I discovered this game thanks to my Steam recommendation (God bless Steam). Cat Quest. I like cats, and I like quests (I guess). What could go wrong?
It’s an indie game, RPG in an open world, published by PQube Limited and developed by Singapore-based teal The Gentle Bros. It was launched in 2017, first on Windows and macOS and then on mobile.
The plot is quite simple: we are a yellow cat who has to save his sister. We have a friend-ghost-cat named Sperry who follows and guides us during the whole adventure.
At first sight
It’s an adorable and colorful game!
The environment is complete with small medieval towns, where you can sleep to save and regain life, vast green plains, spooky wasteland, and mysterious snow-capped mountains.
If you want to have a good time with cute cats, you’ve come to the right place!
The gameplay
As soon as you move your character, you quickly realize that getting started is extremely fast! You can dodge and use sorts. The more you advance in the game, the more you discover new spells to buy through Mage Towers.
This game has all the teasers of an RPG but is simplified to the extreme. We could rename this game “my first RPG ❤”
When you are used to games that are somewhat difficult or just a little difficult, it is very unsettling.
It all looks like the environment of an RPG, but much more straightforward. The progression system is everywhere with the presence of levels, equipment, and upgrades.
We are free to play our way thanks to the equipment: casters, melee, or tank. I opted for hybrid mage tank gameplay.
Killing NPC, completing quests, or exploring caves grants experience. That’s what keeps us going the most in the game.
The equipment can be found either in chests or in quest rewards.
Once again, like a classic RPG, we are free to rush the main quest and, therefore, quickly finish the game or do all the side quests and explore all the points of interest.
Once the main story is over, the game is far from over! You have access to challenges that you can activate in a subsequent game. They are cumulative, so if you like challenges, this is for you!
The scenario
For me, this represents a relatively significant weak point.
Even though the game is deliberately cute and very straightforward, the storyline is highly repetitive. It mainly concerns the side quests.
To summarize :
- a character gives us a quest
- we help him (after several round trips)
- It turns out he is a traitor
- We kill him
Very often, it is the same pattern, with a few exceptions. The main quest also makes us go around in circles a bit to keep us going. Good point, however, on the plot twist at the end! After a very repetitive and predictable adventure, things change a bit!
To conclude
Looking at the reviews on Steam, I find many people praising the game a little too much (which is rated “extremely positive”). It’s a good game, but not a masterpiece. I will indeed put this game in the hands of a kid or someone who has never played video games and especially RPGs to learn quickly without the hassle of optimization.
The very fast-paced gameplay with lots of rewards reminds me a lot of a mobile game. So it didn’t surprise me when I saw that this game was also available on these platforms.
Even if the whole game is straightforward, the fact of unlocking options at the end of the game to make the game challenging is, in my opinion, a good compromise. Perhaps it would have been interesting to make available as of the start of difficulty options. It is possible that the honest try harder has already lost their interest in the game by this point.
The pleasure of exploring all the caves and every nook and cranny remains very pleasant.
There are even some very well-placed easter eggs! It’s just this kind of detail that makes me feel that developers love what they do. And for me, that’s an important part.
