BitSummit is one of Japan’s biggest indie game festivals, taking place every year in Kyoto. This year, I got the opportunity to visit the event as part of AUTOMATON West, and check out a bunch of cool new games coming from both domestic and international developers.
One of the titles that instantly caught my eye as I was wandering around the venue was Abyss Kitchen, an anime-styled fantasy survival action RPG developed by Pico Games, with a heavy focus on delicious food.
For those who haven’t had the chance to read our recent Japanese indie games about food feature, Abyss Kitchen puts you in the role of Lop, a cute anthro adventurer and chef, who is tasked with supporting her party in battle and making sure none of the members leave the dungeon with an empty stomach. While your party members auto-battle through each stage trying to destroy every monster that comes their way, you will be walking behind them and collecting the corpses of the slain monsters, or should I say, fresh ingredients for your pantry.
After breaking and gathering the meat, plants, and other goodies lying on forest and dungeon floors, you’ll be able to cook up various dishes for your party members. The more you feed them, the stronger they become, and once you’ve capped their level at max stars, you can pop another burger in their mouths and let them unleash their special attacks.
While the BitSummit demo was only about 10-ish minutes in length, the gameplay didn’t feel too complicated, and it was quite easy to get into. At first, you’ll leave the monsters completely to your party and just focus on collecting nearby resources. However, the game also introduces bullet-hell like boss battles and different kinds of obstacles within the dungeon, so you can’t just mindlessly run around farming and will have to constantly think about your positioning as well. There are also opportunities for you to deal some damage to enemies as well using your trusty crossbow.
One thing I particularly enjoyed about the game is the adorable character designs. Both the heroes and the enemies are rendered in a soft anime style, and the boss designs were my personal favorites. Though, you do end up feeling kind of bad for having to murder and eat a cute parasol-wielding mushroom lolita.
Finally, at the end of every dungeon run, you get to sit back and relax with your party members while sharing some good food. Of course, all of it is cooked using the monster parts you’d hunted down earlier, and different dishes provide different effects that can help your party survive the following run.
As a side note, considering the recent domestic boom in gourmet-themed manga and anime, like Delicious and Dungeon (doesn’t cooking up monsters sound familiar?)and The Style of Hiroshi Nohara’s Lunch (a Crayon Shin-chan spin off focusing exclusively on Shin-chan’s dad enjoying his lunch), I was kind of expecting that the trend would start seeping into the Japanese indie game scene sooner or later.
Last year, Monster Hunter Wilds literally caused a cheese naan craze in the country thanks to its shamelessly mouthwatering food scenes, and it makes sense that people are just craving to see good food in video games. In this sense, the “food sections” of Abyss Kitchen don’t solely focus on the cooking process, but also eating and appreciating the scrumptious-looking meals on your plate.
Abyss Kitchen is coming soon for PC (Steam). A playable demo is also available.
