PC
Something incredibly weird has happened in video games that people don’t want to talk about: the “hidden cat” games. Search Steam for the term and you’ll get literally hundreds of results, and yet have you ever heard anyone talking about it? And the weirdest part? The cats are never actually hidden in these games. They’re literally games about clicking on drawings of cats sat out in the open. Hundreds of them. The developers behind the completely lovely Papercut Art Gallery: Nature – Catnip Studio – are part of the probl- the conspiracy, with games like Cat Spotter and Cats of the Ming Dynasty (I’m not making that up). But you know what? I liked Papercut so much I’ve decided to forgive them.
This is, essentially, a jigsaw puzzle game. Except, it’s about assembling images from cut out pieces of paper, such that they create a gorgeous collage. Puzzles generally begin with finding the “edge pieces”, usually defined by curves for the circular external shapes, and then matching up the distinctive cut-out pieces, all while relaxing nature-y sounds play. Yet, despite this simplicity, I found it completely absorbing.
It’s enormously helped by just how pretty the images are. Assembling the art is satisfying simply because of how the pieces snap into place (something I usually frown upon in standard jigsaw games, given how you can cheese your way through them, but oddly welcome here), but more because of how lovely the results are to look at.
There are 32 puzzles in the game, which was many more than I was expecting, especially given it only costs $2. And the quality is really high, the whole thing looking and feeling great. Oh, except for one tiny detail: you pick up and put down pieces with the left mouse button, and rotate them with the right button, except they rotate anti-clockwise, and there’s currently no way to toggle it. It takes some getting used to.
I do hope Catnip Studio produces more of these, alongside games about unhidden cats. This gobbled up a couple of hours of my life in a really enjoyable way.
- Catnip Studio
- Steam
- £1.70/$2
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You seem to have missed adding links to the purchase links (but I’m sure I can tackle the challenge of finding this one without help).
I quite like the find cats, commissioned bees, etc games. They aren’t really a challenge, but they are a pleasant soak for a tired brain. I feel similarly about the Glass Masquerade games, which are a lot like this delightful papercraft alternative from the looks of it.
I really want to go on a journey to find the origin of these find the cat games. My gut feels like “Have you seen a cat” is at least up there on the ground floor somewhere.
What’s even more strange, is all of their company names also have cat in the name. Are these just all the same company, generating cat company names to dominate the market on slow cat clickers?