Crafting
Learning paths through this topic
Pay collection-book rewards once, even when you add new items to the book later
A book of everything the player has crafted gives rewards at quarter, half and full. Then an update adds new items: either everyone loses rewards they already got, or they collect them again, or a milestone that was just crossed is skipped. This entry keeps the claims straight when the book changes size.
Count "craft three things today" fairly around midnight, travel and offline jobs
A daily quest looks like the simplest thing: count crafts, give a reward. Then a player crafts at five to midnight, collects at five past, flies to another time zone, or opens the game with yesterday's progress still shown. This entry decides which day each craft belongs to and keeps the counter honest.
Let a finished dish wait for the player, but spoil it gently, even offline
A dish is done, and the player is not there. Burning it at once feels cruel, never burning it makes timing meaningless. This entry gives a short window where the dish is perfect, then lets quality slide to ash, and works it out from the clock when the player returns, so no running timer is needed.
Close a limited-time crafting event without cheating players out of what they started
A seasonal event has special materials and special recipes, and then it ends. Players with a half-finished craft, a queue of jobs, or a pile of leftover event materials are the ones who write angry reviews. This entry says which jobs still pay out, which get their materials back, and how leftovers become something fair.
Use the oldest ingredients first and tell the player how fresh the dish turned out
Ingredients that go off give a kitchen game its tension, but the bag is a heap of mixed ages. Which tomato does the soup take, the fresh one the player wanted to save or the old one about to rot? This entry picks the ones closest to spoiling, throws out what has spoiled, and says how fresh the result is.
Give recipe experience that fades when the same cheap recipe is spammed
Each craft earns experience toward a mastery level, and soon players discover that the cheapest recipe, crafted a thousand times, levels them up fastest. The game turns into a button to hold. This entry makes repeated crafts of one recipe give less and less, lets that recover while the player is away, and handles several levels gained at once.
Plan which customer orders share one oven run so fewer of them walk away
In a cooking game with one oven and impatient customers, cooking orders strictly one after another makes the last ones wait too long, while waiting to fill the oven makes the first ones wait too long. This entry shows the order of oven runs that serves the most people in time, and which orders will still be late.
Show a recipe card with undiscovered parts hidden, and reveal a little more on request
A recipe book that shows everything has nothing left to discover, and one that shows nothing is just frustrating. The middle way is a card where known parts are named and unknown ones are question marks, with a hint button that gives a little more each time. The catch is that the question marks must not give the answer away by themselves.
Hand out the last few dishes so the most customers go home happy
Three customers are waiting and there are two dishes. One guest would take anything, another only the burger. If the game serves in the order they arrived, the picky guest goes hungry while a flexible one holds the burger. This entry finds who gets what so that as many as possible are served, with the best tips.
Reward serving guests in a row without punishing one mistake too harshly
A streak bonus makes a cooking game exciting, but losing a long streak to a single burnt dish makes players quit for the day. This entry makes the bonus grow with the streak and softens the fall: a first slip may be forgiven, and a real break takes only part of the streak, with every payout in whole coins.
Let players discover recipes by combining items in any order
Put fire and stone together and something happens; put stone and fire together and it should be the same thing. Discovery crafting breaks on order, on repeated items and on tries that cost materials. This entry builds the lookup and remembers what was tried.
Convert pistol rounds into rifle rounds without losing the odd leftover
Three small bullets turn into two big ones. The player has ten small bullets and asks for one big one. Does the game take all ten, round up, or hand out a half bullet? This entry converts exactly what was asked, keeps the leftovers and remembers the spare.