Reversed Angry Birds in every sense. And this one has a story! Nice little game which could easily pass as a mobile app.
After seeing the trailer I had to wish-list this game immediately. Although I am not fan of Angry Birds games, this one has cats. I love cats! Obviously I had to buy this game without even looking at the reviews. Just shut up and take my MIAWNEY!!
Grandad’s diary
Premise of the game is very simple. You – a wee little girl – came for a visit to your grandparents’ house. The house seems to be empty and after a while you find Granddad’s diary. Obviously with nothing better to do, you start to read it, and thus slowly uncover the whole story behind this CATastrophy.
But reading the diary is not that simple, because of cats that constantly jumps at you – purring, wanting to be petted – effectively preventing you from reading the pages. You decide to do the only sensible thing – to build a pillow fortress around you that will repel the cat attacks, so you can read the diary in peace.
Do you want to build a fooooortreeeess?
As I mentioned at the very beginning, this game is reverse Angry Birds. It is you who is trying to build a fort to prevent attacking fur-balls to hit you. With each successful repel you read more of the diary, uncover more of the story and get points that you can spend on acquiring more sturdy furniture, that can help you survive increasingly larger attacks.
You will use all you can salvage – mattresses, chairs, pillows, lamps… what have you. And kitties are getting more innovative themselves. After few soft attacks they call in heavy CATtillery in form of fatsos, or piercing bullets with watermelon helmets that will break through nearly anything. Altogether there are 6 types of cats, and some levels will actually challenge your fortress-building skills, which I appreciated.
Childish graphics and story
I love the graphics. Looks original and cute, starting with main protagonist. Seems that lots of love went into drawing the assets and it keeps things colourful but simple at the same time – without cluttering the screen with rainbow of colours that would make different parts of the game indistinguishable.
But I can’t say I liked the story. It started all right (kind of sad), but the ending felt rushed and unpolished. As if the writer lost their notes and had no idea how to finish it, so they added first BS that went through their mind. Overall, story feels as if it was written by an 8 year old kid, who got distracted and never came back to it. Then its parent found the notes and decided to turn it into a game, hastily scribbling some kind of an ending onto the last page.
It’s a shame, because it actually could be a heartwarming story about love and the fear of losing those close to you. Unfortunately it all gets squashed by the over the top ending that doesn’t even make sense and doesn’t fit the narration. Wasted opportunity, in my opinion.
Endless mode
After you finish the story, game is not really over. You unlock an endless mode, where your goal is to build and strengthen your fortress against increasing volume of cat attacks, and to hold on as long as possible. Leader board and unlockable bonuses that you get for reaching certain levels, will keep you occupied for a long time. This was a brilliant move from the developers, as you can finish main game in about 2 hours (unless you are bad at games like me, then it may take 4…).
Verdict: 4 out of 5 cats approve
Game play, graphics and game mechanics are all really nice and this is a fresh take on beloved formula of Angry Birds-like games. While the story can be off-putting for many people, it’s a great “time passer” that can keep you occupied for hours.
However if you are not a fan of endless modes (like me), price can be kinda off putting and I would recommend to get it on sale. But if you know you would be playing for hours, then it is CATcually worth it. And compared to Angry Birds – there are no micro-transactions or paywalls. You get the whole game for the said price!
Of course, if you would like to get this game and help out this blog at the same time, feel free to click on Green Man Gaming banner below. You can get the game usually cheaper than on Steam and it will throw few cents my way. 😉
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