If only the gameplay in Kitchen Panic (GameBoy) were as awesome as its box art

Oh, don't get me wrong--the gameplay in Kitchen Panic, a rather unheralded Japan-only GameBoy title that was released all the way back in 1991, isn't completely terrible. I also wouldn't describe it as overly appealing, though, which is a bit of a shame given the effort put into its colorful box art.

Oh, well, you can't always have everything, can you? And at least in the case of this portable action game--which was developed by Bits Laboratory and published by Coconuts Japan--we got a pretty ace cover illustration out of the deal.

We also got a surprisingly adorable manual out of it. As you hopefully can see in the photos above and below, the front and back covers of Kitchen Panic's instruction manual are supposed to resemble the corresponding surfaces of an actual GameBoy.

Now, don't take all of this yammering to mean that everything other than Kitchen Panic's box and manual art is completely without merit. In fact, some of its spritework is pretty darn nice, and its gameplay is of the accessibly arcade-y sort that only can be found in a title of this era.



Just don't spend an arm and a leg on a copy of it, OK? In fact, before you spend even a dime on it I'd highly recommend taking it for a test drive via emulation. After that, if you're still interested in it and if you've got the means to play it, pick up a loose cart on the cheap.

See also: my 'Great Gaymathon' review of Kitchen Panic and scans of its entire instruction manual