Chef’s Note: Please Read

Before laying it all out for you, there are two important things I’d like to share:

#1# This is not a detailed case study with “metrics”, research notes, wireframes and other artifacts from the process of making the game. Due to company policies, I cannot share that. What this is, is me sharing my role in the game. I might sneak in one or two illustrations to explain some concepts better.

#2# This is a collaborative project, and I worked with a team of talented people. I am in no way taking credit for anything.

Plating: Laying it all out

I was asked to join the project in late 2022 after the initial prototype had been submitted and approved by Disney. Knowing that I’d be resuming in January, I wanted to be prepared so I spent the holidays doing two things:
#1# Playing the prototype and making notes of things that could be improved as well as generating new ideas.
#2# Playing different cooking games.

By January, it felt like running after a bus in Lagos while soaking wet. That prototype? We had to take it apart to its teeny-tiny molecules and built the game back up. This case study isn’t in any particular order as we had multiple iterations. There is no A B C, or D. We have A B C Z Y D A C D 😄. Makes sense? I hope so ☺️

Research and Prototype Playtesting

When I design, I draw inspiration from different things and not just the genre I’m working on. I decided that the best way for me to think outside the box is to not only play cooking games but explore other game genres.

I wasn’t just testing the game, I was studying it. It’s like walking into a house. You feel the wall with your fingers. What’s the texture? What kind of paint? Ouuu there’s a Butler. How and where did he welcome me? Did I feel warm? Or was he cold?

Heading back to the games I explored. I would pay attention to things like:

1# What happened after the splash screen?
2# Did I get a tutorial? What kind of tutorial? Was it text heavy? Or just a finger nudging you?
3# How often to they unlock new pieces?
4# What does the difficulty feel like? For some games, it starts of ass calm, you’re learning and the next, your house is on fire and you have a small bucket with holes.
5# When do we unlock new levels?
6# What kind of game currency do they use?

One thing I wanted to pay attention was the rate at which new pieces are unlocked. From the prototype, I unlocked new dishes so I wanted to see how games implemented something similar. I observed that when a new item is unlocked, the game becomes easy. They let the player get used to it. And slowly, it ramps up and you can barely keep up.

These observations helped me design the game better. For example, with tutorials this influenced my decision on knowing where to nudge the player and when to explain. With simple food items, we used robot hands to show the player. When an appliance is unlocked and it had a unique mechanic, we added text to help guide the player.

Series – Early and Limited Access

Access to the series exposed me to the world of Iwájú. I cannot find the words to describe how I felt watching the series but one thing that comes to mind right now is “proud” – yes, I was proud to see our story written differently. Another thing was, I could see a world I had always imagined. I love cyberpunk and futurism. Seeing futuristic Lagos reinforced my passions and dreams of creating robots and gadgets that embodied my culture and heritage.

Limited access meant limited time so I had to be strategic. I divided my watch time into two: 1) watch the series. Just take it all in. 2) Observe make notes. Watch as many times as you can and take note of tiny details because they matter once we start ideation.

Things I documented included:

The music (artist, song title)
The character names and personalities
The robots
The futuristic cars
Food eaten
Types of patterns used
Timestamps of important events

Seeing Tola’s helper robot sparked an idea, we could have robot helpers in the kitchen. Different ones with unique skills. For the characters, I paid close attention to how they speak. This was super useful when I wrote the narrative. And when it was time to work on the food, I looked through my list and grabbed the dishes from the series.

Ideation Sessions


Armed with my notes from testing (prototype and other games), research and series, I was ready for the ideation session with the team. Aside from sharing my ideas, I worked closely with the Creative Director to manage our ideation sessions. Using Miro, I designed the different components for our sessions. For example, designing boards like Game Pillars and making sure each teammate had stickies assigned to them. I may have gone a little overboard adding stickers and cute touches to the Miro boards, so much that one of my teammates joked that it had to be me, because really, who else would?

Once we finished with Miro, my job was to gather all the ideas and transfer them to a Word document. I also managed a similar session with the Disney team via Zoom.

Documentation

I worked on loads of documents for the project. Like more than enough to last me a life time. The major ones include the G.D.D. (Game Design Document). I also worked with the art team on the initial A.D.D. (Art Direction Document) before handing it over to the new Art Director. Other documents include tutorials (more on this below), initial narrative, and proposals like boss mode. One valuable thing I learned from this was adding date to the document title as suggested by the Disney Team.

Spreadsheets

Spreadsheets and I do not get along, but we had to put our differences aside for Rising Chef. And if you’re wondering, yes, we still do not get along. I used spreadsheets for loads of tasks on the project. To name a few:

Mapping out food unlocks: outlining the levels and food in a location, then highlighting what level it is unlocked. This helped us to plan the difficulty. Meaning when “Yam is unlocked”, the level is easy and not super hard. It also allowed us to know the best places to give rewards.

Wireframes and Hi-fidelity screens: Since I created the wireframes, I was tasked with tracking the high-fidelity screens for each, making sure they were designed on time and important details weren’t missed. Once a design was completed, I would mark it as done and add a link to where the asset is. If I notice any issues, I’d reach out to the UI designer so we can make updates.

Level Rules, Objectives, and Difficulty: Working with the creative director and developers, spreadsheets were used to define level rules, level objectives, and difficulty. As I mentioned, spreadsheets and I have a generational beef. I ended up creating a visual representation of our level difficulty in Miro. This made it easy for everyone to see how difficulty changes based on the colors we assigned to: easy, hard, boss mode, etc.

Track all text in the game: I gathered all text from wireframes and narrative, and put them in one spreadsheet. From here, the other teams refined it and we prepped for localization.

Narrative: initially, we used Word documents, but we later moved the narrative to spreadsheets (sighs).

Ingredient combo: using spreadsheets, we defined the ingredient combos for different dishes. What goes with what. For example, let’s say we have a dish of fried yam, egg sauce and fried fish. Using spreadsheets, we defined which items can be together in a plate. So you can have fried yam + egg sauce, fried yam + fish, OR fried yam + egg sauce + fried fish.

(Note: fried yam, egg sauce and fried fish aren’t dishes in the game. Just for illustration purposes).

The use of spreadsheet wasn’t just for tracking but to help shape key design decisions. For example, let’s say we need to teach the players how to use an air fryer. After writing the tutorial, I’d refer to the food unlock sheet to know where the food that needs an air fryer is unlocked. Then I would highlight the level the tutorial should start. That way the devs know what level they need to trigger the tutorial. I didn’t guess. I used the data available.

Flowcharts

I used flow charts to design different game components and features like: Game Flow, Robots, Treats, Collectibles, Achievements, Chef Titles, Tutorials, Boss Mode and Patience Boosters. For flows that did not need much notes nor explanation, I typically would use Flow A. But when a flow needed extra information, rather than just annotate, I would use flow B.

One benefit of flow B is that it’s visual and self-explanatory. Anyone on the team could see it and understand what was meant to happen. For example, when we got to the polishing stage, I walked the sound designer through the main game flow. This was done to show how the game works and where sounds were needed.

Locations

During ideation, we brainstormed and listed out different locations for the restaurants in the game. Once stakeholders decided on the total number of locations, the next step was designing each one in detail. Using location one as a blueprint, we worked on things like: moodboards, characters, food, upgrades, bots, and furniture. This wasn’t a linear process. Things changed as we progressed based on feedback.

Once we had a good starting point with location one, I created a template from it and used that to work on the remaining five locations. This helped keep things consistent across the board. Anytime something was updated or a new component was introduced in one, I had to reflect that across the others too.

Food, Mechanics, and Combinations

I gathered a long list of foods, snacks and drinks and assigned them to different locations. My decision was influenced by the work we had done in the previous section as well as asking myself “If this were a real location/restaurant, what kind of food will be on the menu?”. I did lots of extensive research into Nigerian cuisines as well as food from other parts of the world.

With the dishes (drinks and snacks included) finalized, I designed the food mechanics. This process involves mapping out what happens when the player taps on an ingredient (item) on the plate. To aid in this part, I watched food recipes on Youtube and simplified the process. For example, I’d watch a quick recipe on preparing white rice and stew, mentally map out the steps the chef used in preparing the dish. Once I had a clear picture, I’d remove unnecessary steps from the cooking process. Something like: adding salt to water or washing rice isn’t that important in the context of our game. Once done, I’d translate my thoughts to simple flows that show ingredients and player interaction.

Lastly, I worked on showing on how each item (ingredient) in a dish can be combined. (p.s. already explained this in the spreadsheet section).

Kitchen Layout

After designing food and mechanics for the game, I created kitchen layouts for all 6 locations. Each location had three layouts so in total, 18 layouts. The reason for having 3 sample kitchen layouts of each location is to give the art team multiple options. That way they’re not locked into one design. To add, this was meant to serve as a guide to them as they drew the kitchen.

Designing the kitchen layout was fun but challenging at the same time. The fun part? Creating a blueprint of the kitchen with different foods and equipment. The challenge? Well, deciding the best position to place food. For example, if the player has to fry fish, I’d need to ensure that the frying pan is close to the raw fish. That way it feels intuitive to click on.

Another challenge was space. Let’s say in location X we do not have enough space for food and equipment. To fix this, I had different options: remove the ingredient, simplify the food mechanic or change how the dish is prepared. Back to location X, the player has to make eggs and the steps involve: whisking the egg in a bowl, pouring in a frying pan and then serving in a plate. With limited space in mind, I would analyze what we had already. If the player has to fry sausages, it means the frying pan is important but the bowl, we can do without it. Removing the bowl means the game could become easier, but we can balance this later by tweaking difficulty elsewhere.

Working on the kitchen layout felt like solving a puzzle. I wasn’t just placing items randomly, I considered constraints and player experience.

Narrative – Game Dialogue

Remember I mentioned noting the different characters and their personalities during the early series screening? That came in handy when I was tasked to write the narrative at the beginning of the project. I wrote the dialogue and narrative for all three locations. Aside from my notes, a core memory I had from my childhood helped me write the dialogue. Growing up, I wanted to become an actor so I downloaded scripts from big Hollywood movies and learned about different acting techniques. One of them was method acting. And I used that knowledge to write the dialogue. Looking back now, it’s funny, but I’d sit and pretend I was a character, then write as they would speak and behave.

Since the game takes place in Lagos, Nigeria, we had to infuse Nigerian Pidgin English in the dialogue. So after writing the dialogue for all three locations, I translated key character dialogue to Pidgin.

As the project progressed, I handed off the narrative to a colleague who refined the dialogue and updated the Pidgin English.

Tutorials

Tutorials were a bit tricky because we didn’t want to rely too much on text, but some features really needed it. For example, showing players where to find a recipe couldn’t be done with just visuals. I had to find a balance between what needed proper dialogue and what could be solved with simple nudges. Player and stakeholder feedback also helped refine the tutorial flow.

I designed all the tutorials and wrote all the dialogue. For the tutorial design, I used wireframe flows to show the different stages of each tutorial.

Image A: tutorial dialogue
Image B: show the player what items they should interact with

These flows helped the devs understand the tutorial better. I also added detailed notes to guide the implementation. Aside from devs, stakeholders used the tutorial flows and documents to understand how the tutorial would appear in the game.

Low-Fidelity Wireframes

Taking the game apart and building it from the ground up meant I had to design low fidelity wireframes for all the existing screens in the prototype. Then after designing the game flow chart, I made notes of all the new pages and created low fidelity wireframes for each.

As we came up with new ideas or updates, I designed additional wireframes and made changes to the existing ones when feedback was received.

Recipe Book

After receiving player feedback from people who are not familiar with Nigerian food, we designed the recipe book to show the dish and teach the player how to plate it (i.e. the order in which ingredients are added on a plate). My role here was designing the concept document, a simple flowchart and wireframe mockups to show how the recipe book feature works.

Furniture

After working on the kitchen layout, I made a list of furniture that would suit each location. I also designed the different furniture upgrade stages. For example:

Stage 1: plain kitchen
Stage 2: add a, b and c
Stage 3: add x, y, z and upgrade a, b and c

(Note, alphabets are meant for illustration purposes.)

Playtesting

I playtested the game to ensure it matches what was designed. I’d often have all the flowcharts and spreadsheets open on my laptop as I played. This helped me to check that everything worked as intended. Aside from playtesting, I joined live playtest sessions where I watched players play the game. Listening to them play taught me a valuable lesson, which I will share later 😁

Cutscene and Narrative

After multiple rounds of play testing, we realized that a cutscene was needed to help the players understand the game, the backstory and the character they would play as. Not only did I design the cutscene, I wrote the narrative. To keep this section short, I’ll just share a quick summary of how I worked on the cutscene:

Playtest mobile games with cutscenes and make notes on their design and style
Come up with ideas
Present the ideas
Refine ideas after stakeholder feedback
Prepare storyboards for each idea
Present the storyboard
Transfer the selected idea to a document
Write the narrative for the cutscene
Add reference image for each frame of the cutscene for the art team

After implementing the cutscene, it was clear that this was the missing piece. It made the game better and provided context to players.

VFX

I worked with the art team to outline VFX for the game. My job involved preparing a document and making a list of items that would need effects and then adding suggested effects. I researched effects from other games, looked at assets and also grabbed ideas from real world examples. For example, I added snippets from a YouTube video showing how frying fish looked like (the steam, smoke).

Paper Prototypes

Using Miro, I designed paper prototypes to test out how food is being served on the plate. This allowed us to fix issues with food going on the wrong plate.

Boss Mode

Wanting to add more spice and heat in the Kitchen, the team thought it’s best to introduce “Boss Mode”. Working with the creative director, we came up with ideas and concepts for the Boss mode. After receiving approval, I translated the concept document to wireframe flows. That way everyone on the team had a visual idea of how it works. One thing I loved the most about “Boss Mode” is how it brings in the villain from the series and how we integrated a boss feature in a cooking game. During play testing, I carefully observed how players were taken by surprise as a Boss walks in demanding more orders. It certainly did what it was meant to do: cause chaos.

Post-mortem

After months of development, ideation, iterations, bugs, feedback and sleepless nights, we were done. Rising Chef was ready to be seen by the world. I had a new mission now, write the post-mortem for the game.

The post-mortem was a way for the team to learn from the entire development process: what went wrong, what went well and how we can improve moving forward. Also, it would serve as a reference for future/similar projects.

To get started, I designed a template for the post-mortem. This document contained everything in the game from development to UI to art. Before adding content, I submitted the template for approval and after receiving feedback, I started adding content for areas I worked on like narrative, wireframes, game design, boss mode, etc.

For sections that needed input from other team members, I added notes so they’d understand what’s expected of them. Once I had finished my part on the post-mortem, I could finally close my laptop and breathe.

We did it.

Chop Chop: Challenges

Just like any restaurant kitchen, we had some quiet days and days where everything is on fire. The rice is burning and a customer just ordered 10 boiled eggs but you only have 2 eggs left in the crate. While trying to juggle multiple orders, your cake mixer breaks.

We weren’t cooking but I thought that’d paint a picture of what it was like. Creative projects do have their challenges and this one isn’t an exception.

The first challenge would be tight deliverable timelines. Since I juggled multiple hats, we had some instances where deadlines coincided. Also doing things like writing dialogues in the morning to designing flowcharts by mid-day was a challenge but I found a balance.

The second challenge: having different iterations can be hectic because many documents are dependent on one another. For example, if we change the tutorial for the recipe book, I’d need to update: the flow diagram, text, and content in our main spreadsheet. Another example is if we change “Egusi” to “Okro Soup”, I’d have to update every instance of Egusi in places like:

Wireframes
Documents
Spreadsheets
Tutorials
Dialogues (if mentioned)

If something doesn’t get updated, it may lead to confusion and wrong implementation.

The third challenge doesn’t necessarily have to do with the project as it is quite personal but it would be my inability to convince stakeholders to try something different. Looking back, I did have lots of ideas of how I would have wanted to design the game. The fear of being rejected held me back. And knowing what I know now, I would have tried. What’s the worst that could happen? The stakeholders say no?

One thing that helped me push through was seeing the effort everyone on the team made from the developers to the art team. Playing through the prototypes and seeing the artwork motivated me to keep pushing. I admit that the first time I saw the new art style implemented, I cried. It made me happy: knowing all the effort was worth it.

Extracts: Personal Lessons

I thought about this part a lot and I would narrow down the lessons I learned to two:

#1# Don’t be afraid to speak your mind or share your ideas. I had a habit of dismissing my ideas and thinking they were not good enough. In the morning, I’d get an idea and I ignore it. By evening, someone from the Disney Team voices the same idea I had. I’ll use the recipe book as an example. During the ideation sessions, I knew we needed a recipe book but I shelved the idea. Months later, we had to implement it based on player feedback.

#2# Never assume people know. Even if it’s common to you, it might be strange to someone else. You have to consider that the people who will play your game may not be familiar with your culture and language.

Bon Appétit

About that thing I mentioned, sorry I ate it but thank you for stopping by, have a fabulous day ❤️