Some people know that I absolutely love games that have an aspect of life sim in them. I love games like Stardew Valley, Animal Crossing, Rune Factory, Portia, and all the other games that are in the same category. So when I first saw Cattails in the eshop nearly a year ago, I was pretty curious and interested. It really looked like Stardew Valley but with cats, which was exactly what Kotaku said about it. As such, I knew that I had to check it out.

The only problem was the price. I think it was like $15 and the reviews weren't all that great either. But then one day the game was on sale for like $8 and I was considering getting it and reviews were getting a lot more positive when the price was lower. I still hesitated a little bit and by the time I decided to grab it, the sale was over and I left empty handed.

But for some strange reason, the game went on sale again not too long after... For like $3. That was 80% off and I scooped it up at that price.

GRAPHICS: 7/10

The graphics are pretty bare bones in Cattails. There's some color and detail in the environment and the characters but it's pretty much your standard 8bit retro art style. There are a couple times where this works because the game is meant to be simple at times but then there are a couple points where it looks just a bit bland and looks like it could have had a bit more going on in the graphics department. My grade for graphics is going to be a 7 out of 10.

SOUND: 7/10

The sound aspect is a bit hit and miss for me. For instance, when it comes to the generic sounds, I’m not a big fan of the sounds that play when you’re talking to other cats. I’m talking about the sounds that play as the dialogue text pops up. It’s also a bit loud, but then I noticed that the music started drowning out most of the basic sounds, which was a little bit annoying near the start of the game before I started messing with stuff.

The music was pretty good as well. Throughout most of the game there was a nice collection of tunes, including ones that were happy and upbeat and some sad emotional ones like the ones that are near the start of the game during the intro cut scenes. As a whole, I thought that the sound in general was decent and it got a 7 out of 10 from me.

ADDICTIVENESS: 10/10

You all know how much I love life sims by now and this is pretty much as good as it gets plus there's so much to do. Not only do you get to be a cat, but you get to experience everything that cats do first hand. You know, things like having kittens, exploring dungeons, and buying stuff from shops, you know cat stuff. Sure, there are a couple parts where the game doesn't work, but it's full of fun stuff.

You get to romance like a million cats and have kittens, you get to explore this giant map, explore dungeons, hunt different kinds of small animals and you get to customize your cat and where you live with hundreds of options. My most favorite aspect of the game is the colony system. Throughout the game world there are 4 distinct colonies. After you complete the early parts of the game, you're able to create your own custom colony.

To me, this adds a whole new level of fun and gives multiple reasons to keep coming back to the game. You get to customize your colony any way you like and then you have to defend it from other colonies that might try to attack you or you can set out and battle the others as you try to get more territory.

Some aspects of the game just aren't great but Cattails does a good job at keeping things new and fresh, and bringing you back to play. As such, my grade for addictiveness is going to be a perfect 10 out of 10.

STORY: 8/10

99% of the game is just what you do with your colony. You know, cat stuff like beating up other cats and finding food. But the beginning of the game has a nice and emotional story to setup how the game comes to exist. There's this girl who adopts a cat from the pet store. The family loves the cat but then the mom goes like no I randomly don't like cats anymore. So they ditch the cat on the side of the road and then the actual game begins.

DEPTH: 10/10

Oh boy is there a lot to do with this game. You can create your own colony and customize it anyway you want while fighting and defending from other colonies. Plus within your colony you can do romance things with like a dozen other cats. Once you have kittens, you get to raise them and even bring them on adventures with you, which is something that I haven't seen in many other games.

There's also a huge cast of characters. Theres nearly 10 different locations for you to explore and each of them have their own residents to interact with. This includes nearly 10 shops that you can buy stuff from and each of them sell like 20 or so items, so there's no shortage of things to buy. There's also a gift system so that you can raise your relationship with another cat and each cat has different likes and dislikes.

You can also hunt, mine, forage, build up your home area, attend festivals, and do so much more. It really is a lot like Stardew Valley isn't it? There's just so much to do and from me, depth gets a perfect 10 out of 10.

DIFFICULTY: 4

The game isn’t really difficult at all because all you’re doing is being a cat. If all you want to do is explore the world and do cat stuff, you can do exactly that. There aren’t any puzzles other than a couple easy ones before you can create a colony, and other than that the only things that you have to worry about is health and hunger. As long as you have money or you’re good at hunting, neither should be difficult.
OVERALL: 8.4/10

Overall, Cattails isn't as epic as I was hoping it would have been but I for sure got a lot more value than what I originally paid for. I'm going to go out and say that it's not worth the full $15 price tag but if you can get it for $10, you'll probably get your money's worth, especially if you are a fan of these kinds of games. If you can somehow get it on sale for around $5, then it would be a no brainer to pick it up because you'd be getting a steal.

Overall, the game has a lot of good aspects and does very well with the sim aspect. I got a handful of hours out of it and the experience was pretty good so my overall grade for Cattails is going to be a 8.4 out of 10.