Throughout serving beef bowls, the gameplay divides into two distinct types. The serving sequences for your three shifts are pretty simple. As customers come in and sit, you’ll direct your character behind the counter. When you get close to them, you’ll notice the type of bowl they’re looking for, represented by a thought bubble displaying one of the PlayStation 2 controller’s four face buttons. Simply press the appropriate button to serve them a bowl and send them on their way. Each level will have its success criteria, usually centered on doing a certain number of customers in a continuous chain. This becomes more difficult as the stores you manage grow more extensive and the customers become more impatient. If you take too long to serve a customer, they will stomp out and reset the onscreen chain counter to zero.
To make matters worse, walkouts lower the onscreen customer-satisfaction meter. While this may appear overly simplistic, some depth is thrown in. You’ll be able to direct customers where to sit, and you’ll be able to create combos by grouping customers who want the same type of bowl together. Serving one of the customers feeds the entire chain and adds time to the game clock, which is constantly ticking away. The greater the size of the group, the more time is added and the more dramatic the effect used to highlight your combo.
