What makes Overcooked a challenging game — The Kitchen Work Triangle
Back in high school, way before I was exposed to the world of data science, I studied design technology as my science elective in my IB Diploma Programme. It was an interesting course, and I learned a lot about the design process, especially while working on the design project for which we have to identify a problem and attempt to solve it with some form of a product.
Fast-forward to 2016, Team17 first published the game Overcooked to the world and the game was met with positive reviews. Although I wasn’t one of the early adopters, I eventually got it and it was one of my favorite party/co-op games when my friends came to visit. Overcooked 2, released in 2018, has largely took over this spot, and I managed to complete the whole map with 3-stars with my friends. Talking about dedication, huh?
It has been years since I came across anything related to design technology and I have forgotten most of the course material. However, one idea stuck around with me — the idea of the kitchen work triangle, and somehow I found that Overcooked really illustrates how this particular design principle is extremely crucial for architects and interior designers.
The Kitchen Work Triangle
Simply speaking, the kitchen work triangle is the triangular area formed by connecting the sink (preparation), stove (cooking) and refrigerator (food storage), which are points that primary tasks are carried out in a kitchen. If the three points are relatively close to one another, the kitchen will be easy and efficient to use, since the amount of wasted steps and time is minimal. The triangle was originally developed by the University of Illinois School of Architecture in the 1940s to maximize the efficiency of a one-cook kitchen.
The design principles of the kitchen work triangle are used by kitchen designers and architects, which include:
- No leg of the triangle should be less than 4 feet (1.2 m) or more than 9 feet (2.7 m).
- The sum of all three sides of the triangle should be between 13 feet (4.0 m) and 26 feet (7.9 m).
- Cabinets or other obstacles should not intersect any leg of the triangle by more than 12 inches (30 cm).
- If possible, there should be no major traffic flow through the triangle.
- A full-height obstacle, such as a tall cabinet, should not come between any two points of the triangle.
Even though everyone’s home probably has a kitchen, I wouldn’t expect everyone to be familiar with these design principles, or even consider them when they are using a kitchen. But it’s there, and it’s affecting your productivity in the kitchen.
The Kitchen Work Triangle in Overcooked
In my opinion, many of the levels in Overcooked are challenging and requires good coordination and collaboration. However, apart from the constantly moving objects and time pressure, I feel like the difficulty could be explained by the kitchen work triangle. In particular, the levels were designed in such a way that violates the design principles of the kitchen work triangle.
Let’s look at an example of a level early in the game (Level 1–2) from Overcooked 2, one without all the fancy conveyor belts and doesn’t involve throwing ingredients across the bodies of water.
If we attempt to draw the kitchen work triangle formed the chopping board (preparation), stove (cooking) and food storage, we get something like this:
As you can see, the island, where the food storage is located, essentially blocks the path between the chopping board and the stove. It is fair to say that, the triangle (it resembles more like a straight line broken in two halves) found in this kitchen is as un-optimized as a kitchen layout could be, without having to even look at the measurements of the individual edges. Bundled together with dysfunctional teamwork and time constraints, the game developers deliberately made the game difficult and challenging by taking advantage of the poorly designed kitchen layouts, which explains why sometimes that three-star rating seems unattainable.
In Conclusion
I’m sure many who have played the game are frustrated by the uneasy levels presented in Overcooked. Particularly to non-gamers, the challenging factors of the game are seemingly contributed by the lack of experience and perhaps fast reflexes or eye–hand coordination. However, that is not always true. In the case of Overcooked, we can clearly see how game design could be inspired and influenced by the fundamentals from a simple-to-understand design principle dating back to the 1940s, and how it makes the game a rewarding puzzle for many to enjoy.
More on Kitchen Work Triangle
- Kitchen Work Triangle on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitchen_work_triangle
- The Kitchen Triangle Theory Is STILL the Best Way to Design a Kitchen by Janice Blakeley: https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/kitchen-triangle-best-way-to-design-a-kitchen
- Is the Kitchen Work Triangle an Outdated Design Rule? by Terri Williams: https://freshome.com/kitchen/kitchen-work-triangle/
