Upcoming cat game Curiosity hides a challenging platformer under its deceptively chill surface

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Among the numerous feline-themed games released after Stray debuted in 2022, Curiosity from iNightGaming LLC’s The Paper Game could very well embody the feline spirit the most, if its demo at Steam Next Fest is a fair representation.

As a devoted admirer, I’d say this feline is all about yearning for home. Much like any other housecat, it enjoys scaling things, toppling items from ledges, and taking lengthy naps. However, what sets this particular cat apart is its apparent love for video games, as it can leap off walls like Mario from Nintendo or run along them like Cal Kestis from Respawn’s Star Wars Jedi series. You might wonder why such peculiar surroundings, but the answer lies in the charm of the storyline: the local village sports skyward planks, floating garden planters, and a cat cafe devoid of coffee, yet brimming with intriguing hats for our agile hero.

This game is primarily designed as a platformer, but it’s also crafted to pique your interest. The tutorial section guides you through the fundamentals, but only if you engage with an interactive scratch post out of sheer curiosity. Once you grasp jumping and navigation, you spot a sequence of platforms that seem reachable, so you venture towards them, and indeed, you can.

By concluding the lesson near a big pool, you learn that cats can swim as you’ll likely jump in to observe the outcome. Regardless if there’s any significant discovery at the end of your exploration, the joy is in the action itself – whether it’s simply pushing a clay pot off a shelf to watch it shatter. There’s nothing quite as feline as that.

As a fan, I found myself treading on an intriguing trail that led me to the village rooftops and beyond. This narrow path was lined with wooden planks and platforms, teetering precariously, offering a linear journey at first but revealing hidden side paths as I ventured further or stumbled accidentally. Eventually, I reached a complex network of routes above the cat cafe, marked by a colossal barber’s pole and some plastic tables. From there, I had to make my way forward on the right path or take chances and hunt for coins to spend at the cafe, expanding my exploration.

Compared to other actions, falling poses a relatively low risk, making it beneficial given its frequent occurrence due to Curiosity’s buoyant leaping. You have the ability to position a cat bed as a checkpoint and use it for teleportation back to that spot, but this feature can only be used nine times. Despite this, Curiosity doesn’t lack difficulty. It demands precision, patience, learning, and risk-taking, much like certain levels in Super Mario Sunshine where Nintendo temporarily took away FLUDD. The key difference is that Curiosity does not penalize mistakes; instead, it motivates you to keep trying.

In the Curiosity demo, there’s a wealth of things to discover and try out, and if you’re eager for more, you won’t have to wait much longer. iNightGaming is planning to release Curiosity sometime in the second quarter of 2025.

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2025-02-28 01:57