Dish satisfaction explained

Satisfaction is the 0–100 score each customer group gives a dish. It decides who orders the dish (see How customers choose and order), feeds your popularity, and makes up the biggest single part of review stars. The formula comes from the game code, and the site uses it exactly.

The formula

satisfaction = clamp(0.9 × (Wv × value + Wr × rarity + Wp × price factor) + 0.1 × local favorites matched, 0, 1)

The game works on a 0–1 scale; the site shows it ×100. The three weights Wv / Wr / Wp depend on the customer group:

The venue page lists which groups live in a district, their share and their in-game names. Put simply, the low-budget group cares about price, the high-budget group cares about rarity, and the mid-budget group weighs everything about equally.

Notice the 0.9: a dish with perfect value, rarity and price still tops out at 90. Only local favorites can take it higher.

The parts

Value: calories for the money

A dish's calorie score is the sum of its ingredients' calories × 50, capped at 1000. Then:

value = clamp((calorie score ÷ price in cents − 0.1) × 4, 0, 1)

In whole currency units, a dish has full value while its price is at most calorie score ÷ 35, and zero value once the price reaches calorie score ÷ 10. A dish with a calorie score of 700 keeps full value up to a price of 20 and has none at 70 or more.

Rarity

Rarity is the sum of the ingredients' exclusivity ÷ 10, times the recipe's own rarity multiplier, capped at 1. Price doesn't affect it. You can change it only by changing ingredients, for example by swapping one ingredient for a rarer one where the recipe allows it.

Price factor

The price factor compares your price with the group's daily budget:

That last row is a cliff. For the low-budget group, a price of 31 instead of 30 can cut a dish from 47 to 13 (see the example below).

Local favorites: +10 each

Every location has a few favorite tags. Each favorite tag on a dish adds +10 after the 0.9 scaling, so one favorite takes a 90 to 100. A dish gets its tags from its ingredients. Diet tags such as vegetarian don't count. Picking ingredients that hit local favorites is often the cheapest big improvement you can make.

Drinks

For drinks the value weight is 0, and the rarity and price weights are scaled up to add up to 1. The low-budget group judges drinks almost entirely on price (about 94%). The high-budget group judges them almost entirely on rarity (about 94%).

Worked examples

A dish with calorie score 400, rarity 0.2 and one local favorite, rated by the low-budget group:

A dish with calorie score 700 and rarity 0.8, no favorites, rated by the high-budget group: 67 at a price of 50, 66 at 60, 64 at 100, and still 61 at 101. With a price weight of only 0.05, this group barely notices price, even above its budget.

The price cap

You can't charge whatever you like. A dish's highest allowed price is:

price cap = floor(recipe's max price × level multiplier)

Leveling a venue lets rarity-focused dishes charge high-budget customers much more without losing much satisfaction.

Practical tips

• Price for the group you're targeting. For low-budget customers, stay near the bottom of their budget. For high-budget customers, charge close to the cap.
• Never go one coin over a group's maximum if you want that group to order the dish.
• Chase local favorites with ingredient choices. +10 per tag is huge, and it's the only way past 90.
• When one dish has to serve several groups, check every group's score. A price that suits one group can push the dish out of another group's 30-point window.
• In game, the face icon follows the same score: below 30 is unhappy, 30–79 is neutral, 80 and up is happy.

Try it

• Compare dishes, tags and ingredients in the recipe wiki.
• Try prices and see each group's score update in the Planner.
• Load your save under My Save to see suggested prices for your real menu.