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In honor of International Cat Day (which was August 8th), though it really should be an entire week, we thought we would share with you some games that are either cat themed, or where you actually play as a cat. There are a lot more games out there than one would think, including adventure games, collectors and platformers, but these five are the ones we feel are worth checking out in 2022.
1. Stray | BlueTwelve Studio (2022)
Considering its recent release and success, it’s impossible to write anything about cat/cat themed games without bringing up Stray. Development on Stray began in 2015 by former Ubisoft Montpellier employees Colas Koola and Vivien Mermet-Guyenet. The game was announced in 2020 and released on July 19th, 2022 on Playstation 4 and 5 and Windows.
Due to its unusual protagonist, Stray allows players to navigate the game world in a unique way, keeping the familiarity of a 3D action platformer while bringing something new to the gameplay. The player can also perform many feline actions, including knocking stuff off shelves, walking on computers, sleeping, meowing and nuzzling NPCs.
Speaking of NPCs, everyone you interact with are robots called Companions, who have grown self-aware since the disappearance of all humans. You’re also accompanied throughout the game by a little companion robot named B-12, who rides around attached to a harness on your back and helps you communicate with the other Companions and solve puzzles. In addition to platforming, the bulk of gameplay is puzzle-solving. How do you get out of the city? What happened to all the humans? Why were they living underground?
All of these questions are answered over the course of the game, wrapped up in a gorgeous and polished little package of cat chaos.
2. Cattails | Falcon Development (2017)
Does Stardew Valley but you’re a cat sound good to you? Then check out Cattails. While this game has one of the saddest openings ever, it quickly turns into an open world “animal simulation RPG.” Cattails is a pixel-based, top down adventure game where you must provide for yourself and your community. You explore and hunt to gather food and herbs, befriend the different cats in each of the three clans, and even get married and have kittens of your own!
Like in Stardew Valley, you can also go searching for treasure in caves, customize your house (or den), participate in seasonal events and even create your own cat colony. Cattails: Wildwood Story, which is currently set to release in Q4 2023, is a standalone sequel to Cattails and is described as a single player “feral life simulation RPG.” It was successfully Kickstarted with a whopping $241,315 pledged and over 4,000 backers.
So if you’re like me and think “I love Stardew Valley but I wish I could play as my farm cat instead”, then go have a look. It’s available both on Steam and on the Nintendo Switch E-shop.
3. Cat Quest/Cat Quest 2 | The Gentlebros (2017, 2019)
In my professional and completely unbiased opinion, Cat Quest and its sequel, Cat Quest II, are the best cat games on the market. You want gorgeous art? Tick. Tight, easy to learn combat? Tick. An interesting story with a fun plot twist? Tick. Cat puns? Double tick.
Both games are top down 2D open world RPGs. The first game itself currently has over 4,000 reviews and is scored 10/10 on Steam. It’s a fun, chill game that you can pick up and play for 10 minutes or 10 hours, and both include a New Game+ mode, which is always a nice bonus. There are subtle changes, but not so much that you’ll feel like you’re playing an entirely different game. Systems have been tweaked, and there’s new spells and items, but the base gameplay is the same.
Cat Quest II adds in local co-op with a dog partner that can either be controlled by the AI or by another player. The AI is quite good as well. If you want to play on your own you can customize both character’s gear and spells and transfer between them at will.
Both games bundled on Steam cost $25, and they’re the purrrrfect kind of game to pick up on Switch, especially when they go on sale.
Go buy them. You will not regret it.
4. Night in the Woods | Secret Lab/Infinite Fall (2017)
Night in the Woods is a bit different from the other games on this list in that it’s heavily focused on story and exploration, and that’s where the game shines. You play as Mae Borowski, a college dropout from the town of Possum Springs, which is inhabited by zoomorphic humans. In Mae’s case, she’s a cat, which is why Night in the Woods is on this list.
The game touches on some sensitive themes such as mental illness and stagnancy, so it may feel a bit heavy to some but the themes are treated respectfully.
As mentioned previously, the gameplay is built around exploration. Mae starts with basic “abilities” like running and jumping and learns more as the game progresses that opens Possum Springs up further to investigation.
Storywise, Night in the Woods starts with the player being allowed a few in-game days to explore the town and interact with its residents, but really revolves around one night in Possum Springs during the town’s Halloween festival and focuses on how Mae sees the world through the lens of her own mental state and dissolution.
If you’re into story driven games that are a bit darker in tone, Night in the Woods is probably a good fit for you. It’s available on just about every platform.
5. Neko Atsume | Hit-Point Co., Ltd. (2014)
For the mobile gamers out there, it’s incredibly likely that you’ve come across Neko Atsume at some point. The game is a very simple concept: collect all the cats, but it isn’t as easy as it sounds. Each cat in the game has different likes concerning food and decor, and if you want to “catch ‘em all” you’re going to have to switch up your stuff pretty often. The special cats in particular will only show up if you have a certain decor piece, usually one that is harder to get. When you see one, don’t forget to take a picture of it for your Cat Album!
Cats will also occasionally leave you gifts, and you can trade grey fish, the regular currency, in for gold fish, the premium currency, so there’s no need to spend any money on the game if you’re willing to spend a bit of time saving up those fish. If you do decide to spend real money, it’s a very low buy-in if you really want a particular food or decor or are juuuussttt short enough gold fish for an item.
Also all the cats have buttholes. Because Japan.
And that’s the end of the list of our top five cat games! We hope that you give at least one, if not all of these games a go at some point. If you like cats or like that genre of game, I can absolutely promise they’re worth both your time and your money. Happy gaming!
