The first goal unlocks the Open Fire, which is the first of two new appliances. In terms of appearance this is a really pleasing cooker. It's got a brickwork structure with an open fire (surprisingly enough!) contained within. This is one of those appliances which I'd love to be able to convert into a floor decoration for cosmetic purposes.
To put the Open Fire together you'll need the help of neighbours.
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| Chocolate Cog and Winter Handle |
In all 5 Brass Diverters, 5 Mallets and 5 Winter Handles are needed to construct it, and the last of these is one of the two new parts shown above. The fact that the Winter Handle is not a knob is satisfying, especially after I grumbled about the feast of knobs in last month's Suggestions Box.
Once you've built an Open Fire, there are three recipes to work with:
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| Open Fire recipes |
It's all about getting your festive fill here, with three hearty foods sure to appease your appetite. I'm quite happy that Storm8 have decided not to rehash Christmas dinner - I think that's something which has 'been done' so it's refreshing to get some tasty alternatives.
It's all very well licking our lips at the prospect of these dishes, but what of their ratings?
| Roast Beast | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 5 | 3 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 4.1 |
| Hearty Stew | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | 7 | 5 | 3.3 |
| Roasted Duck | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 3.4 |
It's the nightmare before Christmas! All three recipes perform poorly across the major factors, resulting in very low overall scores. I won't waste my breath trying to find some positives to glean from these sub-standard efforts, and will instead just shake my head at the gamemakers' lack of Christmas spirit...
Moving on, and once you complete all the goals pertaining to the Open Fire's foods, the Icicle Table is unlocked. This is a really cool table in my opinion. It's actually the third table of its format we've had, following on from the Frosty Table and Winter Table:
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| Frosty Table, Icicle Table and Winter Table |
Both of the previous editions are no longer available to buy, but you can certainly see the similarity. They all have the icicles dangling from the sides, but the Icicle Table trumps the others in terms of both quality and quantity. I like to think of this table as an indicator of how Storm8 have improved their designs over the years. Whether that's true or not is up for debate!
Despite my eulogising, I still feel that the best Christmas table ever added is the Holiday Lights Table. With its patches of snow and strings of fairy lights, as well as the accompanying Holiday Lights Chair, it remains one of my all-time favourite tables. In contrast the Icicle Table doesn't have the matching chair, with the Snowy Chair introduced last week being much less impressive (although it does have a snowman design on the back I hadn't noticed initially!)
From the Icicle Table we manoeuvre back into appliance mode with the Chocolate Stove. This time the new part involved is the Chocolate Cog. Five of them are needed for construction, along with 5 Pocket Watches and 5 Golden Stakes. How a chocolate component would deal with being inside a roasting hot cooker is difficult to say - it would be about as useful as a chocolate teapot! Then again, the entire stove is made of the stuff, so just make sure you've got plenty of cold air blowing around!
Enough with the chocolatey banter, let's take a look at the three recipes on the Chocolate Stove:
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| Chocolate Stove recipes |
I'm not so enthusiastic about these offerings. From a Chocolate Stove I expect wild creations which are extravagant and eye-catching. Instead we've got a fifth pops dish, a hot chocolate which is a poor relation of the Piping Hot Cocoa on the Drink Machine, and some snow. Maybe I'm being overly critical, but these three recipes just don't excite me.
Maybe the ratings will turn me around?!
| Reindeer Pops | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | 10 | 5 | 3.6 |
| Snowman Cocoa | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | 10 | 5 | 3.6 |
| Candy Snow | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit | XP gain | Portions | Profit per plate | Availability | Rating |
| 3 | 2 | 2 | 10 | 5 | 3.3 |
Again it makes for difficult reading, with the numbers indicating that this second trio are just as bad as the first, if not worse. The Candy Snow really tops the lot, with only 14 recipes of 6 hour length earning a lower overall score. And we're talking here about one of the biggest duration pools.
Even if the dishes are not worth it from a statistical angle, at least there are six mastery gems to be gathered, and the prospect of removing the padlock on the last two decorations. The first of these is the Nutcracker. This is only a 1x1 sized piece, and is clearly designed to be a floor filler rather than a show-stopper. I reckon the game's developers have done a decent job with him, but nothing more. It's difficult to make a Nutcracker all that interesting!
On the other hand, the final goal prize is most certainly worth winning. The Frosty Feast features a number of bots enjoying some drinks in a wintry scene. There's an icy cake, rows of sweet treats and tubs of ice creams, as well as a couple of drink dispensers. In some ways it's a strange decoration - why would people be half freezing to death outside at a drinks party?! But I do like how smart they all are and the flakes of snow floating around is a nice touch.
Christmas 2015
Despite my happiness with this prize, it's not getting a look in at The Garlic Tree this Christmas. My place is already pretty well set, so it will take something special to disturb the current layout! However I do have plans formulating in my head for my outdoor area in the New Year, and the Frosty Feast may well be part of it.
Indeed these goals have been quite neutral in terms of their association to Christmas. It has meant less hardcore Christmas stuff but I can understand why Storm8 may wish to broaden the audience for their festive additions. There's still enough of a Christmas feel to the content, and everyone is hopefully now able to put together a snowy scene. The toned down nature of this year's items thus far means that we've all got a stronger inventory of stuff not just to decorate for Christmas but also for Winter in general when we get into January.
So in conclusion I'm thoroughly happy with this goal set. As usual the recipes' numbers provide a sour note, but the rest of the content has ticked all the right boxes to encourage really classy restaurants this holiday season. Merry Christmas everyone!
Thanks for posting the goals content report, TGT :)
ReplyDeleteI've got mixed feelings about the goal offerings. Of course, I'm really happy that RS is still receiving monthly goals, and hopefully we’ll continue to receive them long into 2016. But I wish the recipes were more substantial. The profit margins are great, and somewhat necessary given how many coins one would spend during the course of these goals, but I really wish the portions were bigger. I revamped my menu to fit a Christmas theme this holiday, so the majority of my appliances are Christmas-themed ones from years past, and I have to keep cooking to ensure my customers have stuff to eat. I know it's my own choice, and I could swap out my menu for one with recipes of bigger portions, but who associates country-fried steak with winter holidays? So much for a Christmas feast ;P
Out of curiosity, I went through your blog looking at your more recent recipe ratings. Most of the portion ratings have been in the orange zone since September, and the highest I saw was a ‘5’ on a single recipe. If not on goal appliances, then larger portions on extraneous appliances (like we’ve been receiving in the past few months) would be greatly appreciated.
I haven’t made it to the second appliance yet, but I rather like the recipes on offer :) I maxed out the Piping Hot Cocoa on the Drink Machine and the cocoa recipes on the Cocoa Maker a while ago, so I’m really happy to see the Snowman Cocoa, even if it is on a stove rather than a fountain. (But then again, in my experience, stove-top cocoa is the best kind of cocoa!) Does it melt in a pot over the stove when you prepare it?
As for the prizes themselves: I thought the artists did an amazing job with the floor decorations, and I’m really glad we got two extra decorations, not tied to the goals, that we could buy for coins to decorate our restaurants with. The Frosty Feast looks amazing, and I can’t wait to use it next month when I try on a wintry theme in Nibble and Noms :) I can’t help but wish we’d gotten a matching table-chair-counter set though. I love the icicle tables and frosty counters, but the snow chairs, as cute as they are, just don’t go with them at all (and they’re tiny!) :( Hopefully the update we get today (or next week) will have frosty chairs that better match the tables and counters.
The recipe ratings have become kind of stale in recent months (and probably throughout 2015) since the quality of the new dishes are so poor. They just don't compare with some of the past recipes.
DeleteYour dedication to the cause with cooking themed recipes is admirable! Very rarely have I ever done that, since it requires real organisation and discipline. Not for me!
As for the Snowman Cocoa, unfortunately at the preparation stage it is just a teacup on top of the stove. Not very creative, especially when there are already examples of recipes where the preparation stage features a pot of chocolate (Chocolate Hats maybe?!)
I agree that the floor decorations are all quality, and also feel that having extra items thrown in on a goal week is nice. It just makes the update seem all the more rich in terms of quantity.
There doesn't seem to have been a table-chair-counter combination that matches for a long time. I may have to look into that further, but it's definitely something I'd like to see return. :)