Six Cats Under

PC

Clearly we need to get to how brilliant this game’s name is. But I want to start by expressing my happiness about the way this game’s character reacts to the event of her own death. “Oh my goodness gracious! How clumsy of me.”

In a reading-based accident, the elderly lady we play here has been crushed by a bookshelf, and has become immediately ghostified. Her first reaction is not to lament her passing, but to worry about how her many cats are going to get outside her apartment.

This is, in essence, a one-puzzle point and click adventure. It’s perhaps fifteen minutes long, more if you take your time, less if you stumble on the solutions straight away. And in being so, it becomes this gorgeous vignette, a morsel of a game that completely satisfies in its transient existence.

The apartment is very nicely drawn, with so much life in it. Many cats, each named, with personality traits, hints to how you might be able to construct a series of actions that could lead to the front door’s being opened. But as a ghost, you’re not able to move anything so heavy as a book – you need to think it through.

Of course, as we all know ghosts can light gas rings, switch on electrical outlets, and so on – that’s just well-established fact. So how can you meddle with the scene in your home to cause this collection of moggies to get themselves outside? In putting this all together, you’ll have the enormous satisfaction of seeing it come together for kitty freedom. And then move on, your life’s works complete.

It’s incredibly cute, produced by a team of four as a game jam project, and has totally opened up a door for me: one-puzzle-long adventure games. I could so get into this. Especially when there’s so much to do within that one puzzle, and lots of nice bits of cheerful posthumous commentary on the contents of her home. It feels like plenty. And completely free.

Oh, and the name! It’s so dumb. I love it.

• Team Bean Loop
• itch.io
• Free

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