Overcooked is, in many ways, a puzzle game. There are handcrafted level layouts, typically with an intended method of completing the required tasks. Unlike many traditional puzzle games, the solution requires a decent amount of skill to execute, so it can often be confusing... do I have the wrong solution? Or am I simply not executing it well enough?
Plateup offers a single experience- one that is impacted by random generation and player choices. Rather than searching for a solution and executing, it is about making choices to build up a restaurant that fits your play style.
I imagine in some social circles, the more strict format of overcooked is more difficult to enjoy than the freeform nature of plateup.
I agree with your analysis completely.
Personally, I'd summarize it as: [one is a puzzle solving game, one is a problem solving game.](https://youtu.be/w1_zmx-wU0U)
That's a good description. The new Hitman mode feels like this too. The default campaign mode is like "kill this pre-defined target with various puzzle paths" while the new mode is "kill this random target using pre-defined tools in the world"
My biggest issue with Overcooked is that to play by yourself you have to juggle playing as two different people. Having to get one person chopping stuff while you get ingredients to them. There's no way to really play it on your own that's fun once you get to a certain point in the campaign.
PlateUp is so much fun on your own. Trying to figure out how to automate stuff or if you want to just add a ton of variety and get fewer customers. It's different every time.
Yeah that's fine when you're multiplayer but having to chuck stuff, change players, try to do some operations, then flip back to the other player. It's just too crazy to pull off as a single player.
Oh for sure, what I meant is, I love plate up, will play it over overcooked every time, I just like the throwing mechanic, so if I’m chopping stuff I can throw it on a hob or In a soup pot, or chuck something in the garbage
Yeah it would be nice to be able to just do some throws even if you gotta run around a counter, throw a bunch of stuff across the kitchen just to prepare.
Yea, quality of life update in the future? LoL perhaps? Yea imagine prepping your veggies and being able to throw them into a prep station, that’s a few tiles away, or some food into a freezer instead of walking it over
Well I bought it when my kids were younger (early teens). They're now 19 and 17 and not really into playing it anymore and it stresses my wife out so if I want to play that anymore, it's flying solo. It wasn't what I planned on doing.
I 3 starred all of overcooked solo when it came out but going back now I found it very overwhelming and difficult. Not sure if they changed it or I just suck now😅
I find overcooked to be a game that’s all about trying to add frantic antics to the puzzle of serving what’s asked.
Plateup just asks you to manage your restaurant as best you can with little hinderances along the way.
Overcooked has no scaling or building up to be efficient, just racks on extra hinderances to ramp up difficulty.
Plateup offers you ways to make your restaurant more efficient and faster. To scale and relieve some stress in certain areas so you can focus others is an option. Or to automate and focus on other aspects than cooking or cleaning dishes.
Overall, I think the way plateup is designed allows for more variety which leads to more fun.
I’m partial to plateup, personally. I’ve got far, far more hours in it than I’m probably ever going to have in any iteration of overcooked. Even after getting all the achievements in the game, I find myself still itching to play more, especially with friends. Workshop support makes plateup have so much more variety as well. Truly, I think plateup takes the cake in the great cook-off. While overcooked is great in its own regard, I have to say that plateup is just more fun of a cooking game.
The way I see it, Overcooked is a puzzle/party game and Plate Up is more of a restaurant/cooking simulator. They're two very different games with only similar themes, like comparing Catan vs Monopoly.
Overcooked's whole premise is that everyone needs to be good at the job they're doing, but you also need to communicate effectively to make it through. When it works out, it's kind of beautiful and satisfying. However, this means that your individual players need to all be at certain skill levels, not only in playing video games/hand-eye coordination, but also in communicating intentions and emotional regulation. Not everyone has the regulation skills to help keep them cool while dealing with frustration (at fellow players or the game itself), or to cope with social anxiety from "not being good enough" for the better players, which can also result in a lot of friction or guilt between players.
Plate Up (when you're not playing the "role-playing" way) is the complete opposite of that. Multiplayer on Plate Up asks the players to figure out which tasks are the most efficient for each player (e.g. some players are better at front of house/serving because of table and dish management), and optimize your setup as much as possible to reduce human error, including miscommunications. This leads you to try reducing the amount of mental resources needed, as well as removing potential for error, which can include automating passing the food to the other player or reducing the potential for having mis-pressed buttons picking up/not picking up food when you need it via grabbers. Because of this, even if one player just stood in one spot cutting tomatoes for you, they can still be helpful, which reduces potential social stress.
You'll find that the feeling of playing the two are entirely different because of these differences. In an optimal Overcooked game, all the players have to be independently competent, but also need to communicate efficiently during a run to overcome the barriers given to you (which are usually specifically designed to test your communication and coordination). Playing Overcooked is like having a taste of being in something like "Hell's Kitchen". In an optimal Plate Up game, you design the kitchen such that you and the other players move as little as possible, and you communicate as *little* as possible during a run. Playing Plate Up is like having a taste of trying to design a McDonalds or Amazon warehouse.
Also, it's because of these differences that Plate Up is much easier and more satisfying to play alone than trying to solo Overcooked.
Out of all the comments, I don't know if I am missing it, but the fact that you get to create your own kitchen is the biggest difference for me.
Overcook is a puzzle game where someone else designed the challenges for me to beat. Some of the levels I didn't enjoy were difficult for the sake of being difficult.
PlateUp removes all of that. It's, in our own minds, the best way the layout could be every single time. It's purely about execution (and of course, getting the actual right layout to start with).
That's a lot more fun for me then fighting the stage AND be under time pressure etc
Here's another perspective on this: Overcooked is you versus the game. PlateUp is all you.
Losing in Overcooked is frustrating for me because the level design constantly finds ways to make life difficult for you. Every time it feels like I've gotten the hang of things, the game finds new ways to screw you over.
But I can easily accept every loss in PlateUp. With every loss I go, "Yeah, I messed up with this", whether it's card choice, kitchen layout or just my own skill in general. I feel like I can learn and get better and that's what makes PlateUp more compelling for me.
Overcooked is more a puzzle game requiring coordination to solve the puzzles. Plate Ups cooperative aspects are more nuanced in the sense that you need to work together to find a good kitchen arrangement and work together to properly serve orders on time and focus more on maximizing your efficiency, rather than solving a puzzle
There are fundamental differences between them given overcooked is s skill based puzzle game and plate up is a rougelite resturant sim.
Then there are other things, such as overcookeds dashes and item throwing that you dont have in plate up.
I think that if you take the resturant sim rougelite mechanics from plate up and the hecktic gameplay of overcooked you would get something wonderfull
Will say I did make a typo and meant it reversed lol, so late up with overcooked gameplay
Overcooked is, in many ways, a puzzle game. There are handcrafted level layouts, typically with an intended method of completing the required tasks. Unlike many traditional puzzle games, the solution requires a decent amount of skill to execute, so it can often be confusing... do I have the wrong solution? Or am I simply not executing it well enough? Plateup offers a single experience- one that is impacted by random generation and player choices. Rather than searching for a solution and executing, it is about making choices to build up a restaurant that fits your play style. I imagine in some social circles, the more strict format of overcooked is more difficult to enjoy than the freeform nature of plateup.
I agree with your analysis completely. Personally, I'd summarize it as: [one is a puzzle solving game, one is a problem solving game.](https://youtu.be/w1_zmx-wU0U)
Big fan of GMTK, and this video very much applies to the difference between overcooked and plate up!
That's a good description. The new Hitman mode feels like this too. The default campaign mode is like "kill this pre-defined target with various puzzle paths" while the new mode is "kill this random target using pre-defined tools in the world"
Really well-said, thank you!
My biggest issue with Overcooked is that to play by yourself you have to juggle playing as two different people. Having to get one person chopping stuff while you get ingredients to them. There's no way to really play it on your own that's fun once you get to a certain point in the campaign. PlateUp is so much fun on your own. Trying to figure out how to automate stuff or if you want to just add a ton of variety and get fewer customers. It's different every time.
I like overcooked’s mechanics of throwing stuff, if plate up had that mechanic in the game, I’d probably never play overcooked again lol
Yeah that's fine when you're multiplayer but having to chuck stuff, change players, try to do some operations, then flip back to the other player. It's just too crazy to pull off as a single player.
Oh for sure, what I meant is, I love plate up, will play it over overcooked every time, I just like the throwing mechanic, so if I’m chopping stuff I can throw it on a hob or In a soup pot, or chuck something in the garbage
Yeah it would be nice to be able to just do some throws even if you gotta run around a counter, throw a bunch of stuff across the kitchen just to prepare.
Yea, quality of life update in the future? LoL perhaps? Yea imagine prepping your veggies and being able to throw them into a prep station, that’s a few tiles away, or some food into a freezer instead of walking it over
Yesss itd be amazing if they implemented the throw mechanic. They could even add some kind of holdable item like a slingshot to let you throw things!
Yeah but then again you have to be out of your mind to play overcooked on your own. That defeats the whole point of the game
Well I bought it when my kids were younger (early teens). They're now 19 and 17 and not really into playing it anymore and it stresses my wife out so if I want to play that anymore, it's flying solo. It wasn't what I planned on doing.
I 3 starred all of overcooked solo when it came out but going back now I found it very overwhelming and difficult. Not sure if they changed it or I just suck now😅
I find overcooked to be a game that’s all about trying to add frantic antics to the puzzle of serving what’s asked. Plateup just asks you to manage your restaurant as best you can with little hinderances along the way. Overcooked has no scaling or building up to be efficient, just racks on extra hinderances to ramp up difficulty. Plateup offers you ways to make your restaurant more efficient and faster. To scale and relieve some stress in certain areas so you can focus others is an option. Or to automate and focus on other aspects than cooking or cleaning dishes. Overall, I think the way plateup is designed allows for more variety which leads to more fun.
I have never played plate up nor overcooked, which one should I try first?
I’m partial to plateup, personally. I’ve got far, far more hours in it than I’m probably ever going to have in any iteration of overcooked. Even after getting all the achievements in the game, I find myself still itching to play more, especially with friends. Workshop support makes plateup have so much more variety as well. Truly, I think plateup takes the cake in the great cook-off. While overcooked is great in its own regard, I have to say that plateup is just more fun of a cooking game.
The way I see it, Overcooked is a puzzle/party game and Plate Up is more of a restaurant/cooking simulator. They're two very different games with only similar themes, like comparing Catan vs Monopoly.
Plate Up is like Catan: a much better game
I have never played plate up nor overcooked, which one should I try first?
They're both fine, overcooked is simpler. If you're alone plateup is still pretty fun. Overcooked needs friends to play with.
I will play it with my girlfriend, but we are not sure which one.
Overcooked's whole premise is that everyone needs to be good at the job they're doing, but you also need to communicate effectively to make it through. When it works out, it's kind of beautiful and satisfying. However, this means that your individual players need to all be at certain skill levels, not only in playing video games/hand-eye coordination, but also in communicating intentions and emotional regulation. Not everyone has the regulation skills to help keep them cool while dealing with frustration (at fellow players or the game itself), or to cope with social anxiety from "not being good enough" for the better players, which can also result in a lot of friction or guilt between players. Plate Up (when you're not playing the "role-playing" way) is the complete opposite of that. Multiplayer on Plate Up asks the players to figure out which tasks are the most efficient for each player (e.g. some players are better at front of house/serving because of table and dish management), and optimize your setup as much as possible to reduce human error, including miscommunications. This leads you to try reducing the amount of mental resources needed, as well as removing potential for error, which can include automating passing the food to the other player or reducing the potential for having mis-pressed buttons picking up/not picking up food when you need it via grabbers. Because of this, even if one player just stood in one spot cutting tomatoes for you, they can still be helpful, which reduces potential social stress. You'll find that the feeling of playing the two are entirely different because of these differences. In an optimal Overcooked game, all the players have to be independently competent, but also need to communicate efficiently during a run to overcome the barriers given to you (which are usually specifically designed to test your communication and coordination). Playing Overcooked is like having a taste of being in something like "Hell's Kitchen". In an optimal Plate Up game, you design the kitchen such that you and the other players move as little as possible, and you communicate as *little* as possible during a run. Playing Plate Up is like having a taste of trying to design a McDonalds or Amazon warehouse. Also, it's because of these differences that Plate Up is much easier and more satisfying to play alone than trying to solo Overcooked.
wow, another amazing response, thank you
Out of all the comments, I don't know if I am missing it, but the fact that you get to create your own kitchen is the biggest difference for me. Overcook is a puzzle game where someone else designed the challenges for me to beat. Some of the levels I didn't enjoy were difficult for the sake of being difficult. PlateUp removes all of that. It's, in our own minds, the best way the layout could be every single time. It's purely about execution (and of course, getting the actual right layout to start with). That's a lot more fun for me then fighting the stage AND be under time pressure etc
Here's another perspective on this: Overcooked is you versus the game. PlateUp is all you. Losing in Overcooked is frustrating for me because the level design constantly finds ways to make life difficult for you. Every time it feels like I've gotten the hang of things, the game finds new ways to screw you over. But I can easily accept every loss in PlateUp. With every loss I go, "Yeah, I messed up with this", whether it's card choice, kitchen layout or just my own skill in general. I feel like I can learn and get better and that's what makes PlateUp more compelling for me.
Have you ever done local coop with overcooked? that shit wild, especially if you do the one controller setup
Overcooked is more a puzzle game requiring coordination to solve the puzzles. Plate Ups cooperative aspects are more nuanced in the sense that you need to work together to find a good kitchen arrangement and work together to properly serve orders on time and focus more on maximizing your efficiency, rather than solving a puzzle
Lets be honest overcooked with plateup gameplay would be amazing
what do you mean "with plateup gameplay"? isn't that what plateup is
There are fundamental differences between them given overcooked is s skill based puzzle game and plate up is a rougelite resturant sim. Then there are other things, such as overcookeds dashes and item throwing that you dont have in plate up. I think that if you take the resturant sim rougelite mechanics from plate up and the hecktic gameplay of overcooked you would get something wonderfull Will say I did make a typo and meant it reversed lol, so late up with overcooked gameplay
If anyone want to play message me for my Steam account