Restaurants take too long

"GoldenBuffy;c-16466024" wrote:
Not sure, but that would have been a nice feature. If you sims order takes to long, they get a huge discount on their meal.

If you own the restaurant you can give them free food when it takes to long.
people do complain in a bubble over their head all the time, you must be the owner.
************************************************************************************
If you are just there to eat and others that came in after you are getting served, give up your table, by clicking on it and ask for a new one or go to a different restaurant.

If you have kids or just the one Sim, you can just go into the restaurant fridge and get a snack. or if they have a bar you can order food and drinks from the bartender anytime.

No, my sims don't own the restaurant. Those are nice work arounds for a feature that could - or possibly should - have been included in the GP.

It's worse now. Now it takes more than two hours for the waiter to take your order (probably more, I leave the restaurant at this point). My restaurant involves two floors and maybe a little too many tables, but it was less of an issue with this particular restaurant in the past.

You all should be glad you're at least getting served, because that's not a given in my game. Two out of the last five times I visited a restaurant, my sims ended up abandoning their tables and going home with several of their needs in the red because the food never came, even though all the other guests got served. Another time it did come, but was inexplicably served to an empty table next to that of my sims, and they had to move over there to eat it.

Oh, and yesterday my sim asked for cake three times, but the waitress couldn't be bothered to even take the order. Needless to say, the cake never appeared on the table, but instead I found three fresh cakes in my household inventory later... Pretty sure that's not how it's supposed to happen, is it? Restaurants are so broken, it's unbelievable...

My Sim was invited for breakfast on her day off and it was my first time using Dine Out, so I accepted. She and friend arrived at the restaurant about 10 am and were seated. At noon, I removed the 'Waiting to be seated' from the task list because I thought that might be holding things up and they'd been seated for nearly two hours. They ordered one course, after which the chef and a waitress(?) stood as if absolutely frozen by the stove for about six hours (all other Sims were moving around, Sims and friend each went to the restroom and new sims came in and sat, etc.). I was unable to figure out how to cancel things and go home, or I'd have done so. They finally got served at 10 pm and finished their one course at 2 am! Sim went home with everything in the red, including hunger; the restaurant complained that we'd tried to skip out on the bill - I didn't know how to go about paying. The next day I had to wake her up for work and while she was frantically gulping breakfast the spouse of the friend called to invite her to the same restaurant for 'breakfast' again!

"GrumpyGlowfish;c-16572630" wrote:
You all should be glad you're at least getting served, because that's not a given in my game. Two out of the last five times I visited a restaurant, my sims ended up abandoning their tables and going home with several of their needs in the red because the food never came, even though all the other guests got served. Another time it did come, but was inexplicably served to an empty table next to that of my sims, and they had to move over there to eat it.

Oh, and yesterday my sim asked for cake three times, but the waitress couldn't be bothered to even take the order. Needless to say, the cake never appeared on the table, but instead I found three fresh cakes in my household inventory later... Pretty sure that's not how it's supposed to happen, is it? Restaurants are so broken, it's unbelievable...

I didn't get served. Two hours passed and the waiter hasn't even taken my order. I got disgusted and left.

"Thrippa;c-16572640" wrote:
My Sim was invited for breakfast on her day off and it was my first time using Dine Out, so I accepted. She and friend arrived at the restaurant about 10 am and were seated. At noon, I removed the 'Waiting to be seated' from the task list because I thought that might be holding things up and they'd been seated for nearly two hours. They ordered one course, after which the chef and a waitress(?) stood as if absolutely frozen by the stove for about six hours (all other Sims were moving around, Sims and friend each went to the restroom and new sims came in and sat, etc.). I was unable to figure out how to cancel things and go home, or I'd have done so. They finally got served at 10 pm and finished their one course at 2 am! Sim went home with everything in the red, including hunger; the restaurant complained that we'd tried to skip out on the bill - I didn't know how to go about paying. The next day I had to wake her up for work and while she was frantically gulping breakfast the spouse of the friend called to invite her to the same restaurant for 'breakfast' again!

Yikes.

If that's a completely vanilla game, remove any shelves/decorations from the walls/ceiling directly above the stoves. If that doesn't work, repair your game?

"Thrippa;c-16572640" wrote:
My Sim was invited for breakfast on her day off and it was my first time using Dine Out, so I accepted. She and friend arrived at the restaurant about 10 am and were seated. At noon, I removed the 'Waiting to be seated' from the task list because I thought that might be holding things up and they'd been seated for nearly two hours. They ordered one course, after which the chef and a waitress(?) stood as if absolutely frozen by the stove for about six hours (all other Sims were moving around, Sims and friend each went to the restroom and new sims came in and sat, etc.). I was unable to figure out how to cancel things and go home, or I'd have done so. They finally got served at 10 pm and finished their one course at 2 am! Sim went home with everything in the red, including hunger; the restaurant complained that we'd tried to skip out on the bill - I didn't know how to go about paying. The next day I had to wake her up for work and while she was frantically gulping breakfast the spouse of the friend called to invite her to the same restaurant for 'breakfast' again!

You are a lot more patient than I am. That kind of wait is insane!

"Anthonydyer;c-16461106" wrote:
I did create my own restaurant. I wouldn't consider it the most "optimized" restaurant in the world, as it has the kitchen on the 1st floor and the dining room on the 2nd floor. Other than that, the design is really straightforward. I never witnessed any routing issues. It just takes the kitchen forever to produce the meal.

This GP is really where I had no problems. It depends on what the cook can cook (how fast) and if the server is a good server. You have added to the problem by having to walk a long way to deliver food, too. And it matters who is seated first. My Sims went out all the time when I played TS4 and I could expect to stay much longer if my Sim was not the first to get a seat, if the cook didn't have any experience with the food I set up( and most townies don't) and how often I visited (so they could gain more experience). You can't expect in TS4 these townies know how to cook something better than lunch meat sandwich, which will take longer if they don't have enough experience.

This game is like reality as far as TS4 goes, if they can't cook it takes a long time, if the server doesn't have any experience they are slow and not doing their job, and if your Sim doesn't get the first seat be prepared to wait. You need to build simple restaurants until the townies get more experience. Then change menus to better food. Especially for NPC run restaurants. ETA: Then put those who are fast in a house and mark them as Non played so they can keep that job (maybe) and will serve and cook food faster over time.

ETA: Their experience depends on how many times you visit.

I did knock down the saloon venue from Brindleton Bay and create a new restaurant with 4 tables. My sims were served relatively quickly. Perhaps the key to fast service is less tables.