FirstPlate Early Access Launching This Month + Endless Challenge Update!

FirstPlate Early Access Coming This October + Major Endless Mode Update!

Hey everyone!

We have some massive news to share: FirstPlate is officially heading into Steam Early Access around the middle to end of this month (October)!

Launch Scope: • Career Mode - Build and run your restaurant from the ground up. • Endless Mode with Automation - Survive endless service days and build out automated kitchen setups with your crew. • Coming Shortly After: Versus Mode and a big batch of brand new recipes are already in the pipeline for early post-launch updates.

Before we hit the release button on Steam, we just dropped a major playtest build featuring 38 brand new Endless Mode Challenge Cards , a full fridge overhaul, and lots of gameplay improvements. We really need your help testing everything to catch bugs and dial in game balance before launch day.

Endless Challenge Cards Are Live!

• Double-Edge Challenge Cards - Challenge Days are officially live in Endless mode! Starting on Day 5 and popping up every few days, your crew has to vote on modifier cards that give you awesome perks paired with crazy downsides. All 38 cards are now in the game, including: • Supercollider Zoomies: Run 50% faster, but crashing into a teammate knocks both of you out for 5 seconds. • Vote to Kick: Clear 1 strike immediately, but your team has to vote to exile a friend for 3 days—they turn into a ghost and can only mop. • Swap Meet: Team moves faster, but whatever is in your hands swaps between players every 15 seconds. • Hot Potato: Run faster while holding food, but hold onto it longer than 7 seconds and it blows up in your face. • Final Detonation: Appliances cook faster, but burnt food explodes, knocking you out and breaking the appliance for a bit. • Sudden Death: 2x money on everything, but a single strike ends the entire run.
• Challenge Day Voting & Active Pocket - Features a full voting screen with a 7-second countdown to pick your card (or spend cash to reroll). You can also open your tablet anytime during the day to check your team's active cards and curses.

Modular Fridge & Kitchen Upgrades

• Modular Fridge Manager - Completely redid the fridge with a visual drag-and-drop shelf manager. You can customize your shelves by dragging ingredient boxes (bacon, eggs, steaks, burgers, wings, milk, fish, pepperoni, and more) into whichever slots you want. It saves your custom setup automatically.
• Multitasking Prep & Sinks - You can now multitask while chopping food, whisking bowls, or washing dishes at the sink. While holding click to prep or wash, you can use your free hand to grab or place items on nearby counters within reach without stopping your prep work.
• Fast Cutting Board - Added a high-speed cutting board with quicker knife chop animations and snappy audio so you can slice through prep much faster.
• SFX Volume Slider & Audio Polish - Added a separate Sound Effects slider in Settings so you can balance game sounds and music independently. Also added crisp new audio for cracking eggs, waffle maker timers, whisking, button clicks, and outside traffic.
• New Music Tracks - Added 6 new swing and jazz songs to the radio, including "Bouncing Bistro Swing", "Chef's Jaunty Kitchen Swing", and "Midnight Kitchen Stomp".
• Character Clothing - Added new Chef Jackets, Varsity Jackets, Chef Hats, and Baseball Caps to player customization.

Performance & Bug Fixes

• Better Performance - Big performance pass across the board. The game runs much smoother now with way less stutter, especially during busy rush hours when the dining room is packed.
• Bug Fixes & Polish - Fixed hiccups with cooking appliances and mouse cursor flickering, smoothed out loading screens, and tweaked breakfast dish prices and shop items.

How to Help Us Playtest

Hop into the game, start an Endless run with friends or solo, and put the Challenge Cards through their paces!

Please drop your thoughts and findings in the Steam Community Discussions or over in our Discord :

• Which cards feel fun, and which ones feel way too punishing?
• Did you run into any weird bugs, visual glitches, or desyncs during your runs?

Catching these issues right now helps us immensely before release day. Thank you all so much for your support, and we cannot wait to open the doors for Early Access later this month!