Baking Has Never Been So Boring
I’m a bit of an apologist when it comes to these matchstick-men tycoon games on the Xbox. I’m talking about games like Buffet Boss and Aquarium Land. They will often have day-glo, faceless characters on the Xbox Store card and ask you to perform jobs, as if there weren’t enough jobs to be done in the real world. While I will fully admit they’re not exciting, they can deliver a cozy feeling of constant progression. They have a place.
But even as an apologist, I have my limits. Baking Time is firmly at that limit. It has a punt at stripping tycoon games back, when tycoon games were already at a bare minimum, and all that’s left is a crumb. There’s not enough sustenance in that crumb for even the tycoon fan to enjoy.
The Great Xbox Bake Off
The job that Baking Time hopes to emulate is, unsurprisingly, that of a baker. But you’re not in a bakery, which is faintly odd. Most tycoon games at least present you with an outline of the setting – a building and parking lot, perhaps – but Baking Time has you on floating, sterile islands. It’s the first of a number of decisions that had us scratching our chin.
There are four actions in total. The first is that you wander into a giant oven, health and safety be damned, and gather up produce which you then stack in a pile on your back. It’s all done automatically: you only have to be in the food’s vicinity. This action represents about 90% of the playtime in Baking Time. As the game goes on, you will find yourself increasingly hoovering up croissants and eclairs by doing figure-eight loops on these giant baking trays.
The second action is to bring them to the serving tray, which is triggered automatically. The third is to sell them, which means standing for a prolonged period at the till as punters file in, and the fourth is to collect the resulting cash, again, triggered automatically. There you have it: the entire gameplay loop of Baking Time. Even by tycoon standards, it’s a little on the threadbare side.
The Hired Help
There are the usual bolt-ons that come with these games. You can automate all of the processes I’ve mentioned. Four helpers, all upgradeable, will collect the bakery products for you and bring them to the serving area. They are, of course, rubbish at it – even at the highest level. You’re infinitely better than they are: as the saying goes, if you want something done properly, do it yourself.
To automate the serving and cash collection, you have to reach certain thresholds. That means zooming about on the baking trays forty-five times in total, eventually unlocking a server. If you want to be finally done with a baking product, and move onto the next, then the server is the bare minimum.
There are a few other things to buy, but they don’t amount to much. Aside from upgrading your buddies, you can also buy a pet who gives you a multiplier to the XP you earn (levelling up offers you a choice of increased inventory or faster speeds), an animal that produces passive cash, and you can eventually unlock an upstairs area where cosmetic clothing and a teleport can be purchased. But you won’t be thinking about those much.
Most of your cash will be going towards the next area. Because there is a conga-line of different bakeries, each stocking just one bakery product. Which, we’re pretty sure, is not how bakeries work. Soon, you will have doughnuts, gateaux, tarts and more coming out the wazoo.
Oh Goodie, A Part-Time Job
As you look upon your long, linear empire of bakeries, you might wonder what the point of it all is. Because while it may be satisfying, there is also a long, linear empire of bakeries that you haven’t unlocked. The cost of unlocking them may be a little higher, but they are all the same. All of them require that same loop of making and selling, before you can afford lackeys to do it for you. That may seem more than a little daunting.
On a micro or macro scale, there is not nearly enough happening to maintain attention. The one and only bit of true gameplay is hoovering up food from the trays, but there’s no thought or strategy in that. You’re not opportunistically rushing to a golden croissant that will only appear for a few seconds. There’s nothing like that. It’s a routine, and a mind-numbing one at that.
On a macro scale, you are going to have enough cash to pay for everything eventually, so I suppose the strategy comes from what you choose first. You might wonder whether to unlock a new bakery product, a new pet, or some helper-upgrades with your cash. But even here, I can’t help thinking that the choice is made for you. Since you, the main character, is a thousand-times more efficient than any helper, a new bakery product will always be the best choice. So it’s a bit of a false economy.
I’m going to quibble about the balancing, too. Each new bakery requires you to earn increasingly large amounts of cash. But the new bakeries have pretty duff earning potentials. You might get $1 more from each cake you make. The cash rewards and the cost of unlocks are out of sync: you are having to grind increasingly long amounts of time to progress. Which is not a great message to a player who was burning out as much as I was.
There will be a moment in Baking Time where it won’t seem worth it any more. It’s not as if it’s doing anything new with each bakery, and the only thing you’re truly unlocking is an increasing grind. We stopped at twenty bakeries. We were done playing baker. We were only motivated to play further because we wanted to write a fair review; we imagine other players will stick around for even less.
A Monotonous Trudge Through Half-Baked Tycoon Ideas
In tycoon terms, Baking Time is a bit of a dud. It’s not got the wackiness of Aquarium Land or the variety of actions of Buffet Boss. By some margin it’s the worst of the genre that we’ve played; a monotonous trudge through bakery after bakery. It’s even got the temerity to make you do it for dozens of hours.
Life is too short. We all have tiresome moments in our jobs; we don’t need tiresome moments in our games, too.
Important Links
Baking Time Turns Up The Heat On Xbox And Play Anywhere – https://www.thexboxhub.com/baking-time-turns-up-the-heat-on-xbox-and-play-anywhere/
Buy from the Xbox Store – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/baking-time/9MWXMP54Z163
There’s a Complete Edition too – https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/store/baking-time-complete-edition/9N62HN85X1H4/0010
