The quest in question is the Wild West goals. It seems like a lifetime ago now that we were all frantically collecting Ten Gallon Hats in a bid to stash enough to polish off the challenge. Those hats came with just about every recipe cooked, and were soon racking up. However with 22,000 required to complete the final goal this was a tough quest.
There were some hat boosts available for cooking certain recipes and from certain appliances, and at the time of my previous review I was struggling with the last of them - the Cowboy Coffee. Well, in the end I just couldn't gather sufficient Sugar to produce enough of the coffee, thus meaning I missed out on 1,000 precious hats. But would this prevent me getting over the finish line in the goals as a whole?
The answer was yes. Despite stepping up cooking efforts on the last couple of days and sticking to some of the shorter dishes, I was still behind when the final whistle was about to be blown. In truth with 95% of the necessary hats gathered, I was a little over 1,000 short, so even if I'd achieved the Cowboy Coffee goal I'd still have been down on the target.
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| Final step in Wild West goals |
Not to miss out, I quite happily paid up 55 gems in the last few minutes to skip the final step and get hold of the Ultimate Cowboy Chili. I'm so gem rich right now that this didn't feel like a great loss. Indeed I don't tend to spend my gems very much at all and have thus accumulated over 2,000 at the time of writing! So parting with a substantial number in order to open up three more mastery stars doesn't hurt really.
As is the way we hadn't even had time to wipe our brows after the rigours of the Wild West challenge when a new cruise popped up. The Under the Sea Cruise Catering Event brought with it a selection of decorations to be won, as well as the prospect of another gem producing dish.
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| Notification for Under the Sea Cruise Catering Event |
I have to be honest and say this was the first time I was actually outright pleased to see a cruise as the next event. Initially the cruises were such hard work that I almost feared them, even if the climactic reward is so cherished. But over time experience and improved resources through upgrades has turned my frown upside down. For me the first week of a cruise is now easy enough that in the main I can just go on cooking as normal. They're certainly easier than some of those shattering standard events!
Overall the quality of content with this cruise was seriously high. Lefty the Shark, the Mermaid and the Aquarium Column were especially attractive and were all possible to gain from progressing through the cruise. I actually bought another nine of the Aquarium Columns shortly before they were removed on Thursday, racking up a bill of 360 gems. Why? Because when you line them up in a row they kind of make a proper underwater scene. The continuity isn't perfect, but it certainly looks interesting and actually involved me parting with some gems - shocker!
Also among the prizes in the cruise event were some gold and silver stamps. As a result further progress with respect to the stamp recipes could be made.
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| Gold stamps prize in Under the Sea Cruise Catering Event |
I've now managed to learn 10 of the 12 dishes, with just the Chateau Stove's Salted Caramel Ice Cream and the Chateau Oven's Pain au Chocolate to go. The latter requires 200 Recipe Cards so might just be left till last!
I know a few players don't like the stamp recipes because they are a slog to learn and master, but I see it as an excellent long term goal. Yes they will take an eternity to master, but this is a long term game where you need to play for a long time to truly reap the benefits. Those of us who have been playing from the start can certainly testify to that considering the number of gem making recipes now available to us thanks to the many cruises.
I completed the cruise without any pandemonium, thus unlocking the Seared Scallops. Debbie the Diver is the kind soul who delivers the special ingredient, which in this case is the Scallop (no surprises there!)
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| Seared Scallops prize in Under the Sea Cruise Catering Event |
Talking of the abundance of gem producers, these scallops are the 13th such dish in the game, and the fourth on the Jubilee Oven. I don't know about anyone else, but this fourth addition appears to be the one that has tipped me over the edge of accumulating more special ingredients than I can use to cook. I already need another prize appliance!
Now to something I've not discussed previously in these round-ups. Following the Under the Sea cruise was... nothing. For what I reckon was the first time since updates became fixed to Thursdays, there was nothing new report, be it a quest, additional content or a special sale. In fact going back further, I believe you have to revisit March 2015 for the previous occasion when there was no new stuff or an ongoing goal set. That's impressive, and yet pales into insignificance in comparison to the original game which is now on a streak of over five years without failing to deliver a weekly update in some form!
RS2 News
And this shock quiet continued this past Thursday, meaning that we're looking at three weeks between updates, and even that assumes that normal service resume next week! For me it's not a big problem since there's plenty of cooking towards mastery to focus on between events.
But why the fallow period? I have no idea - it might just be as simple as Storm8 taking a fortnight off the game during the summer, or it could be as complicated as the gamemakers putting all their resources into the recently launched 'Dream City: Metropolis', the latest entry in the Story franchise. Personally I greedily hope that they're working on some serious developments for Restaurant Story 2, with the hot dog van, Ferris wheel sign and fishing boat all still waiting to be used. Now is the time!
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| Fishing boat and Ferris wheel sign |
Of course the worst case scenario is that the game's developers are giving up on it. However I think that is highly unlikely. It's been less than two years since the worldwide release on iOS, and considering that the game appears to still be enjoying a swelling playing population the evidence suggests that RS2 is not going anywhere soon.
Nevertheless, this is a disconcerting turn of events. I think we'll all be keeping a beady eye on the game come next Thursday in hope that there's a bumper update headed our way!
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