It's been six weeks since I posted the final part of my big fat review of RS2, and there's lots has happened since then. Perhaps most significantly, goals have made their entrance, with Chinese New Year, Valentine's Day, St Patrick's Day and Easter all covered.
Let's begin the analysis with the Valentine's Day content. The very first set of goals, everything revolved around gathering Valentine cards from Frank, who was a frequent visitor to our diners. I say frequent, but as the timer ticked down on the goals lots of players found that Frank's visits just weren't coming often enough. Waiting for him patiently proved a great challenge for many!
The cards could be used to unlock recipes on the Valentine Oven, an appliance dedicated to the romantic theme.
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| Valentine Oven recipes |
I personally failed to complete the goals, although it wasn't all my fault. For reasons beyond my comprehension Storm8 decided to make the last two dishes locked until you reached high levels. For most who only managed to access the game after it's general release in December this meant there was no chance of getting through it all.
Why the gamemakers would do this I have no idea. Do they expect players who are say 15 levels short of unlocking the Heartberry Tart to buy thousands of gems to fast-track through the goals?! It was a shocker and caused much unrest in the community.
Anyway, I accrued 36 spare Valentine's cards prior to the goals expiring, which meant that I was able to learn the Lovely Cheesecake once I eventually unlocked it at level 35. But with only 16 cards left (and 20 needed) I won't be able to remove the padlock from the Heartberry Tart when I get to level 47.
Before those Valentine's goals had even finished there was another quest came on the go all about Chinese New Year. These were less strenuous, with only existing dishes needing to be cooked in order to earn some nice CNY décor.
I'd have been delighted to deck my place out for the occasion, but there just weren't enough items to do this effectively. This is something which I find with most themes (seasonal or otherwise). The market is not populated enough yet to be able to create a really rich layout. I suppose we've been spoilt all these years by the depth of RS1's market!
Into March, and a major app update which caused quite the stir. First up there's the Facebook element. A rather obtrusive Facebook icon now sits on the right side of the screen.
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| Facebook notification |
Storm8 want us to log into our account on the social media site (for a 20 gem reward) so that we can essentially promote the game for them by posting updates on our game.
I have no problem with this feature. However at the same time I have no interest in connecting my game to Facebook since there's not a huge amount to gain from my perspective and I get annoyed when others post up their progress in games anyway. But it is nice that Storm8 are providing that option for those do fancy linking to Facebook.
One notable benefit of connecting to Facebook is in relation to gifting. Previously you could only receive a Mystery Box from three neighbours per day, but now you can obtain 20 gifts from your chums. And then there's the Facebook element - you can now exchange Quick Serves with your Facebook friends for free. I don't know if this is counted in your gift limit or not, but either way it's a nice set-up for guaranteeing the most valuable gift.
Restaurant Story 2: The review
Then yesterday's update brought with it a new slant on the Facebook aspect. A new recipe - the Cheese Fondue - was released, but with a caveat. It is locked by goal, and that goal is to connect to Facebook! Perhaps this is the motivation I need to log in, but I'm not all that fussed really. One option may be to log in to get the gem reward and recipe, and then log back out immediately!
Another significant addition in the March app update was an enhanced recipe mastery system. For a while there had only been one mastery level but this update extended that to three levels, similar to the four in RS1. The rewards for mastery are not great though. Extra XP and Mastery Spice seem to be the main prizes - how I'd love to see the gamemakers give away a gem here or there!
With recipe mastery now playing a larger role in the game, we commenced the St Patrick's Day goals.
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| Step from St Patrick's Day goals |
The game's developers once again introduced a character who would drop a useful object when stopping by - this time it was Liam O'Lucky the Leprechaun. Clovers were his speciality, and mercifully the number he dropped varied each time. It was possible to gain as many as five clovers from one visit if you were lucky (pun unintended!)
The general structure to these goals was much improved on the Valentine's fiasco. Rather than using the clovers to unlock recipes, they were required as an ingredient for cooking the new foods. The overall aim was to master the Irish dishes to level three, which was made significantly easier if you used the Mastery Spice strategically. I found this made all the difference and allowed me to finish off the goals with days to spare. In anticipation of a similar batch of goals in the future I've been stockpiling the Mastery Spice ever since, with 29 currently in my Pantry. The only problem is that this is a third of my entire Pantry capacity!
Once the goals expired the Irish recipes (most of which were rather ugly!) were removed with only the prize dish - the St Paddy's Pasta - remaining if you were fortunate enough to unlock it.
Now we get to some severe alterations which changed the dynamics of RS2 for many. On Monday 16th March the Street Market was given a huge shake-up. Previously it offered ingredients at a slightly inflated price, but now the costs are astronomical.
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| Example of new-look Street Market |
Just look at the image above. The price of some of the ingredients has become ridiculous. Take the Lobster for example - at 526 coins that would be taking a quarter of my income from cooking the Surf and Turf on the Château Stove. And that's just for one ingredient! Storm8 have really dropped the ball here, rendering the market useless.
I am particularly peeved at this having been a latecomer to the Street Market. I didn't really realise its value for a good while, and instead prioritised using my tools for other upgrades. Once I did get round to increasing the slots in my Street Market it became a lifesaver! That was until this preposterous price rise. My irritation is replicated across the community, and this act has caused more than a few players (including some who had been playing long before the general release) to quit in frustration.
To add to the disgruntlement, the gamemakers decided to change some of the attributes of existing recipes, including the ingredients required and the duration. I have a touch of sympathy for Storm8 on this front - the game is still relatively new and so little adjustments are inevitable as they try to get the game set up as they want. But that Street Market overhaul was way too far.
Getting up to the present, there are Easter goals currently in progress. The seriously grotesque Mystery Egg Boiler is at the centre of it and is looking repugnant in my classical layout!
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| Notification for Easter goals |
These goals focus on cooking Mysterious Eggs on this new appliance using flowers grown in the Garden. Every time you do so a special egg is dropped with your XP and mastery points, and we need to accumulate enough of these before time runs out to unlock the Deviled Eggs on the Commerical Range. It's going to be tight but I'm hopeful of getting it done!
All in all it's been a turbulent time in RS2. I'm enjoying the variety of the goals and largely am satisfied with the greater level of difficulty than the comparatively easy goals we get in RS1. But with lots of alterations (some bigger than others) it's clear that the game is still being ironed out. I think players need to understand that before making a kneejerk decision to quit the game, but then again that's easy for me to say when I'm continuing to try and not take it all too seriously, as opposed to my complete obsession with RS1!
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