Retro Review: Motoko-chan No Wonder Kitchen for Super Famicom

For those familiar with the Cooking Mama franchise on the Nintendo Wii and other Nintendo systems, let's rewind and take a look at one of the early Nintendo cooking simulation conceptions that never saw the light of day in the US shores.

From the Frying Pan

Insert colorful graphics, humorous interludes and a somewhat edutaintment approach to video games and we have Motoko Chan's Wonder Kitchen!

The entire game will last about 2 hours(at most), with you needing absolutely NO Japanese educating yourself. However, in doing so, you will miss out on an interesting and wacky storyline.

Gameplay

The basic game is you clicking on things in a certain order, then triggering events that will take you on magical journeys through your cupboard, oven, fridge and even pictures. As you do, certain ingredients required for your magical meal will be taken away from you or you'll have to find them. Now, finding them is as simple as clicking on random items that stick out, and then catching the particular ingredient to obtain it in your collection.

As you complete a full set of ingredients required for a certain recipe, you will be transported to the stove. Here you can do a bit of guess work and start putting random items with other random items or, if you actually have some Japanese knowledge, read the Katakana, Hiragana and Kanji to figure out that you have to boil the lettuce/cabbage before you slice it up.

It's fun
(Trust Me!)

Motoko chan no Wonder Kitchen is a game whose story you don't quite need to know but should realize revolves entirely on Mayonnaise. Now, why in the world would anyone want to make a game like that? ...Don't ask. But the most certain entertainment value has sparked T.V. programming and in the future for game systems like the Nintendo Wii.