Diner Dash Tips, Cheats and Strategies

Diner Dash is a time management game for iOS and Android from Glu Games and PlayFirst. In this game, you help Flo serve a seemingly endless stream of customers that grow impatient if their specific dining needs aren’t met quickly. Gamezebo’s Diner Dash Tips, Cheats and Strategies will provide you with the know-how you’ll need to deliver service with a smile.

• Chain your actions – You won’t get very far in Diner Dash if you carry out one task at a time. Chaining your tasks is the key to scoring big points and keeping your customers happy. Don’t seat a customer, then take their order and wait on them to finish eating. Instead, whenever possible, seat several at once, take all their orders, then serve them all at the same time.  
• Know your customers’ temperaments – In order to effectively chain tasks, you need to understand customers’ temperaments. Some will wait patiently, but others need to be served a little faster. Barb the businesswoman grows impatient quickly, as does Shakes the coffee addict.
• Color coordinate! – You get a lot of points if your customers’ clothes match the color of their seats. Even matching up one customer in a group earns you a point reward.
• Pay attention to each level’s goal – Simply surviving the day isn’t always enough to move on. There are specific goals that need to be reached, like coordinating customer colors, or serving them coffee. Always pay attention to the goals listed at the start of a level.

• When things get frantic, concentrate on surviving, not chaining – Pay extra attention to coordination and task-chaining when thing are calm and slow at the start of a shift. That should help carry you through busy periods, when all your energy and focus will be spent making sure customers don’t walk out unserved.
• Don’t sit a party of two at a table for a party of four, ever – One of the worst things you can do is seat a single customer or a party of two at a table meant for four. If a party of four shows up after you’ve given the appropriate table away to a party of two, you being a long chain of delays that may finish off with a lot of irritated customers. Invest in items that keep customers patient while they’re waiting in the lobby.
• Double-tap a table to pick up the bill and clean it at the same time – You can double-tap on a table to pick up its bill and dishes at the same time. This is a big time-saver, but if Flo’s hands are full when she attends to a party that wants its bill, she won’t be able to pick up their dishes.

• Coffee soothes irate diners – Coffee makes everything better – most of the time. If you have tables full of angry customers that are being forced to wait, bring them some coffee to make them more patient, and to refill any hearts they’ve lost while waiting.
• Watch ads for free dinero – Dinero, Diner Dash’s hard currency, is valuable stuff. It’s not easy to earn in-game, but you can watch ads to get some for free. Go to the dinero section of the in-game store to take advantage of the offer.
• Save dinero for buying upgrades – Whatever dinero you manage to grab should go towards restaurant upgrades. Items that keep customers’ tempers down while they’re waiting to be served are always good investments.
• Keep feeding Shakes coffee until he buzzes off – Shakes wants one thing: Java. Keep delivering to him. The more he gets, the faster he takes off and frees up a valuable table.

Nadia Oxford

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In the early aughts, Nadia fell into writing with the grace of a brain-dead bison stumbling into a chasm. Over the years, she's written for Nerve, GamePro, 1UP.com, USGamer, Pocket Gamer, Just Labs Magazine, and many other sites and magazines of fine repute. She's currently About.com's Guide to the Nintendo 3DS at ds.about.com.