Monster Menu: The Scavenger’s Cookbook Review
Release Date: May 23, 2023
Developer: NIS
System: PS5, PS4, Nintendo Switch
Price: Deluxe Edition $49.99
I have a confession. I’ve never actually played a Rogue-like SRPG before. Monster Menu: The Scavenger’s Cookbook initially caught my eye with its cute graphics (think Pokémon mixed with Anime and Crash Bandicoot); and the idea of foraging and making recipes to survive and eat your way through a dungeon seemed intriguing.
Visually the art style does a lot of the heavy lifting and NIS does a great job of carrying that style throughout the menus and other aspects of the game. The character models are high quality with crisp lines capturing their Anime art style, while the dungeon floors are a lot lower quality and resolution with their blurry and forever repeating textures. The lighting and particle effects however, especially around the campfire, were quite impressive.
One of my favorite aspects of any game is character creation. There are multiple base avatars to choose from in MM that the player can use as a starting point to then customize hair, skin, eyes, accessories, outfits, poses, and voices. Sadly, many of the voice options were more annoying to me than not, and I do wish there were more hair, color, and outfit styles to choose from, but I thoroughly enjoyed playing around in this menu for a decent amount of time giggling about the characters designs and deciding the options I preferred most. Yes, I went with the character avatar with the VERY ample chest. It made me laugh way too much not to. So bouncy!
Character creation isn’t just about looks. The player also needs to choose their starting class, which was a bit overwhelming. I play different kinds of games in very different styles. Sometimes I prefer being a magical distanced DPS, others a Warrior that smashes enemies faces in with brute force. There were a great number to choose from in MM, all with varying skills and stats. I had no idea what to pick…. So I went with the one that had the most HP. It seemed safer that way.
There are plenty of customizations for the gameplay including different speeds and inversions for the controls, sound settings, difficulty options and more. Even with the display options I still found myself getting annoyed at the camera angles sometimes, especially when enemies were attacking and I wanted to spin the camera for a better view when there were walls in the way.
Though there are a few, I do wish there were more options for the sound settings. I like the overall sound effects but jumping into battle it gets shockingly loud. And the character talks to themself anytime you interact with something or are near an enemy which gets incredibly repetitive. An option to turn off the mindless chatter would have been MUCH appreciated.
The game starts with a short story of warriors becoming overwhelmed when attempting to fight their way through a dungeon, only to get stranded, starving, and struggling to find their way out. The initial tutorial went over the basics of gameplay but kind of left you in the dark after that. There were no further hints of nuances or tips that I encountered during my playtime. I’m still not sure how to unlock more player characters for my party or use some of the moves that are supposedly available to me.
Making your way through each floor the player encounters new enemies as well as harvest locations and loot boxes to gather supplies to cook for better munching or upgrade for better punching.
The system for crafting items (for better punching) was not very helpful. It was unclear what everything was actually used for, how you find missing ingredients to create new items, or what you can combine to create things that weren’t an already a provided recipe. Some ingredients have a “skill” listed below them with no clarification on where to find this skill, how to use it, or the result from using it. Overall, I was able to figure out how to upgrade a few pieces of gear a single time, but when trying to upgrade the same gear again, the system refused with no explanation or guide as to why.
When it comes to cooking meals (for better munching) the system was fairly simple to figure out. You start with basic recipes and have the opportunity to find more throughout the dungeon floors, or you can simply pick ingredients at random to see what concoction you can create. Once you have made a few it will show you results from combining certain ingredients and you have the option to choose which meal result you would like as a final product.
The dungeon play itself is fairly simple. Gather sparkly resource spots, kill enemies, find the door to the next level, repeat. You can sneak up on enemies for an advantage or they can ambush you when you’re facing away from them or busy collecting resources. Once in battle a grid will pop up around each character in your party showing their movable space. You cannot move your characters outside of this grid and you have to be close enough to the enemies in order to attack in a turn-based sequence.
Once you interact with the door to move to the next dungeon level the player has the option to continue, or rest. If you choose the rest option the game will load into a little campsite where you can cook full meals using the supplies you collected, which can be eaten for large boosts to any damaged stats, and buffs for upcoming battles. This campsite also gives you the option to “rest” until morning or night; use this wisely as enemies are stronger at night. An item of note is that when you do choose the “rest” option at a campsite on expedition it increases some stats and decreases others, so be sure to keep an eye on those!
Along with the resting campsites between levels, the player has the capability to “prepare” individual food items collected while on the dungeon floor, directly from their inventory. This comes in handy because preparing the items boosts their stats without needing to finish the current level to arrive at a campsite first. But beware some snacks will apply a detrimental effect on the character such as sleep or paralysis that you may not notice before encountering the next enemy.
Side note: There is an animation that pops up every time your character eats which I turned off very early into the game because the characters eat so often it was quite repetitive.
For every enemy you defeat in MM the player gains shards which can be spent at altars located randomly around the dungeon floors for buffs and upgrades on the current expedition. But player beware, when your party is defeated all of those buffs will disappear when you return to base.
I’m not going to lie, I absolutely despise the Rogue aspect of this game. Having to start over at essentially square one is horribly frustrating to me. Especially when I have a stockpile of food and supplies to keep my characters alive, only to be bombarded by a dozen enemies all at once, with no escape.
I started playing this game on the default mode to experience the game as the developer intended. And after three or four tries I still couldn’t get past floor 6…. So I knocked it down to easy mode, and….
…only got to floor 8. Maybe it’s just me, but I expected easy mode to be… easier haha.
I have played other games on regular vs. easy mode and there is a noticeable difference in gameplay and it frustrates me that in MM there really isn’t. I sincerely want to play more and explore further into the dungeon floors, to find new enemies for punching and recipes for munching. Even with the shoddy/nonexistent explanations for the nuances I really do enjoy playing this game, until I die unreasonably and have to start completely over, that just sends me straight to rage-quit mode.
If you’re into Rogue Strategy RPGs this game will be a fun way to pass the time, playing against yourself to see how far you can make it. If you’re new to RSRPGs, like me, this is definitely a fun game, though a bit confusing and frustrating at times. It honestly gives me cozy game vibes, until the ridiculous death by seventeen thousand enemies all at once.
Overall I would give Monster Menu: The Scavenger’s Cookbook a rating of 3 out of 5.
Pros:
Cute character design
Fun concept - cooking and eating your way through a dungeon
Fairly easy menus
Cozy gathering “farming” feel to collect and craft items
Cons:
Rouge-like gameplay - ie starting back at square one
Could have more character variety for customizations
Difficult to figure out strategy nuances
Hard to avoid enemies, get bombarded all at once with no escape
No extra tutorial or hints section to figure out more about expanding tools/characters/upgrades
Special thanks to NIS for providing the Gamer’s Lounge with a copy of Monster Menu: The Scavenger’s Cookbook for review.