The Real Kitchen Nightmare

The Real Kitchen Nightmare takes place in an old, run-down restaurant kitchen. – Not in just any old place, but in the kitchen of the famous 3-star Michelin star chef Francois ‘Le Boucher’ Hellerstein. Famous for his exquisite cooking, notorious for his dreaded outbursts of rage. Now suddenly the entire staff of his former restaurant has disappeared, and that calls us as investigators.

We have chosen the Silent Partner Edition in which our avatar, Max(ime), does not speak to us. I really liked Max’s performance. Maybe the one or other look from him was a bit too obvious, but I think otherwise we would never have made this room, which would have been a pity, because the ending was cool. The live images come from a GoPro camera via a YouTube stream and are very clear. A small downer: The YouTube stream could not be synchronized correctly with some players. This caused a significant delay between the image and the sound. These players were not able to puzzle along immediately, and whether something would work, for example whether a lock or a door would open, was already acoustically anticipated by the cheering or disappointment of the other players. A sound file provides atmospheric background music.

The goal of the game, as mentioned, is difficult to achieve in the given time and without tips. In real life only 2-3 percent of the players “survive” this do-or-die scenario. We made it, but even for us the time was almost up. The puzzles fit the game thematically. Some of them are challenging, but all are feasible. I really liked The Real Kitchen Nightmare for the story, the cool, authentic setting (which I’ve never had before) and the general atmosphere.