Cafe World on Facebook: FAQ and Guide

From the creator of Farmville and Mafia Wars comes Cafe World - a restaurant-based social networking game. Here are some of the most frequently asked questions about Facebook's Café World.

This is really similar to Restaurant City. What are the differences and why should I play?
I play Restaurant City too, so I understand. With Café World, Zynga takes two of the most annoying features (resting & feeding employees and finding ingredients) of Restaurant City and squashes them!

In Café World so far is that you don't need to rest your employees or feed them. Some people might like that aspect of Restaurant City, but I find it annoying.

In Café World, you don't need to look for ingredients. Instead you unlock the entire dish recipe. There's no need to keep adding friends for the sole purpose of maybe finding that missing ingredient.

There's also more of a time management aspect to Café World that isn't in Restaurant City. In Café World, you need to plan out your "menu" by cooking each dish on separate stoves. Each dish has a different cooking time and you don't want to tie up all your stoves with dishes that take 2 days to cook and not have anything to serve to hungry customers.

How long before the food spoils?
In Cafe World, food will spoil in the same amount of time it takes to cook. For example, Triple Berry Cheesecake takes 12 hours to cook. When it is finished cooking, you will have 12 hours to take it off the stove and place it on the counter before it spoils. If you're cooking bacon cheeseburgers, it is especially important to hang around by your computer, as they cook in 5 minutes! I lost count of how many times I've opened up my Café World tab to find a swarm of flies and spoiled cheeseburgers on my stove!

My waiter won't serve.
If your waiter just stands there when there's customers to serve, you might want to rearrange the tables and chairs. At this point, it's not known why this happens (it will probably be fixed in an update), but for now, use this workaround.

Will food spoil on the counter?
No, it will be left on the counter until you either remove it or serve all of it to your customers.

Do the more expensive stoves cook dishes faster?
As of right now, all stoves in Cafe World are created equal.

Why should I add more neighbors?
Just like all the other social networking games, the more friends you add to Cafe World, the more special features are unlocked. In Café World, you receive 20 coins and 5 experience points for eating at a neighbors café. Friends can send you gifts, such as tea and lemonade, to increase customer happiness. By adding more friends, you can unlock larger restaurants to grow your empire and add more seating, stoves, decorations, and counters.

My food is not selling for its listed price. What's going on?
The Fruit Salad is listed at a selling price of 100 coins. But when you go to serve it, you're only getting one coin. This isn't a Cafe World glitch, but it can be a bit confusing. To get its selling price per customer, divide the total number of servings by its selling price. The Fruit Salad has 100 servings sells for 100 coins. 100 divided by 100 = 1 coin.

What is the Buzz index?
Buzz indicates how happy your customers are. If they leave with a green "thumbs up", your buzz increases. If they angrily storm out of your café, your buzz will go down. The dishes you serve also affect buzz. Serving only bacon cheeseburgers won't decrease your buzz, but if you serve more complicated, time-consuming dishes, customers will be happier and increase your buzz.

Why do I need to click on the dish several times to get it to start cooking?
This is simply part of Café World gameplay. Clicking on the dish to peel potatoes, slice apples, or add seasoning earns you experience points for each click. Most dishes have 3 or 4 steps for you to click before the progress bar appears.

Of course, Café World is still in BETA and new features will be added, but so far, it's an interesting game. If you like Farmville, you'll enjoy Café World.