It's a hard knock life, locked up in the bucket, waitin' for jug-up while the hacks are bustin' caps (read: It's really tough being locked up in jail, waiting for food while the guards are shooting people). And then there's the hard-core lunch lady to deal with! In Diner Dash style, Adult Swim's time management game, Death Row Diner, puts you in the role of a prison lunch lady and you've got a bit more to do than just serve food and clean up afterwards.
She might look like a sweet, motherly, little woman in a hair-net, hovering over steaming pots of gruel and cleaning up after the boys, but put one foot wrong and clang! clang! clang! she's dishing it out with her soup ladle. And who can blame her? She's gotta serve up the food, collect the trays, keep gang-member tensions in check, mop up the post-brawl carnage, serve up seconds and keep the Warden happy.
As in any time management Diner Dash-style game, use your mouse to click on tasks, queuing up actions by clicking ahead. Keep an eye on the prisoners' temperament bars while you fly around the lunchroom, because these guys have extremely short fuses and will break into brawls at any second. You can use your ladle to break up the fracas, but you have to get in there quickly because these guys can fight to the death. At times, you'll also be called on to feed the warden helping after helping of burgers and drumsticks, and his fuse is shorter than everyone else's. When he's about, any fighting amongst the prisoners is severely and swiftly dealt with by the guards opening fire. And you've only got three chances. Thankfully, your progress is saved.
Death Row Diner is neat on presentation, with humorous graphics and some great music. It obviously has a high level of violence and blood, so parental discretion is strongly advised. Get ready to give the boys your lunch-lady finest, and if they don't like it they can "Kiss Your Grits".
It's nice, but if you mis-click food, you can't undo it.
I like this game.
-- The scoring system is not really obvious at first, but trying to get perfect scores on the first few levels clarified it for me.
-- It's more of a strategy game than a frantic, click as fast as you can game, although the best strategy is not very intuitive.
-- The levels are not randomly generated, but the same thing happens every time. But this is because getting the perfect score requires you to know what's coming ahead. This is also what makes it more about memorization.
-- If you mis-click food, bring it to the sink.
Hint for the warden level:
Get a combo and get the pick-up on the warden last, when he's in green. But this means that you have to prioritize feeding him, so that he finishes at about the same time as the other inmates
I'm only about half-way through, but I've been trying to get the perfect scores.
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