayer representing the game.We hope that Majesco, the game's North American publisher, won't resort to such unsettling tactics here in the States. There's only a 0.01% chance that they would, but we still might have a nightmare or two about it. We think we even prefer "Cheerleader Mama" over this.Go beyond the jump to see another flyer of Mama in her cosplay glory.
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Cooking Mama joins Majesco's E3 roster
Do cooking games have any place in the North American market? Majesco seems to think so. The publisher is taking a gamble on Office Create's Cooking Mama, a mini-game-based niche title, previously available in Japan only - yes, we suppose some Japanophiles did go the import route. But will gaijin dig a perfectly batter-dipped and deep fried tray of shrimp tempura? They best swap in some of Colonel Sanders' finest birds to move units on these shores. Read GameBrink's import review.
