Hi everybunny! I’m fresh off my 8.5 hour shift at KuloNiku: Bowl Up! by Gambir Studio, phew! If you grew up with Cooking Mama and have a love for food-showdown anime like Yakitate! Japan, Yumeiro Patisserie, or Shoukugeki no Souma, you’re guaranteed to enjoy this game!
Sitting at a total of 11,400 watch hours on Twitch as of 28th April 2026, KuloNiku has been gaining a strong following on social media and as a game of choice to watch. With both a cozy and challenging mode available, you can decide whether you want to take your time to try beating the timer.
In KuloNiku, you reopen your grandmother’s legendary bakso restaurant and use the power of simple mini-game cooking and careful ingredient selection to balance flavor profiles and meet customer requirements. Defeat fellow restaurateurs in Meatbrawls to advance up the ranks and have Bakuso become the top restaurant in town again! While you’re at it, befriend the quirky townsfolk by talking to them regularly and hanging out on your off days. (Your off days are on Mondays and Thursdays, coincidentally on the days I stream!)
The hangouts feature beautiful hand-drawn CGs (not inserting any here to prevent spoilers) which are well worth deepening your bonds for. Some special features are also unlocked as you grow closer to the characters! Cassie and Dan are by far my favourite cast members, being our college friend and ex-colleague/childhood friend(?), respectively.
There are many features to talk about in KuloNiku, but let’s focus on the cooking aspect first:
(Tips will be bolded!)
The basics are simple: use the hotpot to boil meatballs and noodles before putting them in a bowl with the seasonings requested. However, the game ramps up in complexity with each unlocked ingredient and cooking equipment. I find the increased challenge a welcome change each time! The first few days may come across a little tedious, but the grind is worth it and you’ll be racking your brain puzzle-solving the ingredient combinations in no time.
Equipment upgrades are given to you at various milestones, while the ingredients will need to be purchased at Umeshop. A nice feature available is that you are able to customise your workspace, moving equipment around to match the workflow you prefer. Some items require vouchers that you can get through festivals or Meatbrawls, but a way to exchange your coins for vouchers will be available about a quarter into the game to make things more manageable if you choose not to brawl much.
Orders are randomly generated based on the equipment and ingredients available to you, which results in some funny orders sometimes, such as “Noodles Delight with no noodles”, or “Very Salty without salt”. With most of the orders, take it like they’re ordering at a kiosk where they have to select an existing recipe before deciding what customisations they want. Many recipes are not straightforward, so increased familiarisation over the days will help you pick what you need more swiftly.
On occasion, you get yong tau foo/mala-style orders that are fully customised. Those are often quite long and list-like. (Wall of brown text, I see you!)
Sometimes, a single overlooked word can cause you to make a completely wrong order. So it’s important to read the orders carefully! Thankfully, you can take your time to read it before starting to cook.
That said, at some point you will unlock a mischievous little animal in your restaurant. Said animal sometimes sits on the counter and blocks the ‘cook’ (start) button. When it first happened to me, I thought my game was bugged! Turns out, you just have to chase your pet off the counter and you will be able to cook as usual.
Unfortunately, every day started and exited midway ends up being skipped when the game is reloaded, so be careful with reloading your saves or trying to restart your days.
When the food is served, there is a moment of suspense to see if you completed the order perfectly, good, or bad. The characters tell you exactly what you missed out on if it isn’t perfect, which is welcome feedback to inform your future fulfilments.
Now, on to Meatbrawls!
Meatbrawls can be attempted on your off days and happen over 3 turns with limited action points, so every step counts in this mode.
Non-ranking brawls get increasingly expensive, so be sure to check the brawl fee before shopping if you intend to challenge someone.
Skipping days to get straight to hangouts or brawls is possible, but you lose out on considerable profit if you do so.
Meatbrawls are similar to your usual cooking, but this time instead of just fulfilling an order, you need to curate the bowl to the judge’s tastes. Thankfully, this is made easy with an indicator on the top left next to the profiles whether the judge loves or hates the ingredient, which nets you some assured points!
The next thing you want to take note are the ingredients and flavor profiles that will get you bonus points written in your notepad. Selecting certain ingredients or hitting specific flavour profile will get you bonus points by default from one or both judges.
Lastly, there is the crowd meter. The contestant that fills in the meter will receive the bonus point, but this is rather hard to anticipate, so I suggest focusing on your ingredient choices. Meatbrawls have additional minigames that you need to attempt performing perfectly to wow the crowd! It adds an additional fun challenge to putting your dish together.
At the very end, the team that has the most hearts (points) wins! Find the best combination to get 10s across the board!
In a nutshell, KuloNiku: Bowl Up! delivers an enjoyably rewarding experience. Many of the game’s elements are cozy: decorating, dialogue, and freedom to choose what you want to do with your day(s). There are a few mechanics that may seem unforgiving in Challenge Mode, but if you prefer a cozier experience, you can also choose that mode instead. If you enjoy a game that poses deceptively simple puzzles or enjoy cozy cooking experiences, KuloNiku might be your pot of broth—just be prepared to second-guess every ‘simple’ order that comes your way!
Part 1: Demo tried!
Part 2: A Day Dedicated to KuloNiku
Part 3 (TBC!)
Follow me on my socials to know when I’ll be streaming this next!